Meditation for February 16, Three Types of Communities

In a letter to a Sister of the Visitation at Monial, Claude de la Colombiere observed that there is worldliness in religious communi­ties.

There are, of course, truly fervent communities:
"I know your religious institute thoroughly," he wrote, "I have found souls of such high sanctity among your Sisters that I have never known greater virtue."

There were, it seems, at the time of Claude de la Colombiere, communities whose fervor was only mediocre. Exterior irregulari­ties were rare, but the interior spirit was marred by a lack of generosity.

"Religious houses are filled with persons who keep their Rule, who get up on time, who go to Mass, to prayer, to confession and to Communion because it is the custom, because the bell rings and the others go. The heart has almost no part in what they do. They are absorbed in their own little ideas and plans, and are in­different to the things of God."

Finally, to quote again Claude de la Colombiere, "there are com­munities in which the religious thrive on aversion, murmuring, and revolt against the superiors; they disregard faults against poverty, consistently make light of little things, confess their sins in a des­ultory manner so that even on leaving the confessional they go around breaking silence, grumbling and murmuring for an hour after, and two or three years later we still notice no progress; the lax are till lax and the irregular are still irregular."

To what category do I belong? What do I contribute to the sanctity of the whole community, my parish, my family, my friends?

"Grant, O my God, that with all the intensity of my love for You and for my superiors, I may never do anything that would retard the progress of the community or diminish its fervor, and its spirit of service and love. On the contrary, may all that I do tend to holiness, fratemal love, and generosity towards You."

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Adapted from Meditations for Religious
by Father Raoul Plus, S.J. (© 1939, Frederick Pustet Co.)