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October 2017

As one of the few congregations of Catholic consecrated women religious with a Motherhouse in Florida, we Sisters of St. Joseph of St. Augustine, Florida are somewhat of a rarity in 21st Century Western culture. There are getting to be fewer and fewer women responding to the call to consecrated religious life in developed nations.

What is consecrated life as a woman religious in the Catholic Church? I like theologian Sandra Schneider's description of Catholic religious life as "...the exclusive life-long God-quest centered in a particular kind of love of Jesus which calls some people to a life of consecrated celibacy lived in community and mission." (Finding the Treasure, p. 364)





Whereas Catholic clergy are identified by their sacramental ministry of service to the Church, Catholic consecrated religious are identified more by their public profession of the evangelical counsels of poverty, chastity and obedience and by their congregational charism. 
"This desire for God alone as the direct and immediate object of one's love is an essentially contemplative project, (p. 131 of Finding the Treasure) writes Schneider. 

Before Vatican Council II in the 1960s the meaning of Religious Life once seemed clear to all simply because of distinctive dress and enclosed housing, writes Schneider. Now, she says, it must be made clear theologically and spiritually if it is to attract those actually called to this life.


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