A think tank of religious brothers in the United States says they are an invisible group in the Church, but that allows them the freedom to be ordinary men performing an extraordinary ministry.
In a country where the number of Catholic brothers fell from 12,271 in 1965 to 4477 in 2012, representatives came together from four organisations: the Conference of Major Superiors of Men, the Religious Brothers Conference, the National Religious Vocation Conference and the Religious Formation Conference.
The think tank affirmed the brotherhood as the heart of male religious life and examined ways to promote it as a serious vocational option for young men.
“Our vocation is one of the Church’s best-kept secrets,” Holy Cross Brother Paul Bednarczyk, executive director of the National Religious Vocation Conference, told Catholic News Service.
“We are vowed religious who commit ourselves to a particular ministry, live in community and share prayers.
“We are not part of the hierarchy of the Church, which gives us more freedom in ministry to respond to those most in need. Our vocation complements the religious priesthood,” he said.
Christian Brother Robert Berger, associate professor of religious studies at Manhattan College in Riverdale, said every religious community says something appropriate for its times.
He said the charism of some religious communities can be distilled to an individual word. “For the Benedictines, it’s stability; the Franciscans, poverty; Christian Brothers, education; Trappists, silence; Dominicans, preaching. Since the Second Vatican Council, the gift has taken a new form, but is still vital to the Church.”
Brother Berger said men considering a religious vocation today “are joining a seed, rather than a large plant”, but they are attracted to the communal life and worship, and the timeless values they promote.
“The technology and speed of the way things are done in the 21st century are countercultural to a group of men who pray over psalms that are 3000 years old,” he said.
Sources:
Conference of Major Superiors of Men
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