My Home is My Convent

It must be so that many women come to a point in their lives where the vocation of cloistered religious actually seems an appealing alternative to the hustle and bustle of the layity, especially the married with children.  I have certainly fantasized about a religious life behind walls with women of the same mission, the same vision, the same purpose, the same personalities....

Wait, what?

That's the fantasy.

Reality is nuns are not carbon copies of holy perfection living in perfect harmony.

I watched a few documentaries on religious sisters/nuns and one thing that stood out to me was their joyful obedience to loving and serving each other despite personality difference, faults, misunderstandings, and even envy and hatred.  They are human, too, after all.  The vowed faithful are no less likely to be plagued with the ways of the this world than anyone else.

I brushed it off, though.  After all, they took vows.  They entered seriously.  They HAVE to or else it is spitting upon their own selves.  If I took such vows, if I lived behind walls in a close-knit community, I'd be better able to live like that.

Then, it dawned upon me.  I did take vows.  I do live behind walls in a close-knit community, and one that I created!!  My vows were my marriage vows.  My community is my family.  My cloister is my very home.

My home is my convent.  My marriage is my vocation.  My wedding vows are my vows.  My husband is my Priest.  I am Mother Superior.  My children are my postulants.  My home is indeed my convent where I am to live out my religious life.

I can and must be kind, loving, and serving; I must be ordered, religious, prayerful, faithful, disciplined despite differences of personalities, willingness to serve, skills, abilities, walks in life, faithfulness, etc.

It gives me an entirely new perspective on my home and vocation within it.