Jesus Life 87 - Jesus Army

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OLD VOWS, NEW PROMISES 4 Jesus Life Old vows www.jesus.org.uk
Jesus Life editor James Stacey takes a look at the challenge of “new monasticism”. BOOK was published last year, featuring A the Jesus Fellowship. It’s called Totally Devoted – the challenge of new monasticism, by Simon Cross, and it explores ways in which Christians in the UK today are exploring how to follow God more closely – in ways that are similar to some of the ancient ways of monks and friars. Centuries ago, the Church defined the three main enemies they were up against in a godless world: the desire for wealth and possessions, the lust for sex, and the desire to dominate. Putting it simply: money, sex and power. The ancient Church responded to these assaults on its devotion to God with three, now ancient, vows. They were the vows of poverty, chastity and obedience. Poverty – the abandonment of personal wealth; chastity – self-denial and sexual purity; obedience – the letting go of personal power. Pioneers, such as Anthony of Egypt and Benedict of Nursia and their followers lived together in communities called monasteries. Later, friars such as Francis of Assisi and his followers embraced the same vows, but lived a life of mission on the open road. It was the friars who specifically defined their vows as poverty, chastity and obedience. Today, we can see the traces of these devoted Christian movements around the UK, not just from ruins on historic hills (even if that old wife-chopper, Henry VIII, did do his best to wipe out all the monasteries in the 1500s). Nor is it just the names of some old streets and roads either. There are some monastic communities still alive and well to this day. Yet some Christians today, while not monks and nuns, are exploring what it means to make promises of purity and commitment to God and to each other in today’s society. Some have www.jesus.org.uk called this a “new monasticism” and this is what Simon Cross’s book surveys. Some members of the Jesus Fellowship make promises that are a little bit similar to the ancient vows of poverty, chastity, and obedience. Some live together in residential Christian community. Some make vows of lifelong celibacy, remaining single in order to serve God more freely. Some make a covenant pledge to live true to God together. A key monastic founding father, Benedict of Nursia, wrote a Rule (a way of living) for monks in the 6th century. It is packed full of deeply spiritual – and thoroughly down-toearth – wisdom for living and sharing together in Christian community. Sister Catherine, a Benedictine nun from Holy Trinity Monastery in East Hendred, Oxfordshire, explained to me the vows Benedictines make. “Our vows are stability, conversion, and obedience,” she says. “Stability binds us to our community, for better or worse. Conversion means promising to live monastic life as it should be lived, which includes the radical renunciation of any form of private ownership, whether of people or things; it’s the daily turning to Christ that I personally find so helpful and so challenging: it’s a daily commitment to being changed. Obedience means following Christ, who was obedient unto death.” Continued overleaf There are some monastic communities still alive and well to this day s s Jesus Life 5
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Jesus Life 87 - Jesus Army

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