The Upcoming LCG Retreat

The yearly Lay Cistercians of Gethsemani retreat is this weekend. I am looking forward to seeing all the people, as well as making my Promise on Sunday afternoon. Why we call them promises and not vows? I don't know, but my guess is we call them promises because we are not entering a canonical relationship. A Benedictine Oblate enters a canonical relationship with their Oblation. The Lay Cistercian does not.

Why not? On the one hand I feel somewhat let down that I've taken on a spiritual practice with a goal in mind -- this upcoming commitment -- only to find I am to make a promise, and not take a vow. This was resolved one Sunday after mass, while sitting out on the Guesthouse library porch with Fr. James. The gospel reading that day had been not to take the seats of honor, to be first, lest someone more important come in. When I mentioned the subject of vows vs. promises to Fr. James, he said, "you want to be first!"

After I had a chance to internalize that enough to break it into pieces and understand it, the truth of it became apparent. I had a problem with inner poverty. Exterior poverty is nothing without interior poverty, and I had none. Not a pleasant self realization, yet, most instructive. According to St. Thomas Aquinas, "to vow is to promise, and a vow is a promise." So was I hung up on a word choice, wanting vow to be used instead of promise? In my mind I still thought that a promise was somehow less than a vow.

Those issues that drive us, subconscious, (and quite devious in their ways), are most harmful when we do not see them, or fail to notice their work. Mine was part of a long cherished desire of mine to be committed to the Church. To my mind it was less to make a promise than to make a vow. Seen in the light of "you want to be first" I now understand my desire to think of myself as more holy. IN my own defense, I do not consciously think about that, all I am saying is that I was sickened to discover this little quirk within me.

The ceremony of my promising is this Sunday, the 30th of September. At this time I have a firm intention to make my promise, sign my document on the altar of the guest chapel, and even bring it home with me. Coming into new life in Christ is a hard journey. That which makes it hard is our tendency to sin. In my pride I felt my promise couldn't be as important as my vow. A promise to God, is a promise to be kept!