THE CONTEMPLATIVE IN THE WORLD

By: Mother Mary Clare SLG

Narrated by: Virtual Voice

FAIRACRES PUBLICATIONS 100

'I am sure there is need to stimulate contemplative dedication in the world today. These vocations are real outposts of the contemplative communities ...and should be centres of witness to those supernatural and eternal principles for which the contemplative life stands.' These words, introducing a series of talks given by Mother Mary Clare to members of the Fellowship of the Love of God, suggest the challenge of a vocation to the contemplative life in the world. As Mother Jane writes in the Preface, 'Monastic spirituality is open to all. ...This call to the contemplative life may explain why increasing number of people who are not actually called to become religious find fulfilment in an association with a religious community . The link may be a formal one, as in the case of Oblates, Tertiaries, or Associates; or it may be informal - simply going as a friend of the community for long or short visits.' Mother Mary Clare's vision of the call to the contemplative life in the world, as well as this very practical and searching examination of the way the call can be lived out in ordinary life will speak to many . With the tough wisdom of the cloister she states unhesitatingly: 'The whole life , if it is true, must be one of discipline and self-abnegation. It does not consist of a series of spiritual poses or self-conscious emotional dreaming or sentimental prayer which does not touch the real life, but it must be disciplined in every part. There is any amount of romance in it, but the work itself is discipline, penance and sacrifice in union with the offered life of our divine Saviour.'