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Once you have received that strong and burning call to dedicate your life to God, the search can be confusing. If you decided that a religious order might be a fit for you, here are some basic facts that could help you in your journey towards finding God’s will for you. The Catholic Church is big and wide and holds a variety of orders, institutes, societies and congregations, but each is unique and a precious gift to the Church.

Religious life is a practiced life style with in the Church that is almost as old as the Church itself. Tradition, spiritualities, history and a sense of mission are deeply ingrained in these groups. We will not cover the history of them here, but know that it is a rich and deep treasure within the Church that our Lord holds in the palm of his hand.

Some basic characteristics of religious orders, institutes, societies and congregations are that they live in community (unless they are hermits), they pronounce vows/promises and they are committed to specific works within society and the Church.

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Components of a Religious Order:

There are three important components of religious orders that make them unique and distinct from each other: history, spirituality and mission of the community.

The history will tell you when they were founded and why. Perhaps the community you are looking at was founded during a time where there was a great need for medical service, so the community began helping the sick. Or perhaps there was a need for education, the members dedicate themselves to work in educational ministries today. Each religious order was born out of a need during that particular era.

The spirituality of the community will tell you what aspect of Christ do they make emphasis on in their daily lives. Take the Franciscans for instance, they follow the suffering Christ, the poor Christ, even though they are guided by the life of Francis, the members look to how Francis related to Christ. The title of a community many time can point out to you what the community’s spirituality is, for instance: Sisters of the Sacred Heart, the Redemptorist Fathers, Mercy Sisters, etc. All communities follow the life and example of Christ; it is their founders who showed them the way to follow our Lord.

The mission of a congregation, society, institute or order can be very focused or have more variety to it. For instance, the Sisters of the Good Shepherd were instructed by their founderess, Saint Mary Euphasia to only serve women and girls in need. If they ever strayed from this work they would lose the essence of who they were. Today, the Sisters of the Good Shepherd continue to do exactly what their founderess directed them to do. Other communities work in a variety of services as long as it is in line with the purpose and mission of the order, whether it be teaching, doing medical work or in the case of my religious congregation, doing any work that will allow us to bring the goodness and kindness of the Savior to all people. How focused you need to be in terms of ministry? How much room do you need to have to find a ministry that is comfortable for you ?


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Order of Saint Benedict

The international Benedictine monastic order of sisters and brothers was founded by Saint Benedict of Nursia, Italy (480-547), the Patriarch of Western Monasticism. In the sixth century A.D., he wrote what we know as the Rule of Benedict or Regula Benedicti.
Benedictines carry on a monastic tradition that stems from the origins of the Christian monastic movement in the late third century. They regard Saint Benedict as their founder and guide even though he did not establish a Benedictine Order as such.

He wrote a Rule for his monastery at Monte Cassino in Italy and he foresaw that it could be used elsewhere. Monte Cassino was destroyed by the Lombards about A.D. 577 and was not reestablished until the middle of the eighth century. Meanwhile the Rule found its way to monasteries in England, Gaul, and elsewhere. At first it was one of a number of rules accepted by a particular monastery but later, especially through the promotional efforts of Charlemagne and his son Louis, it became the rule of choice for monasteries of Europe from the ninth century onwards.


These three elements: community, rule, abbot, are for Benedict the three elements which constitute the cenobitic life, and the order in which they are expressed is very important. The history of monastic life shows us that each time the balance between these three elements, or the order of their subordination was modified, there was a deviation from the charism. In certain centuries the Rule was given such prominence that legalism resulted, at other times community was stressed to the point of arriving at a kind of parliamentary democracy, while at other times again, the role of the abbot was accentuated to the point of transforming it into a monarchy. And, whether we like it or not, the conception of community and the role of the abbot are always conditioned by the sociological situation of each epoch.
Features of the OSB Website: Rule of Benedict (Latin and modern translations). Geographic database of houses. Advanced search. What's New, election results, academic and international institutions, general information, texts and articles, habit, saints, etc.


Benedictine Sister



Benedictine Brothers





http://directory.ic.org/878/Order_of_Saint_Benedict

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Order of Saint Augustine

Augustinians are, first and foremost, a community. Saint Augustine believed that God could be best discovered in the company of friends, and that is how we have chosen to serve God.

Our community life is built on the same qualities as friendship: mutual acceptance and respect, a willingness to listen to others and to open oneself to them, kindness and concern, a spirit of forgiveness. It is a way of life that puts far less emphasis on rules and regulations than on personal responsibility and decisions made together.

Part of our life is spent in contemplation and prayer, and part in ministry. We go where the needs of the Church call us-to the inner city, to rural and remote areas, to the campus, to foreign lands-and we serve in many ways: as preachers of the word and presiders at the sacraments, as pastoral ministers and missionaries, as chaplains and social workers, as teachers and scholars, as writers, professional counselors, musicians and artists.

Whatever form our work takes, we bring with us our identity as Augustinians. Among those we serve, we try to create what we seek in our Order's own houses: a community of love and respect, where the presence of God can be recognized in each member. Our hearts strive to be on fire with the experience of God's love, and we desire always to share that fire with others.

The Rule of Saint Augustine

One of Saint Augustine's most important legacies is his Rule: a brief set of principles, fewer than a dozen pages in length, for the guidance of those living in a religious community.

Augustine advised his followers to "See yourselves in this little book, as in a mirror." The oldest of its kind in the Western world, the Rule has been chosen by the Augustinians-and by more than a hundred other religious orders and congregations-as the pattern for their daily lives.

The Rule's most fundamental message is this: Love-love of God, love of neighbor-is the center of Christian life. By their love for one another, by their ability to live together in harmony, a religious community's members embody the truth of Christ's teachings. They make Christ's love visible to others.

The Rule addresses, concisely and in the plainest of language, what Augustine saw as the major elements of monastic daily life: prayer, moderation and self-denial, chastity, the sharing of goods, the care of the sick, obedience to authority and friendship. Though the occasional detail reminds us that Augustine was speaking at a different moment in history, the Rule's lessons are timeless. For Augustinians, this "little book'" is as powerful a model of conduct as it was when Augustine wrote it more than sixteen centuries ago. The challenge for those who wish to follow Augustine is twofold: we seek God not in philosophical speculation alone, but in careful observance of the guiding presence of a loving, personal God always at work in our life's journey. While, at the same time, we strive to be dedicated servants of the Church in the ministries of word, sacrament and justice.

Our Charism

Charism, a word and a concept of special importance to Augustinians, means gift-the gift, or gifts, that are given to us through the power of the Spirit.

In a religious community, charism is the particular contribution that each religious order, congregation or family and its individual members embody. Normally, such a charism originates with the community's founder, or with its founding document or rule. While charisms differ among religious groups, there is a sameness to all, for all follow the gospel of Jesus Christ.

The charism of Augustinians is love of God and love of neighbor, which are the foundation of the gospel of Christ and which Saint Augustine enunciates time and again in his writings, especially in his Rule. For Augustine and Augustinians, the interior manifestation of this charism is the life that his followers lead in common and the bonds of friendship that hold them together. It is externalized by the hospitality that Augustinians extend to others, our service to the world, recognizing that each member of our community and each person with whom we come in contact is a temple of God. Dii estis, "You are gods," (Pslam 82:6) is Augustine's famous phrase.

And so the gospel imperative of love of God and neighbor-which Augustine sees as one, since we love our neighbor in God and our God in our neighbor-becomes for the followers of Augustine their particular charism in friendship and hospitality. No human being is a stranger to an Augustinian.



Augustinian Priests in the Philippines


Augustinians



http://www.augustinian.org/who-we-are/the-augustinians

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