Unit 4 Consecrated Life

Question 1

What is consecrated life?

Answer 1

A state of life recognized by the Church in which a person publicly professes vows of poverty, chastity, and obedience.

Question 2

What are evangelical counsels?

Answer 2

The call to go beyond the minimum rules of life required by God and strive for spiritual perfection through a life marked by a commitment to chastity, poverty, and obedience.

Question 3

What is chastity?

Answer 3

The virtue by which people are able to successfully and healthfully integrate their sexuality into their total person; recognized as one of the fruits of the Holy Spirit. Also one of the vows of religious life.

Question 4

What is poverty in the context of consecrated life?

Answer 4

A call to imitate the material poverty of Christ and to detach oneself from material wealth and goods.

Question 5

What does obedience mean in consecrated life?

Answer 5

Accepting God’s will in place of their own and obeying one’s lawful superiors in religious life as well as the teachings of the Magisterium.

Question 6

What is charism?

Answer 6

A special gift or grace of the Holy Spirit given to an individual Christian or community, commonly for the benefit and building up of the entire Church.

Question 7

What does eschatological mean?

Answer 7

Having to do with the last things: the Last Judgment, the particular judgment, the resurrection of the body, Heaven, Hell, and Purgatory.

Question 8

What are Corporal Works of Mercy?

Answer 8

Charitable actions that respond to people’s physical needs and show respect for human dignity. The traditional list includes feeding the hungry, giving drink to the thirsty, clothing the naked, sheltering the homeless, visiting the sick, visiting prisoners, and burying the dead.

Question 9

What are Spiritual Works of Mercy?

Answer 9

Charitable actions that respond to people’s spiritual needs and show respect for human dignity. The traditional list includes sharing knowledge, giving advice to those who need it, comforting those who suffer, being patient with others, forgiving those who hurt you, giving correction to those who need it, and praying for the living and the dead.

Question 10

Who are consecrated virgins?

Answer 10

A woman who has been consecrated by the church to a life of perpetual virginity in the service of God.

Question 11

Who are consecrated widows?

Answer 11

Those who lose a spouse and consecrate themselves to perpetual chastity in the service of God.

Question 12

What is a breviary?

Answer 12

A prayer book that contains the prayers for the Liturgy of the Hours.

Question 13

What does eremitic mean?

Answer 13

Relating to the life of a hermit, characterized by self-denial and solitude.

Question 14

What is asceticism?

Answer 14

Pertaining to spiritual discipline in which a person leads a strict life of simplicity and self-denial.

Question 15

Who is St. Paul the Hermit?

Answer 15

Lived until age 112; the earliest of the Church’s hermit saints.

Question 16

Who is St. Anthony of Egypt?

Answer 16

Father of monks; inspired other hermits; St. Athanasius wrote a biography about him.

Question 17

Who is St. John Cassian?

Answer 17

A monk and theologian (360-435) who recorded the sayings of the Desert Fathers called Conferences.

Question 18

What is Lectio Divina?

Answer 18

Latin for ‘divine reading.’ It is an ancient form of praying with Scripture that is a slow and thoughtful encounter with the Word of God.

Question 19

What are religious communities?

Answer 19

A group of men or women religious who are joined by a common charism.

Question 20

What does mendicant mean?

Answer 20

From a Latin root meaning ‘to beg.’ Members of mendicant orders rely on charity for their support.

Question 21

What was the Counter Reformation?

Answer 21

A movement of internal reform within the Church during the later sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries that came about as a response to the Protestant Reformation.

Question 22

What is a sacred bond?

Answer 22

A binding commitment within the Church recognized by Canon Law. Religious vows are considered sacred bonds.

Question 23

Who are moderators?

Answer 23

Those who hold a place of authority within a secular institute; similar to the superior of a religious congregation.

Question 24

Who is St. Catherine of Siena?

Answer 24

A 3rd order Dominican called to ‘Heal the wounds of the Church’; helped to end the Avignon Papacy; first woman to receive the stigmata; Doctor of the Church.