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Brothers in the Church Today: Probing the Silence

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 February 2024

Bruce H. Lescher CSC
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The years since Vatican II have hit religious brothers hard. Brothers have been leaving religious life in greater percentages than priests or women religious. The brothers’ present search for identity in this vocational crisis may take years to work itself out. Meanwhile, brothers need to reflect on a phenomenon not affecting women religious or priests: general silence in the Church about their vocation. The question is: what do we make of the silence?

Before exploring the silence, I want to first situate the brother’s vocation in a historical perspective. Brothers are presently caught between two contradictory historical forces. On the one hand, the lay religious life has an ancient, valid, and venerable tradition in the Church; on the other hand, male religious life has become clericalized since the middle ages.

In western monasticism, by the ninth century the vocation of the lay monk suffered gradual diminishment as more and more monks were ordained. The identity of the brother suffered further obfuscation during the Gregorian Reform. A monastic reform accompanied Gregory VII’s battle against the abuses of lay investiture. New communities such as the Camaldolese and Cistercians arose; other monks (e.g. William of Hirsau) attempted to reform Benedictine monasticism without breaking away. During this monastic reform, some orders created a new class of religious: the laybrother (at that time called conversi Laybrothers were not considered monks. Some orders, particularly the Cistercians, established structures of class distinction. Cistercian laybrothers, for example, had no vote in chapter, wore a habit different from that of the monks, were not allowed into the cloister, and could not be taught reading and writing.

Type
Research Article
Information
New Blackfriars , Volume 71 , Issue 842 , October 1990 , pp. 445 - 455
Copyright
Copyright © 1990 Provincial Council of the English Province of the Order of Preachers

References

1 Worldwide, between 1980 and 1985 the number of brothers dropped by 11%. For the same period women religious dropped by 4.5% and priests (both religious and diocesan) by 2%. See John A. Weafer, ‘Vocations–A Review of National and International Trends’, Furrow 39 (August 1988): 501–502. The decreases are even greater if one goes back to years closer to Vatican II. In the United States, for example, in 1964, there were 22,707 religious priests in the United States; in 1985 there were 22,265, a drop of 2%. For the same period the number of brothers went from 12,271 to 7,544, a drop of 39%. Sisters went from 179,954 to 115,386, a drop of 35%. See the Official Catholic Directory (Wilmette, IL: P. J. Kenedy & Sons) for 1965 and 1986. In Ireland the number of brothers dropped from 2,195 to 1,230 between 1970 and 1986, a loss of 44%. During the same years religious priests went from 4,019 to 2,789 (a loss of 31%) and women religious from 15,145 to 11,397 (a loss of 25%). See Weafer, ‘Vocations’, 502.

2 A full treatment of the historical development of the place of the brother in religious life lies beyond the scope of this article. For brief overviews see James Fitz, ‘Historical Development of Brother‐Priest Relationships’, Who are My Brothers? Cleric‐Lay Relationships in Men's Religious Communities, ed. Philip Armstrong (New York: Alba House, 1988), 3–33; Giancarlo Rocca, ‘Fathers and Brothers in Religious Institutes’, in Brothers in Our Institutes (XXI Meeting of Union of Superiors General, May 1985), 1–19. See also Thiele, Augustinus, ‘Laienbrüder—Mönchpriester,—eine Entwicklung’, Studien und Mitteilungen zur Geschichte des Benediktiner‐Ordens 89 (1978): 301–345, 577–596Google Scholar.

3 Flann Markham gives the following figures: by the end of the eighth century 20% of monks were clerics; by the end of the ninth century this figure had risen to 60%; by the end of the tenth to 75%. See ‘Religious Brotherhood: An Historical Sketch’, Brothers Newsletter (Association of Religious Brothers of Southern Africa) 1 (May 1989): 2. This article is a reprint from Religious Life Review.

4 The most thorough study of the emergence of laybrothers is Hallinger, Kassius, ‘Woher Kommen die Laienbriider?’Analecta Sacri Ordinis Ciscterciens 12, fasc. 1–2 (1956): 1–104Google Scholar. See also my article, ‘Laybrothers: Questions Then, Questions Now’, Cistercian Studies 23, No. 1 (1988): 63–85Google Scholar.

5 See the discussion below on the traditional religious imagery of the brother.

6 Compare, for example, the spirituality of teaching brothers with the spirituality of coadjutor brothers in Dictionnaire de Spirituality, s.v. ‘Ordres Enseignents’, t. 11, cols. 894–901, and s.v. ‘Frères’, t. 5, cols. 1231–1240.

7 I am making a distinction here between the presence of ordained members in a religious community and the introduction of a system of class distinctions.

8 For laybrother revolts among the Gilbertines see Knowles, M.D., ‘The Revolt of the Lay Brothers of Sempringham’, English Historical Review 50 (July 1935): 465–487Google Scholar; among the Order of Grandmont see Dictionnaire de Spirituality, s.v. ‘S. Étienne de Muret’, t. 4, cols. 1504–1514; among the Cistercians see Thiele, 'Laienbrüder, 587–591.

9 This remark reflects my experience of conditions in the United States; conditions may be different in other parts of the world. The outlook in this article generally reflects conditions in the northern hemisphere. I acknowledge this cultural limitation.

10 National Catholic Reporter, 14 August 1987, 3.

11 Statistics from Official Catholic Directory for 1986, 267.

12 National Catholic Reporter, 20 March 1987, 26 and 28. In all fairness, one must note that the National Catholic Reporter has at times given brothers more coverage, and one hopes that this trend will continue. See, for example, ‘Real Brothers Don't Pose for TV Ads’, National Catholic Reporter, 18 December 1987, 12, and ‘1988 Promises Crowded Calendar of Catholic Life’, National Catholic Reporter, 8 January 1988, 17 and 20.

13 Weafer, ‘Vocations’, 509 and 508.

14 Dolan, Jay P., The American Catholic Experience: A History from Colonial Times to the Present (Garden City, NY: Doubleday and Company, Inc., 1985)Google Scholar.

15 Ibid., 439 and 447.

16 Gaudin, Adrian, ‘The Identity of the Religious Brother in America Today’ (M.A.T. Thesis: School of Applied Theology, Berkeley, CA, 1982), 9Google Scholar.

17 Lumen Gentium, 41. See Abbott, Walter M., ed., The Documents of Vatican II (New York: The America Press, 1966), 67Google Scholar.

18 Lumen Gentium, 31. Ibid., 57.

19 Perfectae Caritatis, 15. Ibid., 477–478.

20 Published material regarding the effects of Vatican II on laybrothers is virtually nonexistent. See Brothers (Publication of the National Assembly of Religious Brothers in the U.S.) 8 (May–June 1989): 4 for two letters from Cistercian Brothers expressing unease at the loss of their vocation. For an overview see O'Connor, David F., ‘The Changing Role and Image of Brothers in Clerical Institutes’, Review for Religious 41 (March–April 1982): 286–298Google Scholar.

21 See Brothers in Our Institutes (Rome: Union of Superiors General, 1985Google Scholar).

22 For the English text of the Plenaria's report see ‘The Lay Brother–His Active Role in the Sanctity of the Church’, Consecrated Life 12 (No. 1, 1988) 98–100Google Scholar.

23 For quotes, see ibid., 99 and 100.

24 See Statistical Yearbook of the Church (Vatican City: Typis Polyglottis Vaticanis, 1985), 348–349Google Scholar.

25 Canon 588 designates religious institutes as either ‘clerical’ or ‘lay’. See Coriden, James A., Green, Thomas J., and Heintschel, Donald E., eds. The Code of Canon Law: A Text and Commentary (New York: Paulist Press, 1985), 460–461Google Scholar.

26 News release, National Catholic News Service, 12 August 1987, 9.

27 Tutas, Stephen, ‘Religious Life Today’, Origins 17 (15 October 1987): 316Google Scholar.

28 ‘The Lay Brother’, 100.

29 See, for example, Wheelwright, Philip, Metaphor and Reality (Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press, 1962Google Scholar) and Kaufman, Gordan D., The Theological Imagination: Constructing the Concept of God (Philadelphia: The Westminster Press, 1981Google Scholar).

30 See, for example, Schneiders, Sandra M., Women and the Word: The Gender of God in the New Testament and the Spirituality of Women (New York/Mahwah, NJ: Paulist Press, 1986)Google Scholar.

31 See Dictionnaire de Spiritualité, s.v. 'France—19e Siècle, t.5, col. 985.

32 Dictionnaire de Spiritualé, s.v. 'Frères t.5, col. 1239.

33 For example, see Dictionnaire de Spiritualité, s.v. ‘Ordres Enseignant’, t. 11, cols. 894–901.

34 See brochure entitled ‘Washington Statement on a Call to Brotherhood’, published by the National Assembly of Religious Brothers; 1307 S. Wabash Ave., Suite 201; Chicago, IL 60605. All quotes are taken from this brochure.

35 See Chapter II of the Dogmatic Constitution on the Church. Abbott, Documents, 24–37.

36 Azevedo, Marcello, Vocation for Mission: The Challenge of Religious Life Today, trans. Diercksmeier, John W. (New York/Mahwah: Paulist Press, 1988), 5Google Scholar. See 3–12 for a fuller discussion.

37 O'Connor, ‘The Changing Role’, 296.