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THE THREE LOVES OF THE AUGUSTINIAN RECOLLECTS: CONTEMPLATION, COMMUNITY, AND APOSTOLATE The Contemplative Character of the Order The primordial element of the patrimony of St. Augustine and of the Order is contemplation, which is life for God, life with God, life in God, the very life of God Himself; it is also that total and unconditional surrender of the self to God. The Augustinian Recollect religious searches for God and surrenders himself completely to Him. The Augustinian Recollect feels himself completely bound to God, as to his one and only end. The knowledge and love of God, with no recompense other than love itself, constitutes the exercise of contemplation, the one enterprise that should interest the religious in this life and which will become perfect happiness in heaven. The God for whom the Augustinian Recollect religious is searching is the God revealed in the history of salvation, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. The infinite and eternal plenitude of the Father is, at one and the same time, the source and the goal of contemplation; by means of this, the immutable Truth and the highest Good become present and are reflected in the intimacy of human consciousness. But only through Christ, with Him, and in Him is it possible to achieve an intimate and vital union with God. Christ is the supreme rule and the way that must be followed according to the Gospel and within the Church. Christ is followed insofar as He is imitated. The special vocation of the Augustinian Recollect is to hold a continual conversation with Christ, and his special care is to attend to everything that will most quickly and easily set him ablaze in the love of Christ. Due to pride, we separate ourselves from God, fall into ourselves, and gravitate toward creatures, wasting ourselves in the multiplicity of temporal things. It is only with the aid of Christ, by means of purification through humility, that we can return and enter once more within ourselves, and as we begin to search for eternal values, rediscover Christ, and recognize his brothers. This is the transcending Augustinian interiority, which is the source of all piety. Such is the meaning of the return to self, or recollection, of the Forma de Vivir, the way that leads directly to contemplation, community, and apostolate. In effect, recollection is an active and dynamic process through which a person, broken and alienated by the wounds of sin, and moved by grace, returns to his inner self, where God is already awaiting him. Being thus enlightened by Christ, the Interior Teacher, without whom "the Holy Spirit neither instructs nor enlightens anyone," the person transcends himself, becomes renewed according to the image of the new man who is Christ, and attains peace in the contemplation of Truth. Recollection is also the spirit and exercise of prayer. And finally, recollection is a spirit of penitence and continuous conversion, which cleanses the heart so that it may see God. It is a manifestation of that same spirit in our external works, which serve as mirrors of our internal selves. The exterior organization of the Order must promote interior peace, silence of the spirit, study, and piety, so that amidst the created things that we encounter by passing necessity, we may still maintain our quiet conversation with God, so that whatever we do may spring from the intimacy of our communion with Him. To do this two things are required: "a prompt and willing spirit and well-ordered laws." (Constitutions, Chapter I, Article II) The Communitarian Character of the Order Contemplation, the exclusive affair between a person and his Creator, and thus the intimate relationship of the person with God, does not change the religious into a hermit. On the contrary, as each one feels himself called by and looks for God, all will find themselves united in His knowledge and love. God, the universal Truth and the common Good, unites all understanding and all wills in His knowledge and love. Thus, contemplation has the force of union, and is, of itself, communitarian. It makes us lovers of Truth; it unites our hearts and souls in God. Christ, who is Truth and Goodness made Flesh, brings together those who have been dispersed and makes them brothers through the communion of charity. The Holy Spirit, who reaches even the depths of God, introduces the community by means of fraternal charity to the knowledge and truth of Christ, which grow even to the contemplation of the Father. Hence it is that the search for and contemplation of God results from the experience and adoration of God in our brothers. God, the highest Truth, is especially revealed in the practice of fraternal charity: Love your brothers. If you love the brother whom you see in him you will also see God. Thus you will see love itself; for God dwells where there is love. Our community, according to the purpose of St. Augustine, proposes to imitate the first Christian community of Jerusalem: "A passage from the Book of the Acts of the Apostles will be read to you, so that you may see described the form of life which we desire to live fully... You already know what we wish; pray that we may be able to put it into practice." The brothers live together in agreement and in harmony according to the very Spirit through whom they are one mind and one heart in God and for God: love came, and with it came the unity of the brethren. The community is built up in the Church of Christ, upon the foundation of charity, as the true family of those who have God as a Father, Christ as a Brother, and the Church as a Mother. Thus within the community, nobody has anything as an exclusive possession, but all is held in common: God is our common richness; heaven is our common heritage; our own soul and the souls of all the brethren are held in common, because in reality your soul is not yours alone, but belongs to all the brothers. So their souls are also yours, or better still, their souls along with yours are not many, but are one soul alone, the soul of Christ." The brothers in the community love each other as children of God and brothers of Christ, honoring in one another the Holy Spirit, whose living temples they are. They give themselves and all they have to the service of love; they bear with one another; they forgive one another's faults; they correct one another with delicacy and receive correction humbly; and they help each other with their prayers before God. Among the members of the community, there reigns an amicable spirit of life together in Christ. Everyone fosters mutual confidence in open dialogue; they show concern for the sick, console the disheartened, rejoice sincerely for each other's qualities and victories just as if these were their own; they complement one another and unite their efforts in the common tasks; and each one finds fulfillment in his surrender to the others. In the practice of the common life, all show themselves to be content with their vocation and with the company of the brothers, so that the sweet fragrance of Christ flows from our communities diffusing itself everywhere. The community, a realization of the mystery of the Church, is like a sacrament by which Christ becomes present, reveals and shares Himself in harmony and concord. The Spirit, by pouring love into human hearts, creates unity among the brothers with the Father and the Son through the bond of peace. By its external organization, the community gives testimony before the Church and the world that the brothers have but one soul and one heart directed to God. This external witness, as a faithful reflection of the internal reality of the community, is ordained to the service of the Spirit of Christ, Who vivifies it by way of building up the Body. Mutual peace and concord among the brothers is a certain sign that the Holy Spirit lives among them; and this constitutes our witness in the church, a witness ever valid and necessary before men and women, who are becoming more and more conscious of their mutual dependence. This witness is also valid and necessary before those who ignore or deny God; for "the fraternal charity of the faithful who, with a unanimous spirit, collaborate in the faith of the gospel and raise themselves as a sign of unity, greatly contribute to a manifestation of the presence of God." The community, which sprang up in history as a fruit of the Holy Spirit, who renews the Church without ceasing, submits itself to the action of the Spirit and, by His urging and the guidance of the Church, remains ever faithful to the Gospel and to its primary inspiration and attuned to all times and all people. (Constitutions, Chapter I, Article III) The Apostolic Character of the Order Contemplative love, besides uniting souls and hearts in community, is of itself diffusive and apostolic The love of God diffuses itself primarily in the community of the three divine Persons, and secondarily in creation. The more we participate in the knowledge and life of God, the more strength we will have to diffuse that love and knowledge with those around us. The contemplative and communitarian religious are generous and effective apostles because they carries that love within themselves, the essence of which is to give and communicate itself, the natural impulse of which is to extend itself to others in order to win them all for God, for Christ. The religious, in virtue of their apostolic love, work in order that all people may love God with the brethren and they are always disposed to serve mankind and the Church, in accordance with the charism of the Order. The life of our community is contemplative and active in such a way that both aspects interlace harmoniously and complement one another, because in the Church contemplation and action are vital signs of one and the same love. "No person must be so committed to contemplation as, in his contemplation, to give no thought to his neighbor's needs, nor be so absorbed in action as to dispense with the contemplation of God ... as by no means ought delight in the truth be abandoned, lest the sweetness of contemplation disappear, and the frenzy of activity overwhelm us." All members of the community help one another mutually, both in action and in contemplation: "that you may work in us and we be idle in you." The community is apostolic, and its primary apostolate is the community itself. To be dedicated to prayer and to the practice of virtue and to be united in the holy purpose of the common life is in itself an apostolic work. Just as contemplation unifies the brothers in truth and love, it should equally attract them "to the service of preaching the Gospel." Because of this, the community, always sensitive to the needs of the Church, seeks the place and the manner in which it will be most useful in the service of God. All members of the Church have a right to our services, and our charity ought to embrace the whole world. "We are servants of the Church of the Lord; and our principal duty is to those most in need, no matter what our condition or station may be among the members of this community." Interiority, which is the essential element of our Augustinian monastic tradition, embraces the apostolate of searching for truth and its fullest expression as a service to the Church. The community ought to be organized so that apostolic activity and daily occupations leave the brethren sufficient time for study and prayer and the giving of themselves to the Scriptures. "The servants of God are veritably carried away by a thirst for truth and knowledge and the discovery of His will in Sacred Scriptures." As the Church of Christ "advances on its pilgrimage between the persecution of this world and the consolation of God," and looks for and foretastes heavenly bliss, so too the community, beset as it is by the anguish and temptation of this world, yearns for that future Jerusalem, that orderly and well-arranged society in which the brothers will rejoice with God and mutually enjoy one another in Him and in which they will live together with the Father and the Son and in the Holy Spirit. (Constitutions, Chapter I, Article IV)
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