Then:
So I entered a religious order. Eventually I vowed poverty. But I was richer than I had ever been. Piled up and overflowing. I had not anticipated going out with a brother to buy a new stereo setup for the Guesthouse common room. I certainly never anticipated going out and buying two new cars and paying cash. The serving table in the refectory was Tudor; it was an old monastery refectory table preserved for a new monastery arising in the Church of England. There were old vestments of the age and of better quality than the Coronation vestment is the Tower of London. There were vestments galore, and gold and jeweled chalices and other vessels. And I had everything I needed and much of what I wanted. Books and learning galore. And not just theology but mysteries, though no sci-fi to speak of. And on a variety of subjects that joiners had brought with them. And music to listen to. We lived and worshiped in an architectural gem. It was the architect’s dream, the perfect Burgundian church of 1150. The glass was the maker’s attempt to reproduce the colors of Chartres. We chanted plainsong gorgeously. People came to hear us. Our liturgies were perfect; crowds came to the special liturgies. Eventually what I saw was a monastic theme park.
Now:
I am a neer do well I guess. When I talked about leaving, T said I would wind up homeless. I’m approaching that. And B, an older man. asked how I would live when I could no longer work. On Social Security and Food Stamps, I don’t have enough to live on. I see things I can’t have, like the garlic press at the grocery store; I use a lot of garlic. I can’t afford to take my cats to the vet; Warren is old and needs checking on, but . . . I overspend my food stamps to make sure I have fresh fruit and vegetables, which as a diabetic I need. There are places I want to go, people I would like to associate with, but gasoline is expensive. My social life is very limited by this. I have a small apartment but it is too expensive. I think I need to find a roommate situation and default on my lease. I dunno what I will have to give up for that. I do have a lot of books and things, and a full range of kitchen implements. And then there are the cats; they are my family.
I guess my problem is that we called this poverty. And when I commented on this, the answer was that we were limited. We had to ask permission to buy things that we needed. But still, I was wallowing in luxury. At least from my point of view.
I gradually came to see asking permissions as infantilizing. We talked about making changes, but could never walk away from privilege. Once one of the brothers described our relationships as being like a cotillion. WTF! I had no idea what that meant. And once when we were having some financial problems in a small house, I suggested that we might look at it in terms of our voaction to poverty. A senior brother was instantly enraged.
This may have been where the problem lay. The others came from more privilege then I. Their expectations of life were much greater; perhaps they did feel impoverished. certainly didn’t. Our cook once remarked that if we ever ran out of money, we could just collect the silver spoons from each of our cells.
I guess it was part of the Society’s vocation to be of a certain class, one I did not belong to by right. after some years, I saw that, though I didn’t think in terms of class until I reflected on it later. It was all angst and rejection between myself and other brothers. When I tried to talk about it, I was rejected. One brother, who was in charge of the house I was in, told me he never wanted to hear another prophetic word from me. Later, when I talked to a priest who knew the community, I said it was a class conflict and he said, “I can believe that.”
Am I learning anything from this? Is it like fasting, which never did a thing for me, symbol without substance, a simulacrum.
Do I have a vocation to poverty? What would it be like to make a positive of all this?
It might involve living with the poor rather than where I do. To be homeless among the homeless?
That really scares me.