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Catholic religious order

Religious rules

Religious orders follow one of the religious rules. For example, a large number of the religious orders in the Catholic Church ( Benedictines, Trappists, Cistercians, etc.) observe the Rule of St Benedict that is a collection of precepts for what is called contemplative religious life; others follow the Rule of St Augustine that stress self-denial, moderation, and care for those in need, whereas the Rule of St Basil, one of the earliest rules for Christian religious living, tends to be followed by monastic communities of the Orthodox Church. In addition, the individual Orders have their own regulations for the practical living out of their chosen Rule so as to be able to serve their own Order's charism more fully.

Authority structure

A Religious Order is characterized by an authority structure where a superior general has jurisdiction over the order's dependent communities. An exception is the Order of St Benedict which is not a religious order in this technical sense, because it has a system of "independent houses", meaning that each abbey is autonomous.

There are two principal types of Catholic religious orders. Members of congregations (such as the Congregation of Holy Cross) take simple vows, while members of orders proper (such as the Society of Jesus) take solemn vows. The term congregation sometimes also applies to branches of an order which historically united several ones or was extended with one or more branches of a different kind, such as for women in addition to the pre-existing one for men, or tertiaries. Additionally, a number of generic terms, which are not always exclusively defined, exist to define groups of orders and congregations, such as mendicant orders or canons regular. As well particular or familiar names exist for religious such as Brother and Sister, whereas older terms including Monk and Nun are now more infrequently used. Technically Nuns are religious women who profess solemn vows rather than simple vows.

History

The roots in Egypt and the Syriac and Greek speaking East

From the earliest times there were probably individual hermits who lived a life in isolation in imitation of Jesus' 40 days in the desert. They have left no confirmed archaeological traces and only hints in the written record. Communities of virgins who had consecrated themselves to Christ are found at least as far back as the 2nd century. There were also individual ascetics, known as the "devout", who usually lived not in the deserts but on the edge of inhabited places, still remaining in the world but practicing asceticism and striving for union with God, although extreme ascetism such as encratism was regarded as suspect by the Church (cf. 1 Tim 4:1-5).
Paul of Thebes (fl. 3rd cent.), commemorated in the writings of St Jerome, is regarded as the first Christian hermit in Egypt, his withdrawal into the desert apparently having been prompted by the persecution of the Christians at the time. Saint Anthony was the first to leave the world specifically to live in the desert as a monk; St Athanasius speaks of him as an anchorite. In upper Egypt, sometime around 323 AD, Saint Pachomius decided to organize his disciples into a form of community in which they lived in individual huts or rooms (cellula in Latin), but worked, ate, and worshipped in shared space. Guidelines for daily life were drawn up (a monastic 'rule'); and several monasteries were founded, nine for men and two for women. This method of monastic organization is called cenobitic or "community-based". Towards the end of his life St Pachomius was therefore not only the abbot of a monastery but also the head of an entire order of monasteries.

The Greeks (e.g. St Basil the Great of Cappadocian Caesarea) and the Syriac-speaking east have their own monastic traditions (e.g. St Ephrem of Nisibis and Edessa).

Gaul

The earliest forms of monasticism in Western Europe involved figures such as Martin of Tours, who after serving in the Roman legions converted to Christianity and established a hermitage near Milan. He then moved on to Poitiers where he gathered a community around his hermitage. In 372 he was called to become Bishop of Tours, where he established a monastery at Marmoutiers on the opposite bank of the Loire River. His monastery was laid out as a colony of hermits rather than as a single integrated community.
John Cassian began his monastic career at a monastery in Palestine and Egypt around 385 to study monastic practice there. In Egypt he had been attracted to the isolated life of hermits, which he considered the highest form of monasticism, yet the monasteries he founded were all organized monastic communities. About 410 he established two monasteries near Marseilles, one for men, one for women. In time these attracted a total of 5,000 monks and nuns.
Most significant for the future development of monasticism were Cassian's Institutes, which provided a guide for monastic life and his Conferences, a collection of spiritual reflections.
Honoratus of Marseilles was a wealthy Gallo-Roman aristocrat, who after a pilgrimage to Egypt, founded the Monastery of Lérins, on an island lying off the modern city of Cannes. Lérins became, in time, a center of monastic culture and learning, and many later monks and bishops would pass through Lérins in the early stages of their career.

Italy

The anonymous Rule of the Master (Regula magistri), was written somewhere south of Rome around 500. The rule adds administrative elements not found in earlier rules, defining the activities of the monastery, its officers, and their responsibilities in great detail.
Benedict of Nursia was the most influential early Western monk. He was educated in Rome but soon sought the life of a hermit in a cave at Subiaco, outside the city. He then attracted followers with whom he founded the monastery of Monte Cassino around 520, between Rome and Naples. His Rule is shorter than the Master's, and somewhat less legalistic. By the ninth century, largely under the inspiration of the Emperor Charlemagne, Benedict's Rule became the basic guide for Western monasticism.

Ireland

The earliest Monastic settlements in Ireland emerged at the end of the fifth century. The first identifiable founder of a monastery was Saint Brigit, a saint who ranked with Saint Patrick as a major figure of the Irish church. The monastery at Kildare was a double monastery, with both men and women ruled by the Abbess, a pattern found in many other monastic foundations.

Commonly Irish monasteries were established by grants of land to an abbot or abbess, who came from a local noble family. The monastery became the spiritual focus of the tribe or kin group. Irish monastic rules specify a stern life of prayer and discipline in which prayer, poverty, and obedience are the central themes. However Irish monks read Latin texts, both spiritual and secular, with an enthusiasm that their contemporaries on the continent lacked. By the end of the seventh century, Irish monastic schools were attracting students from England and from Europe.

Irish monasticism spread widely, first to Scotland and Northern England, then to Gaul and Italy. Columba and his followers established monasteries at Bangor, on the northeastern coast of Ireland, at Iona in Scotland, and at Lindisfarne, in Northumbria. Columbanus, an abbot from a Leinster noble family, traveled to Gaul in the late 6th century with twelve companions. Columbanus and his followers spread the Irish model of monastic institutions established by noble families to the continent. A whole series of new rural monastic foundations on great rural estates under Irish influence sprang up, starting with Columbanus's foundations of Fontaines and Luxeuil, sponsored by the Frankish King Childebert II. After Childebert's death Columbanus traveled east to Metz, where Theudebert II allowed him to establish a new monastery among the semi-pagan Alemanni in what is now Switzerland. One of Columbanus's followers founded the monastery of St. Gall on the shores of Lake Constance, while Columbanus continued onward across the Alps to the kingdom of the Lombards in Italy. There King Agilulf and his wife Theodolinda granted Columbanus land in the mountains between Genoa and Milan, where he established the monastery of Bobbio.

List of Catholic religious institutes

The following list refers to some of the major religious institutes of the Catholic Church, both orders and others; it should be understood that communities using the same name may exist in the Anglican tradition as well, as well as more than one Catholic order with the same name. Each is accompanied by its official name in English as well as the acronym (or "post-nominal initials") commonly used to identify its members. In many cases name variations and/or alternative names are also in use. In parentheses is the year it was established.

Some organizations in the following list are not Religious Institutes because they are Associations of the Faithful and have not yet received a decree of erection to become an Institute of Consecrated Life. For this reason, this list does not verify the canonical status of an organization.:

Adorers (Adorers of the Blood of Christ) - A.S.C. (1834)

Adornos (Clerics Regular Minor) - C.R.M. (1563)

Adrian Dominican Sisters (1233/1853)

Albertines (1888)

Alexians - C.F.A. (1469)

Angelic Sisters of St. Paul - A.S.S.P. (1535)

Apostles of the Sacred Heart of Jesus - A.S.C.J. (1894)

Assumptionists - A.A. (1845)

Little Sisters of the Assumption (1865)

Religious of the Assumption (1839)

Atonement, Society of the (Atonement Friars/Graymoor Friars/Sisters) - S.A. (1909)

Augustinian Recollects - (Order of the Augustinians Recollects) - O.A.R. (1912)

Augustinian Sisters, Servants of Jesus and Mary - A.S.J.M. (1827)

Augustinians (Order of Saint Augustine) - O.S.A. (1244)

Augustinians of Kansas: Society of Saint Augustine - S.S.A. (1981)

Baladites (Order of Lebanese Maronite) - O.L.M. (1694)

Barnabites (Clerics Regular of Saint Paul) - B., C.R.S.P. (1530)

Benedictines (Order of St. Benedict) - O.S.B. (529)

Benedictine Oblates of St Scholastica

Benedictine Sisters of Perpetual Adoration (1874)

Bernardine Cistercian Sisters of Esquiermes

Bernardines (also see Cistercians) (1098)

Bon Secours Sisters - C.B.S. (1824)

Brigidine Sisters (1807)

Bridgettines (Order of Our Savior) - O.Ss.S. (1350)

Brotherhood of Hope - B.H. (1980)

Brothers Hospitallers of St. John of God (Order of Hospitallers) - O.H. (1572)

Brothers of Christian Instruction of St Gabriel - F.S.G. (1711)

Brothers of Mercy of Our Lady of Perpetual Help - f.m.m. (1839)

Brothers of the Christian Schools (Lasallian Brothers or Christian Brothers) - F.S.C. (1680)

Brothers of the Poor of St. Francis of Assisi (Brothers CFP located in the United States, Belgium, The Netherlands, and Brazil, Regular Third Order) (1861)