Religious Habit - Habits of Roman Catholic Religious Orders

Habits of Roman Catholic Religious Orders

Pope John Paul II in his Post-Apostolic Exhortation Vita consecrata (1996) says concerning the religious habit of consecrated persons:

§25 … The Church must always seek to make her presence visible in everyday life, especially in contemporary culture, which is often very secularized and yet sensitive to the language of signs. In this regard the Church has a right to expect a significant contribution from consecrated persons, called as they are in every situation to bear clear witness that they belong to Christ.
Since the habit is a sign of consecration, poverty and membership in a particular Religious family, I join the Fathers of the Synod in strongly recommending to men and women religious that they wear their proper habit, suitably adapted to the conditions of time and place.
Where valid reasons of their apostolate call for it, Religious, in conformity with the norms of their Institute, may also dress in a simple and modest manner, with an appropriate symbol, in such a way that their consecration is recognizable.
Institutes which from their origin or by provision of their Constitutions do not have a specific habit should ensure that the dress of their members corresponds in dignity and simplicity to the nature of their vocation.

Read more about this topic:  Religious Habit

Famous quotes containing the words habits of, habits, roman, catholic, religious and/or orders:

    ...it has been a joy to live, at last, under an Administration which—stumbling forward and backward, colliding with all the habits of government, all the habits of business—has still endeavored to make the happiness of man, woman and child its chief consideration.
    Sarah N. Cleghorn (1876–1959)

    Movies are one of the bad habits that corrupted our century. Of their many sins, I offer as the worst their effect on the intellectual side of the nation. It is chiefly from that viewpoint I write of them—as an eruption of trash that has lamed the American mind and retarded Americans from becoming a cultured people.
    Ben Hecht (1893–1964)

    The Roman world is in collapse but we do not bend our neck.
    Jerome (c. 340–420)

    I maintain that I have been a Negro three times—a Negro baby, a Negro girl and a Negro woman. Still, if you have received no clear cut impression of what the Negro in America is like, then you are in the same place with me. There is no The Negro here. Our lives are so diversified, internal attitudes so varied, appearances and capabilities so different, that there is no possible classification so catholic that it will cover us all, except My people! My people!
    Zora Neale Hurston (1891–1960)

    The religious inebriation of big cities.—Pantheism.
    I am everyone; everyone is me.
    Whirlwind.
    Charles Baudelaire (1821–1867)

    He was thoughtful and grave—but the orders he gave
    Were enough to bewilder a crew.
    When he cried “Steer to starboard, but keep her head larboard!”
    What on earth was the helmsman to do?
    Lewis Carroll [Charles Lutwidge Dodgson] (1832–1898)