Yeah, because if you have to explain the Trinity by explaining the hypostatic union of Jesus' soul (he was fully human and fully divine...and not schizophrenic)... it is easy to get tangled up in the theological implications of these mysteries. The early Church councils had some rather heated debates on these fundamental ideas of Christianity.
No worries,
Di - the Catholic Church does not consider celibacy a 'superior' calling. The "better" vocation for a particular person is always the one he or she is called to. Now, there have been certain people throughout church history who have valued celibacy/virginity so highly that as far as they were concerned, the only purpose of marriage was to make more virgins
. But that view is a bit narrow. The pending canonization of
Louis and Zelie Martin suggests that there is nothing wrong with people dropping out of seminary and/or novitiate and getting married. St. Therese's parents both considered religious life, but it didn't work out for them. Zelie Geurin wanted very much to enter the cloister. She tried to enter a Visitation Convent, but was turned away (likely because of poor respiratory health). She became a lacemaker to support herself, a business which she continued as a wife and mother. Louis Martin was turned away from an Augustinian monastery because he did not know Latin. He spent a year trying to learn, but eventually had to give it up and resume his work as a watchmaker. Considering their background, it is not all that surprising that when they met and married, they agreed to live a celibate life for the first 10 months of their marriage. A confessor advised them that they should consider the vocation of parents, as well, and so they consummated their marriage and lived as a normal married couple for the remainder of their years. They had 5 daughters who survived childhood (3 other children died as infants, and one daughter died of sickness at age 5). Therese was the youngest child, and she became one of the most famous saints - the Little Flower. All 5 daughters became nuns some time after their mother's death; 4 of them Carmelites, and 1 a Visitation sister.
But that was me drifting off topic, wasn't it? Not really, though. Joining the Kingdom of Heaven and becoming a saint are really the same thing, which is why it is a 'both now and later' situation. It's...life. It's the choices we make. It's doing God's will. It's loving our neighbor. All of that is 'the Kingdom of God.' Holiness can be very elusive, but it is found neither exclusively in the cloister nor in the home. It is found in prayer and suffering and surrender and wisdom and humility and desire. Hoping for the New Jerusalem does not mean that there is nothing here for us now, but that we are living this life with an awareness of a final hope. Marana tha! Come, Lord Jesus
.
I wanted to comment on your idea of "collective salvation,"
Lord M. In some ways, that is true - as part of the communion of saints, we can help one another along in both concrete and mysterious ways. We are bound together by prayer and shared experiences and acts of mercy, but even more intimately by the Holy Spirit. The reason "they neither marry nor are given in marriage" in heaven is that by partaking in the life of the Trinity, those in heaven are in perfect communion with one another as well. No one loses their individual self, but we know as we are fully known...at least, as much as we have capacity for. And we certainly experience that here as well, with the idea that no man is an island - no one learns the meaning of love of neighbor "alone," which is why monasteries only allowed very mature, advanced monks to try out the vocation of hermit
.
But there is a danger in taking the idea of "collective salvation" too far. You cannot acheive salvation by proxy or proximity. In other words, while it may be a blessing to my whole family for my father to be ordained, his faith isn't automatically 'transferred' to his children. He can't cover for us - we have to work that out on our own. God doesn't have any grandchildren - He has children. The idea of inheriting the kingdom comes with the idea of becoming children of God...personally. It's not that some people become celibate to 'make up for' those who don't...it's that the entire Church receives blessings from the lives of consecrated persons, just as the entire Church receives blessings from the witness of the lives of married persons as well. Each member contributes to the Church, but we each have a different part to play in the Body of Christ. We are all called to give ourselves, as a gift...but that gift can take different forms. Poverty *is* meant for everyone. Jesus' advice to the rich young man was made out of compassion. The guy was earnest and good...but attachment to possessions can make you dead inside. He did not seem to love. Even if we don't all do the 'go, sell all that you have' thing, we learn something of that detachment and generosity in the idea of 'share the wealth' like the early Christians who held their belongings in common. Whatever you do for the least of these....that matters. In the end, it may be the only thing that matters - true religion is to care for widows and orphans. The idea of extreme poverty is to live on God's providence. Relying on God and trusting in him - that's faith. The wealthier you are, the healthier you are...the easier it is to trust in your own strength. Little children trust their parents. There isn't only one way to live in poverty, but part of the idea of being a Christian is to recognize that all that we have comes from God. Job's prayer: "The Lord gives and the Lord takes away; blessed be the name of the Lord."
Again, I feel the need to add caveats to my post. I am trying to explain...succinctly. I am perhaps stating myself a bit too forcefully when speaking about mysteries that have many nuances to them. And, I am speaking for myself, not for everyone who has ever read the Bible and decided that Jesus was on to something.... In other words, I am saying some things as I would say them when discussing these ideas with people who were also on my wavelength. I realize that Low Church Anglicanism and Roman Catholicism are
not on the same wavelength about all of these things. So, I know it sounds weird
. It sounds a bit weird to my evangelical Protestant friends, too. I'm skipping a lot of the explanations.
But I guess I have appreciated for a long time that my church doesn't say that everyone has to get married, and even though marriage is a great good...it's not like it's the only way to live for God. And, I guess, this recognizes that there are some conflicts between living radically and being responsible for a family. But it's not like Catholics have a monopoly on that insight; Rich Mullins could be a vagabond specifically because he did not have a family to tie him down. The movie about his life is called "Homeless Man." His song
You Did Not Have a Home (3:50-6:30) reminded me very much of St. Francis, who is one of the people in history who I think came closest to imitating the life of Jesus. I shared that song with one the Franciscans I know, and he liked it very much
. But here is a snippet of what Rich Mullins said at that concert in Texas. I think this is a good snapshot of what Christianity is all about:
Rich Mullins on the Psalms and 'feeling close to God'. I am not sure what his church background was, but I know he wasn't Catholic. He was just a radical Christian. He died in a car crash not long after this concert; the song 'Homeless Man' was never recorded in a studio.
Edit - Okay, sorry Lord M! No more on celibacy...really. I can restrain myself
. I will say, though, that my sister loves marriage and children. She isn't joining a group of sisters because of any dislike for that. Poverty is perhaps a topic that can be more widely discussed, anyway.
There's no real reason why my hypothetical examples have to be men, of course. 
)
)
I'm going to start using that term at church!
