Program of Priestly Formation 6th edition

106 | PROGRAM OF PRIESTLY FORMATION

boundaries with others, relating to all persons as beloved children of the Father, and possesses a solid understanding and desire of a habit of healthy solitude. He demonstrates a growing transparency in his relationship with Jesus Christ through his ability to describe this relationship to others in a meaningful way; he nurtures this relationship through a well-established habit of reading and meditating on Sacred Scripture.

CONFIGURATION STAGE BENCHMARKS

239. The well-established friendship between the seminarian and Jesus Christ, which is necessarily characteristic of the man by the end of the configuration stage, is reflected in an internalized habit of reading and meditating on Sacred Scripture, as well as the ability to identify and communicate connections between meditation on Sacred Scripture, his relationship with Christ, and his personal spiritual growth. This friendship can be seen in his ability to live a simple life and articulate the reasons for it. He is able to recognize and articulate concretely God’s grace active in his life and the lives of others, identifying in common life that communio which enriches and deepens his life with Christ for the sake of others. He demonstrates an ability to maintain fidelity to the Liturgy of the Hours (or the Divine Praises, in the Eastern Catholic Churches), daily Mass, and personal prayer, both in the seminary or religious house and away from those structures. Thus he demonstrates that his spiritual life has been internalized and that he is not only fulfilling external require ments. He can assist others in their spiritual growth through a prayerful familiarity with God’s Word and the spiritual Tradition of the Church. By the end of the configuration stage, the seminarian can live the virtue of chastity and can communicate a free and joyful lifelong commitment to celibate chastity. With the ever-deepening awareness of his own humanity, with its gifts and limitations, he can recognize common 240. 241.