hermits and solitaries

The Advisor Council publishes “A Handbook of the Religious Life” which is extremely helpful. In recent editions, there is an Appendix on hermits and solitaries.

The terms Hermit and Solitary are often used interchangeably but for the purposes of the Handbook, the term ‘hermit’ refers to a member of a Religious Community and the term ‘solitary’ refers to one who is not a Religious.

Appendix V

There is a long tradition that anchorites (modern solitaries) are semi-religious. The above gives a technical starting point. There are many consequences from the above short working definition. Maybe I will post about them?!