I’ve been thinking a lot lately about taking a Vow of Poverty, which is quite a bit different than having to live, through no choice of your own, a life of destitution. I don’t have any hard figures, but I’m going to guess that there are about a hundred million times more people living in destitution than there are living under vows of poverty. Which would make those of us who are wannabe poverty vowees a fairly privileged class of people, as if we didn’t know that already.

That would be the difference between dumpster diving for sport vs. dumpster diving for your next meal when you haven’t had one in the past four days.

The Vow of Poverty is usually something you do if you are part of some religious order, for example if you are a nun or a monk. And it’s usually part of a three-for-one deal where you also get to take vows of celibacy and obedience. As much as I have been toying with the idea of the V.O.P. ever since I signed up for Social Security a few years ago, the other two, the V.O.C. and the V.O.O. have never held much interest for me.

I mean, think how disappointed my wife would be if I took a vow of celibacy—I realize I may be making an unwarranted assumption there. But on the other hand, think how thrilled she’d be if I took the Vow of Obedience.

No, the Vow of Poverty is the only one of the three which suits my lifestyle and current roster of personality disorders.

Before the Second Vatican Council of 1962-5, the V.O.P. was considered primarily as a Church-sanctioned entry into a state of dependency, where you gave away all your stuff and became completely beholden to others (generally a religious community) for board and room and clothes. I’m pretty sure that would not have worked for me, because I probably could not have found a religious community that would have had me, and so would have been forced to rely on the constant generosity of family and friends, a similarly improbable bet. Continue reading My Vow of Poverty: or not →