By C.J. Smith
I AM AN INVISIBLE MAN.
It is not because I’m black and marginalized by society like Ralph Ellison. Nor is it because I suffered a freak accident at the lab and was turned into a horrendous film starring Chevy Chase (did you see that debacle?). No, the reason I am invisible is because I am a monk.
I do not have a brown hood, grey beard, or shaved head. I dress like everyone else (which for my setting means rockin’ wheat nubuck Timberlands with some phat carpenter jeans and a skullcap), and on the outside seem like a normal twenty-something male. A normal twenty-something male, that is, studying to be a priest.
I took three vows for life: poverty, chastity, and obedience. Poverty means that I own no private property. Obedience means that I have a religious superior who ultimately makes the decisions about my path in life. And chastity, a.k.a. celibacy (who was it that put the “ass” and the “titty” in “chastity”?), means I choose not to involve myself in an exclusive relationship, especially a romantic-sexual one, so that I may be free to love everyone.
I’ve long since given up trying to explain to people why I’ve made such a crazy decision—most people do not even have the context, experience, or vocabulary to discuss this stuff with any depth. My newest line is that I’m saving myself for Alicia Keys.
My entire young adult life has been spent on this path, going on its fourth year now. I experience life in just about the same way as any other young urban-dwelling, college student: I ride the public transit, go out to the movies with friends, check my email, watch The Dave Chappelle Show, down a few brewskis on Friday nights...the usual. Yet there is something different about it all, something that I can’t quite express but definitely know on an experiential level.
Celibacy is the vow that distances me the most from other people, making me feel alone even in the midst of large crowds. There is some part of me, very close to my center, that is off-limits, that I cannot share with any one person in this world. That separation is a challenge, with two possible responses to it:
1. I can fold in on myself, becoming an island violently projecting all my inner anguish onto the world.
2. I can allow the pain and recognition of my finitude wash over me and teach me humility, acceptance of what is, and patience with those around me. By acknowledging my inner restlessness, I understand what connects me with all other beings on the planet.
It is difficult when I am out to dinner with a girl-who-is-a-friend (not a girlfriend) and someone walks by and tells us how cute of a couple we make. It is at that those moments I suffer a great deal; I realize I could be dating this girl. And why aren’t I? Because I am not a dating threat, the defense shields often recede when I’m around women, and in those rare moments they let their guard down, women say the most amazing things. I never imagined being celibate would put me in a position to hear the lights and shadows of living as a woman. While it has increased my desire to be with one even more, it has also made me a stronger man.
But there are also plenty of humorous stories to go with the sad ones. Two favorites:
1. The blazing co-ed younger sister of my younger sister’s best friend promising me that she could make me leave the seminary after one night of fun.
2. One of my ghetto-fabulous Mexican ESL Students telling me that she isn’t interested in dating per se, but rather in reenacting a scene or two from El Crimen del Padre Amaro. I of course would play the priest.
Truth is, I don’t spend a great deal of time thinking about it, for most of my life is concerned with basic day-to-day living. Yet every night when I go to bed and every morning when I wake up alone, there are five minutes where I think to myself how the f-bomb did I get here and how the f-bomb am I going to do this forever?
As crazy as it sounds, I don’t miss the physical act of lovemaking [And why would you?—ed.]. What I miss is looking deeply into a woman’s eyes, knowing that she is thinking about me, and feeling her fingers run through my hair. I miss the little things, like cooking dinner. I miss having someone to lay my head upon when I am hurt, and I miss someone to share those Eureka moments of deep passion, joy, and creativity. I am alone in both my sadness and joy. That is my pain, but it is also the greatest spur to interior growth.
Love involves pain and suffering. Love is sacrifice—love is the embrace of everything that is. Love engendered creation. Involution is the loving sacrifice of the one slain before the foundation of the world, the self-contraction and limitation the Godhead took on out of love. To me, then, it is not surprising that the man we celebrate on this February 14th feast of love, Saint Valentine, was murdered in a most gruesome manner for refusing to give up his love of Christianity. His love cost him his life, for love and death are inexorably intertwined, and the lesson is clear: love until it explodes your heart and ends your life, whether you are a celibate or not.
May the peace of Christ which surpasses all understanding shine in our hearts and illuminate our world.
C.J. Smith is a young seminarian in the Roman Catholic Church. A devote fan of hip-hop, he once organized a pilgrimage to the important Detroit landmarks of the life of rap artist Eminem. He resides in New York and is, as of this writing, still celibate.
