The Office of Consecrated Life acts as a liaison between the Archbishop and the men and women in various Institutes of consecrated life in the Archdiocese of Saint Louis by supporting the members of the Institutes in fulfilling their unique charism and undertaking their apostolic works. The Office also works in collaboration with the Office of Vocations to promote vocations to consecrated life.
What is Consecrated Life?
Catholics are most familiar with the term consecration through their participation in the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass during which ordinary bread and wine are consecrated and become the Body and Blood of the Our Lord Jesus Christ.
To consecrate means to “set apart for the sacred”; in other words, it is a call to holiness.
Mission
The Office of Consecrated Life strives to carry out the Church's pastoral concern for the men and women in the consecrated life and to work with them to help achieve the goals set forth in the mission statement of the Archdiocese.
Its purpose is to serve:
- consecrated men and women in areas essential to their spiritual and psychological growth;
- the Archbishop when the director of the Office of Consecrated Life acts as his representative; and
- the Archdiocese by supporting the apostolates of consecrated men and women accomplished in the context of the local Church.
Donations are gratefully accepted to support consecrated religious in the Archdiocese: giving.archstl.org.
What is a Vocation?
"A vocation, while a gift, will undoubtedly also be demanding. ... Yet the demands they make are not an obligation imposed from without, but an incentive to let that gift grow and develop, and then become a gift for others. When the Lord awakens a vocation, He thinks not only of what you already are, but of what you will one day be, in His company and in that of others."
-- Pope Francis, 'Christus Vivit' ('Christ Lives')
Resources for discerning a Vocation