Consecrated life is a style or way of living Christian life. Its point of departure is a charism communicated by the Spirit to follow Jesus in a consecration through vows, lived in communion for mission. Among the characteristic aspects of the spirituality of consecrated life there is the fact of living one’s faith, hope, and Christian love beginning with the commitment of the vows of obedience, poverty and chastity. These vows introduce special tones in the way of living a theological life. The three vows are expression of the three theological virtues, but each of them emphasizes and exercises one of them in particular. […]
A spirituality of the vows furnishes a special framework to the three fundamental demands of the following of Jesus (Cfr. Lk 14:2-35), which are addressed to all Christians: keeping family ties in balanced perspective is expressed in consecrated chastity; seeing material goods in just perspective is concretized in poverty; keeping one’s autonomous life plan in perspective is symbolized by carrying the cross and seeking to fill God’s will in obedience, and living free for the service of the [Kingdom], in consecrated chastity.
!["I took for my advocate and lord the glorious St. Joseph and earnestly recommended myself to him. [...] I don’t recall up to this day ever having petitioned him for anything that he failed to grant."](https://scontent-dfw5-1.cdninstagram.com/v/t39.30808-6/336879821_1374507696727108_3000064146961560788_n.jpg?_nc_cat=102&ccb=1-7&_nc_sid=8ae9d6&_nc_ohc=GeKBPoaKfMcAX9h0wg5&_nc_ht=scontent-dfw5-1.cdninstagram.com&edm=ANo9K5cEAAAA&oh=00_AfAcLb9BeLfzYJ7Lx7y3p7CUeWbXYuQwcKCz_isfJSl3zQ&oe=64238CFB)
Carmelite Quotes 
An excellent exposition of what, as the writer says, each of our secular Christian lives too needs to be about. My Community told me that stewardship is my secular equivalent of vowed poverty.