Consecrated life (also known as religious life) is a state of life in the Catholic Church lived by those faithful who are called to follow Jesus Christ in a more exacting way. It includes those in institutes of consecrated life (religious and secular), societies of apostolic life, as well as those living as hermits or consecrated virgins.^[1]

According to the Catechism of the Catholic Church, it "is characterized by the public profession of the evangelical counsels of poverty, chastity, and obedience, in a stable state of life recognized by the Church".^[2]

The Code of Canon Law defines it as "a stable form of living by which the faithful, following Christ more closely under the action of the Holy Spirit, are totally dedicated to God who is loved most of all, so that, having been dedicated by a new and special title to his honour, to the building up of the Church, and to the salvation of the world, they strive for the perfection of charity in the service of the kingdom of God and, having been made an outstanding sign in the Church, foretell the heavenly glory."^[3]

What makes the consecrated life a more exacting way of Christian living is the public religious vows or other sacred bonds whereby the consecrated persons commit themselves, for the love of God, to observe as binding the evangelical counsels of chastity, poverty and obedience from the Gospel, or, in the case of consecrated virgins a holy resolution (sanctum propositum) of leading a life of perpetual virginity, prayer and dedication to the service of the Church, which the Church publicly accepts.

The Benedictine and Carthusian vows of stability, conversion of manners/life and obedience are evivalent to the more common vows of other religious institutes. Depending on their specific vocation, members of some religious institutes may also take on a fourth vow.

Members of the Consecrated life are not necessarily part of the hierarchy of the Catholic Church, unless they are also clerics.^[4]

The Catechism of the Catholic Church comments: "From the very beginning of the Church there were men and women who set out to follow Christ with greater liberty, and to imitate him more closely, by practising the evangelical counsels. They led lives dedicated to God, each in his own way. Many of them, under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, became hermits or founded religious families. Thus the Church, by virtue of her authority, gladly accepted and approved them."^[5]

Consecrated life may be lived either in institutes, societies, or individually. While those living it are either clergy or laypersons, the state of consecrated life is neither clerical nor lay by nature.^[6]

Institutes of consecrated life are either religious institutes or secular institutes.

• Religious institutes are societies in which members, according to proper law, pronounce public vows, and lead a life as brothers or sisters in common.^[7]
• Secular institutes, are those "in which the Christian faithful, living in the world, strive for the perfection of charity and work for the sanctification of the world especially from within".^[8]

Societies of apostolic life are dedicated to pursuit of an apostolic purpose, such as educational or missionary work. They "resemble institutes of consecrated life"^[9] but are distinct from them. The members do not take religious vows, but live in common, striving for perfection through observing the "constitutions" of the society to which they belong. Some societies of apostolic life, but not all of them, define in their constitutions "bonds" of a certain permanence whereby their members embrace the evangelical counsels.^[10] The Code of Canon Law gives for societies of apostolic life regulations much less detailed than for institutes of consecrated life, in many instances simply referring to the constitutions of the individual societies.^[11] Although societies of apostolic life may in externals resemble religious life, a major distinction is that they are not themselves consecrated and their state of life does not change (i.e. they remain secular clerics or laypersons).

Examples of societies of apostolic life are the Oratory of Saint Philip Neri, the Daughters of Charity of Saint Vincent de Paul, and the Society of the Priests of Saint Sulpice, the Society of St Joseph of the Sacred Heart and the Missionary Society of St. Columban.

Besides institutes of consecrated life, the Catholic Church recognizes:

• the eremitic life, also known as the anchoritic life, "by which the Christian faithful devote their life to the praise of God and salvation of the world through a stricter separation from the world, the silence of solitude and assiduous prayer and penance".^[12] Apart from hermits in religious orders, the Catholic Church law recognizes as a diocesan hermit "one dedicated to God in a consecrated life if he or she publicly professes the three evangelical counsels, confirmed by a vow or other sacred bond, in the hands of the diocesan bishop, and observes his or her own plan of life under his direction".^[13] "They manifest to everyone the interior aspect of the mystery of the Church, that is, personal intimacy with Christ. Hidden from the eyes of men, the life of the hermit is a silent preaching of the Lord, to whom he has surrendered his life simply because he is everything to him. Here is a particular call to find in the desert, in the thick of spiritual battle, the glory of the Crucified One."^[14]
• Consecrated virgins who "expressing the holy resolution of following Christ more closely, are consecrated to God by the diocesan Bishop according to the approved liturgical rite, are mystically betrothed to Christ, the Son of God, and are dedicated to the service of the Church."^[15] These virgins are, as well as hermits, one of oldest forms of consecrated life.
• Consecrated widows seek a live a life of simplicity and humility.^[16] Pope John Paul II's post-synodal apostolic exhortation Vita consecrata of 25 March 1996 said: "Again being practised today is the consecration of widows, known since apostolic times (cf. 1 Tim 5:5, 9–10; 1 Cor 7:8) as well as the consecration of widowers. These women and men, through a vow of perpetual chastity as a sign of the Kingdom of God, consecrate their state of life in order to devote themselves to prayer and the service of the Church."^[17] Although the Latin Church has no specific liturgical rite for the consecration of widows, the Code of Canons of the Eastern Churches envisages individual eastern Churches choosing to have consecrated widows.^[18]
• The Code of Canon Law^[19] and the Code of Canons of the Eastern Churches^[20] express that any approval of new forms of consecrated life is reserved only to the Apostolic See.

Each major development in religious life, particularly in the Latin West, can be seen as a response of the very devout to a particular crisis in the Church of their day.

When Constantine the Great was legalizing Christianity in the Roman Empire in the early 4th century, and the Christian faith became the favoured religion, it lost the self-sacrificing character that had profoundly marked it in the age of Roman persecution. In response to the loss of martyrdom for the sake of the Kingdom of God, some of the very devout men and women left the cities for the testings of the life in the desert that was meant to lead the individual back into a more intimate relationship with God, just like the wandering of the Israelites in the Wilderness of Sin. The Greek word for desert, eremos, gave this form of religious living the name eremitic (or eremitical) life, and the person leading it the name hermit. Anthony the Great and other early leaders provided guidance to less experienced hermits, and there were soon a large number of Christian hermits, particularly in the desert of Egypt and in parts of Syria.

Though the eremitic life would eventually be overshadowed by the far more numerous vocations to the cenobitic life, it did survive. The Middle Ages saw the emergence of a variant of the hermit, the anchorite; and life in Carthusian and Camaldolese monasteries has an eremitic emphasis. The Greek Orthodox and the Russian Orthodox Churches have their own eremitic traditions, of which Mount Athos is perhaps the most widely heard of today.

The Code of Canon Law 1983 recognises as diocesan hermits persons who - without being members of a religious institute - publicly profess the three evangelical counsels, confirmed by vow or other sacred bond in the hands of their respective diocesan bishop, as Christian faithful that live the consecrated life (cf. canon 603, see also below).

The eremitic life was apparently healthy for some, but led to imbalance in others. Pachomius the Great, a near-contemporary of Anthony the Great, recognised that some monks needed the guidance and rhythm of a community (cenobium). He is generally credited with founding, in Egypt, the first community of monks, thus launching cenobitic monasticism.

Basil of Caesarea in the East in the 4th century, and Benedict of Nursia in the West in the 6th century, authored the most influential "rules" for religious living in their areas of the Christian world ("rule" in this sense refers to a collection of precepts, compiled as guidelines for how to follow the spiritual life). They organized a common life with a daily schedule of prayer, work, spiritual reading and rest.

Almost all monasteries in the Eastern Catholic Churches and in the Eastern Orthodox Church today follow the Rule of St Basil. The Rule of St Benedict is followed by a variety of orders of monastics in the West, including the Order of Saint Benedict, Cistercians, Trappists, and Camaldolese, and is an important influence in Carthusian life.

Canons regular are members of certain bodies of priests living in community under the Augustinian Rule (regula in Latin), and sharing their property in common. Distinct from monks, who live a cloistered, contemplative life and sometimes engage in ministry to those from outside the monastery, canons devote themselves to public ministry of liturgy and sacraments for those who visit their churches.

Historically, monastic life was by its nature lay, but canonical life was essentially clerical.

Around the 13th century during the rise of the medieval towns and cities the mendicant orders developed. While the monastic foundations were rural institutions marked by a retreat from secular society, the mendicants were urban foundations organized to engage secular city life and to meet some of its needs such as education and service to the poor. The five primary mendicant religious Order of the 13th century are the Order of Friars Preachers (the Dominicans), Order of Friars Minor (the Franciscans), Order of the Servants of Mary (Servite Order), Order of St. Augustine (Augustinians) and the Order of Our Lady of Mount Carmel (the Carmelites).

Until the 16th century recognition was granted only to institutes with solemn vows. By the constitution Inter cetera of 20 January 1521, Pope Leo X appointed a rule for tertiaries with simple vows. Under this rule, enclosure was optional, enabling non-enclosed followers of the rule to engage in various works of charity not allowed to enclosed religious. In 1566 and 1568, Pope Pius V rejected this classification, but their presence was tolerated and they continued to increase in number. Their lives were oriented toward social service and to evangelization in Europe and mission areas. The number of these congregations increased further in the upheavals brought by the French Revolution and subsequent Napoleonic invasions of other Catholic countries, depriving thousands of monks and nuns of the income that their communities held because of inheritances and forcing them to find a new way of living their religious life. On 8 December 1900, they were approved and recognised as religious.^[21][22]

The Society of Jesus is an example of an institute that obtained recognition as a religious order with solemn vows, although the members were divided into the professed with solemn vows (a minority) and the "coadjutors" with simple vows.^[23] It was founded in the wake of the Protestant Reformation, introducing several innovations designed to meet the demands of the 16th century crisis. Its members were freed from the commitments of common life, especially the common prayer, which allowed them to minister individually in distant places. Their unusually long formation, typically thirteen years, prepared them to represent the intellectual tradition of the Church even in isolation.

Secular institutes have their modern beginnings in 18th century France. During the French Revolution, the government attempted to dechristianise France. The French government had required all priests and bishops to swear an oath of fidelity to the new order or face dismissal from the Church, and had forbidden any form of religious life. Fr Pierre-Joseph de Clorivière, a Jesuit, founded a new society of diocesan priests, the Institute of the Heart of Jesus. He also founded the Daughters of the Heart of Mary (French: Société des Filles du Coeur de Marie). While living a life of perfection, they did not take vows, remaining a secular institute to avoid being considered a religious society by the government. They would eventually receive Pontifical institute status in 1952. The Daughters of the Heart of Mary, though resembling a secular institute in some ways, were recognized as an institute of religious life. On 2 February 1947 Pope Pius XII issued the apostolic constitution Provida Mater Ecclesia recognizing secular institutes as "a new category of the state of perfection" (Latin: nova categoria status perfectionis).^[24] The 1983 Code of Canon Law recognizes secular institutes as a form of consecrated life.^[25] They differ from religious institutes in that their members live their lives in the ordinary conditions of the world, either alone, in their families or in fraternal groups.

In 1997, Pope John Paul II instituted the World Day of Prayer for Consecrated Life, fixed annually on 2 February, the feast of the Presentation of the Lord.^[26]

• Christian monasticism
• Congregation for Institutes of Consecrated Life and Societies of Apostolic Life
• Enclosed religious orders
• Institute of consecrated life
• List of religious institutes
• Monasticism
• Religious institute (Catholic)
• Vocational discernment in the Catholic Church

• Section on the Consecrated Life in The Code of Canon Law, 1983 (archived 18 April 2016)
• Apostolic Exhortation Vita Consecrata of Pope John Paul II, 25 March 1996
• Catechism of the Catholic Church – "The Consecrated Life"