Conversatio morum...a useful Latin phrase

Conversatio morum is a Latin phrase often translated ‘conversion of life’ or ‘reformation of life’.

It is one of the three vows made by the Benedictine monk - the others being obedience and stability.

“Obedience is the first virtue of Christ. It is listening in love to someone else so that what they want seems to you more important than your own will - as Jesus prayed in Gethsemane. Stability is a promise to persevere in this particular community - it is a promise of loyalty. ‘Conversatio morum’ is often left untranslated since it is hard to find English words that are adequate. It is a vow to a continual change of heart, a daily reshaping of the mind and heart according to God’s plan for us “. (Ampleforth Abbey)

This was explained on the blog of someone who has recently started to follow my blog. This follower speaks into some of the theological stances that this blog wrestles with, that I wrestled over because of a sermon preached in a particular church in Putney last year, in which there was a certain heckler - long-haired and leather-clad, that I continue to wrestle with, as I did this weekend just gone, in conversations with a passionate Christian who articulates his brother's homosexuality in terms of a gift to him because it enables him to connect with the 'other', 'the marginalised' and become an even deeper recipient of God's grace... so the wrestling and reflecting goes on, neither advanced nor set-back by the voice, was it mine? which spoke in an ethics essay of late on homosexuality and the Church of England. Welcome friend- dialogue will always enrich and cause us to grow.