Catholic Dictionary

Find accurate definitions of over 5,000 Catholic terms and phrases (including abbreviations). Based on Fr. John Hardon's Modern Catholic Dictionary, © Eternal Life. Used with permission.

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VENITE SEORSUM

Instruction of the Sacred Congregation for Religous and for Secular Institutes on the Contemplative Life and on the Enclosure of Nuns. Besides the doctrinal principles on the contemplative life, the document gives detailed norms on how this life is to be lived by cloistered women religious. Its basic norm is that "papal enclosure is to be regarded as an ascetical regulation particularly consistent with the special vocation of nuns, in that it is a sign, the safeguard, and the characteristic form of their withdrawal from the world" (August 15, 1969).