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novitiate is an episode in the training of the monastic, not of the secular, clergy: it is a period of probation imposed upon all aspirants to the monastic life. Religious of every order and congregation, both men and women, must spend at least one year as ‘novices’ before they are permitted to bind themselves by the solemnity of the vows. During that period they experience the full severity and asceticism of the life to which they aspire, and they in turn are minutely observed and tested by their superiors. It is a wise provision: the least that can be done to palliate the gravity of taking such an irrevocable step. Since no formal study is permitted during its course, it necessitates an interruption of the ‘humanities’ of monastic clerics.

In the original intention of the founders of the monastic orders there was no distinction between clerics and lay members. Francis of Assisi, who was