Provide each person a separate “cell” according to the layout and provisions of your home.
This provision is one of the adaptations that requires little explanation: Provide each person a separate cell according to the layout and provisions of your home. For many of us, a separate room is not a possibility. There are many families for whom even older children must share a room and it can be good, to a certain age, for children to actually share a common room--this does develop social skills, a stronger family identity and understanding of sharing that can be undermined by having private bedrooms--but family development and child psychology is not our topic here. For the most part, people have separate rooms whenever possible understanding also that in marriage, a husband and wife have been united in one, sacramentally and authentically in their being, and so their room is truly a private cell. This provision is not intended to offer even the slightest suggestion that husbands and wives should have separate rooms, but that it is good and appropriate for parents to have a separate room from heir children--also understanding the special care and place that infants have in the family. This here gives us a good place to remember that common sense is always the best guide and the the Rule and Adaptations is not a strict law to obeyed according to every letter, but is a guide and direction for a way of life that leads to Christ. It is the ideas and the meaning behind the provisions that will lead us toward Him. If then, most people already have a separate room if they are able to and this provision is rather simple and self-explanatory, why does it need to be included? Why does it need any further explanation? It remains important that we neither forget the importance of having a private cell to this Way of Life, nor to neglect our responsibilities to the members of our families and those we serve.
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