a) Letting it be known that we are open to receive gifts from those outside the community can lead to a preferential option for the rich. We pay more attention to those who can do favors for us, who can give us presents, or who can bestow certain intangible assets such as love, esteem, affirmation, and admiration. As a result we become exploiters. We see others only in terms of potential advantage for ourselves. Real friends, both personal and community, respect our vocation and its concrete exigencies. They do not want to do anything that would weaken its integrity.
b) When we receive gifts, especially extravagant gifts, a certain indebtedness is created. We can be reasonably sure that in some subtle way we will be expected to reciprocate. We do this by giving more of our time and attention, by diverting community resources in favor of the donor, or even by compromising some of the principles of monastic behavior that ought to remain permanently intact.
c) When some members of a community, whether by virtue of their position or their personality, seem to receive and retain many gifts, especially when these are of a kind not available to others, a climate of inequality develops. When secret assets are shared among a few, the possessor is in a position to exercise patronage—to invite to his parties those whom he chooses and to exclude those whom he rejects. This kind of behavior is liable to lead to serious problems, as Benedict notes (69:1–4).
d) Monastic poverty involves a certain solidarity, if not with the poorest of the poor, at least with ordinary working-class people. This means that we ought to be diffident about accepting the little luxuries that kind-hearted friends often delight in pressing upon us. Occasional treats probably do no harm, but when these are institutionalized, they lead to a situation in which we come to expect that we drink only fine wines and wear only well-cut and fashionable clothes. More important, when, for some reason we are compelled to lower our standards, we become upset. Our emotional investment in such relative luxuries indicates that our hearts are divided.
e) Monastic life is impossible without attention given to the preservation of symbols. Often our principles are made visible and reinforced only because they are expressed to us and to others by certain material tokens. A neatly patched habit, for example, reminds us and others that we have opted out of consumerism and are happy to make the most of what we have. The absence of the latest gadgets tells everyone that we are living on a different planet—which, in a sense, is true. It is no great tragedy if our meals remind us that we are more like Lazarus sitting at the gate than the rich man who feasted magnificently every day, since this animates our hope that we too will be called to Abraham’s bosom.
Monastic poverty should not be thought of as being imposed from the top and resignedly accepted by the rank and file. In that case much ingenuity will be exercised in subverting official parsimony by all sorts of demeaning subterfuges. If poverty is not only practised but also loved, then life becomes less cluttered, and more of our energy can be directed to seeking that for which we came to the monastery in the first place.
2. Poverty of Spirit
Material poverty is important, but humility is essential for perseverance in monastic life. Without poverty of spirit no purity of heart is possible. Here we understand this quality less as a feature of social living and more as an attitude toward ourselves. Do we live in full awareness of the liabilities we carry? Just as chastity can be built only on a foundation of truth, so poverty is really a matter of stripping away the distraction of material wealth, which hides our nothingness from ourselves and others. Expensive possessions may signal to others that we are people of substance, but the signal is wrong. Naked we came into the world and from it we will depart naked; everything that obscures that truth is an obstacle to true humanity.
That humility was important for Benedict is obvious from the amount of space he devoted to it. It is the longest chapter in the Rule.56 Humility is a gospel quality that is particularly difficult for our contemporaries—on the one hand we live in an age of blatant self-promotion and, on the other, never before have so many people suffered from the baneful effects of an unhealthily low self-esteem. This means that practising humility, as Benedict understood it, demands a solid conversion of mind and heart. Our beliefs and values are framed in the context of the gospel promise of ultimate reversal. If we wish to be high we must be low. If we wish to be first we must be last. If we desire to flower and bear fruit, then, paradoxically, we must seek the environment of the desert.
The spirit of poverty that restricts our use and consumption of material goods also inclines us to have no more than a moderate degree of self-appreciation. In particular, it calls on us to affirm our dependence on God for all that is good, even for our own spiritual progress. This means recognizing that when it comes to consistency in the matter of the spiritual disciplines we are fairly unreliable. Most of us cannot afford to be frivolous in spiritual matters; we have to work hard to maintain the intensity of our search for God. What inspires this sobriety is our recognition of the part sin has played in our personal history; who and what we are today has been tainted by our resistance to grace and our willful choices—invisible though this may be to our friends and admirers.
If you read through Benedict’s chapter on humility you will notice that most of the behavior patterns he praises are utterly repugnant to modern sensibilities: fear of God, submission, patient acceptance of injustice, a preference for what is cheap, self-denigration, conformity, silence, and seriousness. And how hard it is for us to appreciate the values embodied in Benedict’s portrayal of a monk who has ascended to the very top of the ladder: He is always conscious of his sins and dreads the judgment; his prayer has not risen above the publican’s plea for mercy. Before we see this as an ideal there has to be a massive shift in our values.
Curiously, most of the saints seem instinctively to have understood the necessity of poverty of spirit. Sometimes we are surprised that they were so modest in their self-appreciation. Some, like St. Thérèse of Lisieux seem to have created a whole system based on littleness. Many of the saints have been bold, but few of them were bombastic, particularly in self-presentation. Their message was the Good News of God’s love—they were not marketing themselves. They were sincere when they spoke of themselves as unworthy stewards and unprofitable servants. They were not obsessed with sin, but they had a clear eye that enabled them to perceive their own proneness to evil. This clarity of vision came from an overwhelming conviction that God’s love was unconditional. In a sense their own lamentable failures did not much matter to them, and so they were never forced into denial and repression.
We are unlikely to come to an appreciation of the role of humility in the Benedictine tradition unless we have disenfranchised ourselves from contemporary Western culture. And we are unlikely to become strangers to the ways of the world unless we have some intuition about the role that humility plays in preparing us to meet God. Maintaining our distinctiveness and cultivating the humility typical of the monastic charism go hand in hand. You will not find one without the other.
3. The Fragility of Life
If we depart from the sphere of moral endeavor and move into more neutral territory we will discover that we humans live in a very precarious situation. “This world is most appropriately called the land of the dying because in it nothing is stable, nothing eternal and the life of human beings is lived in the shadow of death.”57 None of us is certain about what tomorrow will bring. Apart from the remote possibility of an asteroid strike that will render us as extinct as the dinosaurs, there are many factors that threaten the continued existence of the human species. See how much we have degraded the earth on the groundless assumption that ecological damage is self-repairing. How easily we lull ourselves into lethal inactivity by believing that there is no urgency. Look at the low moral caliber of most national leaders and the callous stupidity and self-interest of the populations that elect them. Is there any folly of which, we can confidently assert, they are not capable? If television is a reliable guid
e to intelligence and interests of peoples, a disinterested observer would have to wonder whether there is any hope at all for the future.
Since the nineteenth century we have been half-convinced by the myth of progress so that we half-believe that tomorrow will be better than today. A glance at history should disabuse us of that notion. It is not only the prospect of plagues, famines, and natural disasters that ought to occasion a sobering apprehension. There are also the deliberate or unforeseen effects of political choices: wars, rampant injustice, disempowerment, discrimination, persecution. We are right if we are somewhat concerned about the morrow and its quality of life.
Even if global disasters are averted, there is no guarantee that tragedy will not strike our own lives and those of the people we love. Every day there are fatal accidents, terminal diagnoses, the break-up of relationships, the loss of employment, the failure of cherished projects. None of us is so lucky that we have no experience of such adversities. The world that we have so carefully constructed around us teeters constantly on the brink of extinction. To the extent that we have mortgaged our happiness to the continuance of the status quo, one day we will probably face a major crisis.
If such considerations fail to move us perhaps we should turn our attention to the certainty of death.58 This is, of course, the ultimate act of dispossession. Not only do we retain for ourselves nothing of what we previously owned, but from that day onward we do not have any power over the material elements that hitherto constituted our own body (58:24-25). It is not only death, but the years of vital attrition and the progressive diminishment that precede it. As I write I am sixty-two years old; this means that in all probability three-quarters of my life has finished and what remains is likely to be inhibited by impairment. Obviously, I do not much like this. It is, however, a reality. What it means for me is that I had better hurry up and get started on doing the things I want to have done during my lifetime. For the night comes when no one can do any work.
And so, whether we voluntarily anticipate death by self-dispossession or whether we cling tightly until the last moment, at the end we are all called to detachment not only from material realities but from bodily instincts and eventually from the body and from life itself. Those of us familiar with monastic customs are probably aware that death is, in a way, anticipated by the ritual of monastic profession.59 In entering a monastery and committing ourselves to spend the rest of our life there we are, in a sense, dying to the world—just as in baptism. If Martin Heidegger could define the human person as “a being-towards-death,” then surely this definition must apply even more fully to the monk. Benedict, we know, sees the daily remembrance of death as a spur to fidelity (4:47). And it is probably true that death is a regular visitor to most established monasteries—with the ancient monastic rituals surrounding it offering little scope to hide its finality. To sit in silent vigil beside the body of one who was so recently alive brings home the reality of the end that awaits us all. It is only a matter of time before it is my turn. In some monasteries the church door leading to the cemetery was inscribed with the words Ille hodie et ego cras. Today he: tomorrow me.
Our Christian faith, however, keeps reminding us that death is the doorway to eternal life, so that there is no need to attempt to blot it out of consciousness. In fact one of the high points of monastic profession is the triple chant of the Suscipe: “Receive me, O Christ, according to your promise and I shall live; do not disappoint me of my hope.” This is not only an apt verse for profession, but a wonderful accompaniment for the transition to eternal life. I hope someone remembers to sing it for me on my deathbed. And it is an equally wonderful mantra all life long. We live in hope (4:41), ardently desiring eternal life (4:46) and never despairing of the mercy of God (4:74). With so much to hang onto, it is not so difficult to let go of lesser benefits
It is eschatological hope that allows the monk to take present reverses less seriously and to hanker less intensely for the conveniences and gratifications that will last only for a time. This attitude derives not from a negativity about created reality in itself, but from the recognition that when affections and desires become fixated at a level below the optimum, one’s whole personhood is devalued and one’s sensibility is debased. Surgeons and pianists and others whose hands are crucial to them should not work in a timber mill. An accident would cause them to lose more than their fingers—in a sense, without the means of self-expression, their spirit would be quenched. Monastic tradition is formed around a firm faith that as human beings we are intended for union with God. Nothing else can fully satisfy us. To allow ourselves to be diverted by the pursuit of temporal realities in such a way that our spiritual energies are diminished is ultimately self-diminishing.
In fact, letting go is a means of liberation. “Freedom’s just another word for nothing left to lose”60 —at least, according to a popular song of the 1970s. It is true that many possessions can become burdensome because of the care needed to maintain them and the anxiety that accompanies potential loss. Reducing our involvement with them allows our energies to be channeled in other directions. Poverty is more than economic abstemiousness. It is a work of faith, calling us to be less interested in things of earth and time, and to invest more of our resources in eternity. It is to give priority to the unseen. What is seen is corruptible and soon passes away. What is unseen endures for ever. Those who cling to what is eternal are not poor. They are endowed with the only riches worth having.
7 Antecedent
Willingness
The benefit of obedience
RB 71:1
In a world that cherishes autonomy and self-assertion the monastic ideal of obedience seems both oppressive and unhealthy, akin to the dehumanizing systems that shape the societies in which we live. It is not so easy to see obedience as a spiritual dynamism that is an essential component of all Christian discipleship and that has a direct bearing on the quality of our prayer. As a result those entering monasteries often carry with them negative attitudes that lead them to confront the reality of obedience with a mere compliance that will often degenerate into a surly minimalism. This is especially true of those entering from a background that is consistently suspicious of governments, resentful of bosses, and reluctant to follow rules and regulations. For such people, unless somebody takes the trouble to educate them, monastic obedience is purgatorial at best and, at worst, a veritable hell on earth.
The fact is that, even in a monastery, obedience can become infected with beliefs and values that transform it into something far different from what Benedict intended. Something is lost when monastic texts about obedience are interpreted merely as recommendations that we do what a superior commands. In that case the monk’s life would be reduced to the level of a canine obedience school or the army. The primary function of obedience is ascetical, not organizational. The real action takes place at the level of belief and value: That is why Benedict insists on the primary role of doctrina and disciplina in the exercise of authority. This is to take up a New Testament idea that obedience is more a state than an action; it is closely identified with faith.61 Obedience is, in the first place, an antecedent openness, an attitude of receptivity, a willingness to listen combined with the recognition that this responsiveness may involve changing one’s life in accordance with what one hears. It is the attitude of the girl keeping the gate in Acts 12:13—alert and listening so that she can answer a summons promptly.
1. God or Self?
Monastic obedience presupposes that we have elected to give priority to the divine will over our own. This is why, in his ladder of humility, Benedict places the abandonment of self-will and a more general submission to the divine will before he moves to cenobitic obedience (7:31–34). Rendering obedience to an abbot is one specific form by which the monk imitates the self-emptying of Christ. The general attitude goes beyond interaction between subject and superior, even beyond mutual obedience: It is an unrestricted search for God’s will. Such an attitude is incumbent on everyone i
n the monastery, including superiors. This is why abbots are to ask counsel of the young (3:3), and to pay attention to any criticisms offered by a visiting monk (61:4). In both cases it is Christ who speaks through human agents—the less overpowering they are, the more attentively the abbot must strain to hear what they say. The same principle applies here that Benedict enunciates concerning the poor: The terror that great ones inspire assures them of respect (53:15), but it is in listening carefully to the little people, the young, the marginalized, and the inarticulate, that Christ is more especially honored. Even the scoundrels of the community, supposing that there be some, are to be heard, since they often read situations more acutely than those blindly committed to the preservation of the status quo.
Dorotheos of Gaza makes the same point. God always reveals what is best, provided we are prepared to hear the divine voice in the most unlikely place. He cites as an example Balaam’s donkey (Num. 22:22–34). If God can speak through a donkey, how much more likely is it that even the least important among the faithful might be carriers of his word? It is not the speaking of God’s revealing word that is in doubt, it is our capacity to hear it.
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