Prologue pt. 4
The Rule of Benedict January 4
Benedict continues here to demonstrate from Scripture the conditions in which God is at home, both in the human soul and in a community. But, Father Benedict instructs, it is vitally important that neither the soul nor the community develop pride as a result of its purity. Yes, let us cast temptations from the sight of our hearts before they take hold in our soul and/or community, but let us also cultivate a humility that keeps God in God's place and us in ours.
When I read this section of the rule and Sister Joan's commentary on it, I couldn't help but think of The Life of Brian, which I just watched with Chris this weekend. Now, bear with me, this is a sincere comment! I probably haven't seen that movie since high school, and I had no idea how brilliant it was then. Now I am in a better place to appreciate it and it struck me much more strongly than a comedy usually does.
ReplyDeleteIf you haven't seen it or it's been awhile, the movie follows the life of a young man from Nazareth - Brian - whose birth, life, and death happen at the same time as Christ's. This proves for some great comedy, as in the opening of the movie when the wise men go to the wrong place and give Brian's mom gold, incense, and myrrh before realizing their mistake and taking it to the manger down the street where the Christ child has been born.
In any case, around the time that Jesus begins his public life, Brian becomes involved with a group of hapless activists working against Roman occupation. This provides a great opportunity to take a few jabs at the left- especially the disjunctured left of the 1970s. I have always appreciated this part of the movie, which plays on the tendency of ideologically-driven movements to promote divisiveness in the name of ideological purity (Brian is warned to never confuse the “People’s Front of Judea” with the “Judean People’s Front”). In the early years of my political activism I couldn’t help but recall the film many times.
Anyway, after joining the group and volunteering for a poorly planned mission to kidnap Pontius Pilate’s wife (which, predictably, goes horribly awry), Brian finds himself facing crucifixion and spends the last part of the film running away from Roman soldiers. Along the way, and quite unwittingly, he acquires a group of followers who are convinced that he is the Messiah. Despite his protestations, they manage to turn everything he does or says into a sign of his chosen-ness. Poor Brian, who is eventually captured by the Romans, dies the death of a martyr despite himself.
I don’t really remember what I took from this the first time I saw the movie – perhaps that is why it was not one of my favorites. But this time, I was struck by Brian’s repeated protestations and his insistence to the crowd that “you don’t need a leader.” Brian, like so many of us born in the twentieth-century and imbued with “modernist” values, wanted to believe that everyone could be, and should be, self-sufficient. While he is busy protesting the concept of leader-ship (and his own, in particular), the woman he fancies comes to him declaring he is a natural leader destined to advance the cause of the People’s Front. He doesn’t want to accept the leadership role, but is happy to accept her sexual advances.
What Brian doesn’t see, and what I didn’t see when I saw the movie the first time, is that we all need a leader. Brian is no exception – despite his elegy to independent thought and individual sufficiency, he cowers in all of his interactions with the Romans, denies the Judaism he proudly declares at home while he pathetically claims the Roman heritage of his father that he otherwise despises. Brian, like the crowd he looks scornfully and despondently upon, needs a leader as much as any of us.
There was a time in my life that I might have agreed with Brian. I still have a problem with authority after all and I am still a very proud person. But it is in part because of these characteristics, which have led me to deny the leadership of many people, that I have been able to acknowledge God as my leader. And through that faith, God revealed to me his leadership in the person of Christ. And of course it is in travelling that journey that I have found myself in the bosom of this community, where I am led, loved and supported in my journey.
Perhaps we should celebrate St. Brigid's Feast Day with a viewing of The Life of Brian! Thank you, Ruth. It's a joy to be on this journey with you.
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