July 31

Feast of St. Ignatius of Loyola, founder of the Society of Jesus (Jesuits)


Chapter 49

The Rule of St. Benedict July 31

I think most would read our Father Benedict's talk of the "joy of the Holy Spirit" with regard to Lenten abstinence as deluded or darkly humorous.  We have a hard time imagining how "the joy of spiritual desire" can in any way be enhanced by physical denial.  But in the Christian tradition, Lent is not punishment.  It is preparation for New Life in the Easter experience.  For the heart that truly desires this New Life, then, the Lenten practices, painful as they may be in the short term, can produce the profound joy of the Spirit who brings about New Life in us.

The Spiritual Exercises  of St. Ignatius of Loyola are the central component of Ignatian Spirituality, and are a powerful process that anyone who desires New Life would do well to consider undertaking at some point.  I would like for the Community of St. Mary of the Annunciation to consider undertaking The Spiritual Exercises during the next Lenten season.  We will, of course, welcome any who would like to join us in this endeavor.

Br. Chad 2012

July 30

Chapter 48 pt. 3

The Rule of St. Benedict July 30

Sundays, in this passage, are to be set aside for the cultivation of the inner work that is study, or lectio divina.  I find it fascinating that our own society at large, until very recently, regarded Sundays as a day set aside for "rest"--stores closed, family gathered, home-cooked meals shared, etc.  But a dominant attitude in this recent memory is an entitlement to leisure, or idleness, on Sundays--watching football from the couch, reading the Sunday comics, long naps, etc.  It seems that the days and weeks of most people in our culture are spent between frenetic busyness and complete idleness.  Instead of balancing our time between mindful work, prayer, and study, we are consumed by tasks, one after another, until the sun goes down and we crash in front of some screen.  Sunday, for many, is a whole day set aside for vegetative leisure, in or out of church.

I wonder what it might look like if we were to build into our attitude about Sundays the value of cultivating our inner life rather than the value of leisure.  The key, I suspect, is to order the rest of our days in such a way that preserves internal resources for the work of the soul.

Br. Chad 2012

Every Pilgrim's Jerusalem

Sermon preached on 29 July 2012, The Ninth Sunday after Pentecost, Proper 12 at St. Augustine's Episcopal Parish in Tempe, Arizona.


Every Pilgrim's Jerusalem

1. Dublin

I find something very exhilarating in the act of stepping out onto a street in an unfamiliar city with my only bag on my back, boots on my feet, and the address of my place of lodging in my hand.  On the morning of July 11^th, the Airport bus dropped Jana and me off at the corner of Cathal Brugha Street and O’Connell Street Upper near the Dublin City Centre, a gentle drizzle coaxing us off the wide sidewalk to the shelter of the closest eaves in order to examine our unfolded itinerary and get our bearings.  We had to make it to the Maldron Hotel at Parnell Square where we had a room booked for that night, and where we would meet Fr. Gil and Cathy, who had arrived the day before. 

We gathered that we had to move north, asked directions from some friendly passersby, and set off to find our bed that we hoped would be available a couple hours before noon.  After a few wrong turns, a couple more friendly passersby, a free map at the tourist office, and not before my shoulders were aching from the weight of my pack, a fact that had me not a little worried about the next three days of walking, we passed through the glass doors of our hotel a fair bit closer to noon than we expected.  And as if they were waiting just for us, Gil and Cathy rose from their black leather seats in the lobby, and, with smiles and exclamations of welcome to Ireland, embraced us.

2. Jerusalem

Here at St. Augustine’s we’ve heard a lot about pilgrimage over the years, and the topic is especially poignant to us now as Fr. Gil and Cathy make their way from East to West across the Land of Saints and Scholars.  Pilgrimage was central within the spirituality of the Middle Ages throughout all of Europe, and the great medieval masters of the mystical Christian path understood pilgrimage as a symbol of the soul’s journey to its home in the heavenly Jerusalem.  Jerusalem, in other words, is the destination towards which every pilgrim sets her face, no matter upon which earthen trail her feet leave their prints.  And, as the fourteenth century Middle English poem, “Piers Plowman,” says, “Pilgrims are we all.”

Few descriptions of life within this Jerusalem, the true destination of every pilgrim, of every soul, are more detailed than what we find in this morning’s reading from the letter of St. Paul to the Ephesians.  Listen to his words again.

I bow my knees before the Father, from whom every family in heaven and on earth takes its name. I pray that, according to the riches of his glory, he may grant that you may be strengthened in your inner being with power through his Spirit, and that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith, as you are being rooted and grounded in love. I pray that you may have the power to comprehend, with all the saints, what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, so that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.

Now to him who by the power at work within us is able to accomplish abundantly far more than all we can ask or imagine, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus to all generations, forever and ever. Amen.

The Jerusalem to which I refer is what St. Paul here describes as a reality to be experienced in our “inner being”.  It is a reality saturated with love, the love of Christ that is beyond our knowing, but that dwells within us.  And when we awaken to this love, we are “filled with all the fullness of God”.  If this sounds far-fetched, don’t worry, as all pilgrims know, no one ever gets there by herself.  It is God’s “power at work within us” that delivers us to our destination.

3. False Jerusalems

Most people have mistaken their soul’s true home, the heavenly Jerusalem deep within, for some other reality that seems more tangible, more readily attainable.  In today’s Gospel we witness Jesus retreat from the crowd when he realizes that they intend to “take him by force and make him king.”  This is their response to being fed from the loaves and fishes.  They’ve mistaken the heavenly Jerusalem for a political kingdom wherein their interests have priority.  Now, there’s nothing wrong with oppressed people banding together to affect political change for the sake of their hungry children.   But the path of a bloody revolution in order to transfer power from one set of vested interests to another is not the path of a pilgrim whose face is set towards Jerusalem, the city of peace.

Others mistake the inner Jerusalem for the place where their desires are fulfilled.  In today’s Hebrew Scripture, King David, from his throne in the physical city of Jerusalem, takes advantage of a vulnerable woman and murders her faithful husband for the sake of nothing more than his pleasure and comfort.  David believes that in Jerusalem, what the king wants, the king gets.  But the pilgrim knows that in the true Jerusalem, the one throne in not for him.

4. How to Walk

So we are all pilgrims, and though our feet walk different paths on earth, and though we might lose sight of it, we share a common destination, Jerusalem, Zion, where Christ dwells in multi-dimensional love and where the fullness of God fills our inner being.  How, then, do we walk with our face set toward this goal instead of toward some false Jerusalem?  Well, as one might expect to hear from a preacher in a Christian church, we learn to walk by following Jesus on his own pilgrimage to Jerusalem.

During my time in Ireland, I brought a small journal along.  It was a gift from The Rev. Julie O’Brien, and it didn’t fare well in my pocket on the wettest of our days along the Wicklow Way.  In it I recorded my reflections on the verses I was reading from the Gospel According to St. Luke during my practice of lectio divina of which I’ve spoken before.  On the morning of our first day of walking, I had arrived at verse 51 of Chapter 9, which reads, “When the days drew near for him to be taken up, he set his face to go to Jerusalem.”  This oriented me to see my journey, my pilgrimage, through the lens of Jesus’ own pilgrimage to Jerusalem.  After our first day of walking, on a rainy morning in a youth hostel at Knockree, I read verses 57 and 58: “As they were going along the road, someone said to him, ‘I will follow you wherever you go.’  And Jesus said to him, ‘Foxes have holes, and birds of the air have nests; but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay his head.’”  In silent prayer, as I sat with these words, I saw the fox in me saunter along the way I walked— plotting, detailed, cautious, competent.  Then I saw the bird in me flutter down onto the path and back up into a tree—carefree, unfettered, irresponsible.  These are two ways of being a pilgrim: to plan every step, like a fox, or to “wing it,” like a bird.  But the Son of Man is not a pilgrim in either idiom.  Unlike a bird, Jesus has his clear destination, but unlike a fox, he does not control every detail of the journey.  If we are to walk our pilgrimage in the idiom of the Son of Man, we must set our clear intention “to go to Jerusalem” as we release our hold on the plans and expectations we carry with us.  If that sounds scary, this is one reason G.K. Chesterton wrote, “Christianity has not been tried and found wanting; it has been found difficult and not tried.”

5. Kildare

Our three days of walking delivered us to the ancient monastic city of Glendalough, and we spent Sunday among its many churches and scenic lakes.  We celebrated Mass in the ruins of St. Mary’s Church, just outside of the old monastery wall, and we walked to where we could see St. Kevin’s bed from across the water of the Upper Lake.  We felt peaceful, and a little sad walking among so many ruins of what was once a living and vibrant spiritual community.  We also had trouble orienting ourselves to the fact that we still had four days to spend in Ireland even though our time of walking the Wicklow Way had ended.  On Monday morning, we said goodbye to Gil, and Cathy drove us to Kildare where we planned to spend two nights in the city where St. Brigid founded her double monastery for women and men in the 5^th Century.  After a lovely lunch at a pub on the town square, we said goodbye to Cathy, and set off with our packs to find our Bed and Breakfast, which we knew was located at 1 Dara Park in Kildare.  It was just two blocks away, much easier to find than our hotel in Dublin, and we were shown to our room upstairs. 

Months before we left for the Emerald Isle, Gil had lent me a small book that he had bought five years ago when he had last visited Kildare.  It was written and published by the Brigidine Sisters, two of whom lived in a house somewhere in Kildare Town.  Jana asked me what I wanted to do with the rest of our afternoon, and I pulled the book out of my pack to see if we could figure out where the sisters’ house was located with the hope that maybe we could take a walk over, see if anyone was home, and say hello.  I turned the book over and saw that Solas Bhríde, which means, “the light of Brigid,” and is the name of their house, was located at 14 Dara Park, just a few houses down from the room in which we sat.

Five minutes later, as we walked, hand in hand, from the sidewalk toward the front door of Solas Bhríde, we exchanged smiles with a face in the front window and were met at the door by Sr. Mary Minehan, who welcomed us inside as though she was waiting just for us.  She asked our names, took our coats, and showed us into the small chapel where we sat in three chairs of a dozen arranged in a circle.  In the corner of the room burned a candle, which is the literal Solas Bhríde, which the Brigidines re-kindled at the Kildare Town Square in 1993.  Sr. Mary smiled, looked each of us in the eyes, and said, “I can tell that you pray.” 

At that moment I knew that I had found what I had come to Ireland seeking.  I saw reflected in the eyes of a living daughter of St. Brigid the work of a power that had accomplished within me far more than I could ask or imagine.  I felt that I was sitting before a window through which I saw my first glimpse of Jerusalem.  And as we sat together, drinking tea and talking, I began to awaken to the love of Christ, which seemed to fill every corner of the space we shared.

Amen.

July 29

Chapter 48 pt. 2

The Rule of St. Benedict July 29

Ora et Labora is the ancient Benedictine motto.  "Prayer and Work."  Chapter 48 "On the Daily Manual Labor" is one reason why it seems appropriate to add "Study" to the motto's translation.  Our Father Benedict clearly considers reading to be an essential component of the work a Benedictine is to do each day.

We see in this passage the creating of conditions by which ever further spiritual formation can take place throughout the year.  And, as is needed, a support system is provided for those who may resist such ongoing formation.  As Sr. Joan writes, "Study is hard work.  It is so much easier to find something else to do in its place than to stay at the grind of it."  Remaining open to the Spirit's creative energies within through engagement with the wider world of ideas is a beautiful disposition of the Benedictine heart.

Br. Chad 2012

July 28

Chapter 48 pt. 1

The Rule of St. Benedict July 28

One of my favorite lines in all of Sr. Joan's commentary on the Rule is from today's reading.  She writes, "Benedictine spirituality exacts something so much harder for our century than rigor.  Benedictine spirituality demands balance."

This morning I read the story of Jesus' visit to Martha's home in Chapter 10 of St. Luke's Gospel.  Martha welcomes Jesus and his entourage in, offering them hospitality, but is "distracted by her many tasks" to the extent that she begrudges her sister, Mary, her seat at Jesus' feet.  This passage is often used to extol the virtues of overt religious devotion over and against the vice of being a busybody, but far more than this simplistic dichotomy is at play here.  Jesus' affectionate admonition to Martha contrasts the "many things" about which she is "worried and distracted" with the "only one thing" of which there is need.  To be "worried and distracted" implies that one's attention is absent from one's actual environment.  Presence is the "one thing" that is needed if one is to, like Mary, listen to what the Lord is saying.

Rigor often holds one's attention hostage to a set of expectations around what must be done.  Those who value rigor too highly often direct their efforts toward human-made goals at the expense of presence in each moment.  Yet it is only in each moment that the voice of Christ can be heard.

What Benedictine balance affords is the opportunity to move from sleep to prayer to study to work in a way that needs only the "one thing".  When it is time to work, we listen to what the Lord is saying through our work.  When it is time to stop working and pray, we leave our work, perhaps undone, and listen to what the Lord is saying through the Office.  It is not magic, nor is it easy, but such is the balanced life that shapes the Benedictine soul.

Br. Chad 2012

July 27

Chapter 47

The Rule of St. Benedict July 27

Sr. Joan Chittister opens her commentary on Chapter 47 by describing Benedictine prayer as "regular and artistic."  I find much resonance with this characterization.

Prayer in the Benedictine tradition is literally regular, in that it conforms to a rule, a regula.  Its starting place is not extemporaneous, but formal.  It begins with a signal and proceeds with a carefully defined series of hymns, Psalms, and readings, and it is put to the religious superior to see to it that this is so in each Benedictine community.

Along with the regulation of prayer, Chapter 47 also tasks the superior with attending to the quality of its aesthetic presentation in the community.  This is the Opus Dei after all, the Work of God, and should be approached with a measure of beauty and excellence.

There are shadow sides to both of these elements that every healthy Benedictine community must acknowledge and address, however.  Regulations and artistry can become idols.  The sneering, upturned nose of the aesthete or the conformist's obsessive anxiety are every bit as damaging to our Father Benedict's intentions as haphazardness and ugliness.  We are to strike a balance in prayer that frees our hearts from the swirling chaos of our environments without shackling them to idols made by human hands.

Br. Chad 2012

July 26

Feast of St. Joachim and St. Anne, parents of the Blessed Virgin Mary and grandparents of Jesus


Chapter 46

The Rule of St. Benedict July 26

One aspect of community life is the wealth of stories that accumulate over the years.  One such story I overheard at St. Gregory's Abbey last year had to do with the instructions in this chapter.  It seems that a procedure for "com[ing] immediately before the Abbot and the community" after breaking something took on the form of kneeling with the broken item in hand at the entrance of the place where the community would gather next.  So, if the next community gathering is prayer, one would kneel at the entrance of the chapel, if a meal, one would kneel at the entrance to the refectory, and so on.  One day, many years ago, a brother was cleaning the bathroom before lunch and happened to break the toilet seat.  So, as the community and guests, of which there happened to be a large number that day, came silently into the refectory after the lunch bell, they had to walk past this brother kneeling with a toilet seat.  I was told that the procedure was modified after that.

Chapter 46 calls each member of the community to take responsibility for any fault they contribute to the common life, whether through a small, inconsequential accident or a "sin-sickness of the soul."  Our Father Benedict desires to cultivate a climate of trust and intimacy in the community.  Without trust, the community is poisoned by cycles of deception, suspicion, and accusation.  Without safe intimacy, the individual suffers the soul-killing trajectory of hidden guilt, self-loathing, and hardness of heart.

Br. Chad 2012

July 25

Feast of St. James the Apostle


Chapter 45

The Rule of St. Benedict July 25

Last year on the Feast of St. James the Apostle, I was at St. Gregory's Abbey in Three Rivers, Michigan, just concluding my two-week stay in the Summer Vocation program.  I saw the instructions from Chapter 45 (aside from the last sentence) played out several times during my time at St. Gregory's.  Almost every member of the community, including the Abbot, at one point or another, made a mistake on a Psalm tone or on a reading and immediately performed a small, quick genuflection toward the Superior.  This little action seemed to be the beginning and the end of the matter, and I felt it to be refreshing to have such a clear procedure for the addressing of mistakes rather than a muddled series of apologies and/or reprimands and/or passive-aggressive silence and/or cloying assurances.

As Benedict indicates, the issue for the offender is that of humility, which, in truth, needs not speak a word of excuse or defense.  And the issue for the Superior and community is that of holding the space for that humility to manifest without undue commentary or judgment.

Br. Chad 2012

July 24

Feast of Thomas á Kempis


Chapter 44

The Rule of St. Benedict July 24

The oratory and the table are the two pillars of common life in a Benedictine monastery, and when one member violates his responsibilities to the community, he endangers the very life he has vowed to uphold.  Without explaining away the harshness of Benedict's instructions here, I hear in this chapter a call to consider how profoundly our personal spiritual health affects the common life we have vowed to share with others.  As Sr. Joan writes in conclusion to her commentary today,

This chapter forces us to ask, in an age without penances and in a culture totally given to individualism, what relationships we may be betraying by selfishness and what it would take to cure ourselves of the self-centeredness that requires the rest of the world to exist for our own convenience.

Br. Chad 2012

July 23

Feast of St. Mary Magdalene (transferred)

Chapter 43 pt. 2

The Rule of St. Benedict July 23

Sr. Joan Chittister's commentary on this second half of Chapter 43 is worth reading in full.  Do so here. She writes,

In Benedictine spirituality, . . . the sacramental value of a meal is that the human concern we promise daily at the altar is demonstrated in the dining room where we prepare and serve and clean up after one another.

and further,

The meal becomes the sanctifying center that reminds us, day in and day out, that unless we go on building the community around us, participating in it and bearing its burdens, then the words, "family" and "humanity" become a sham, no matter how good our work at the office, no matter how important our work in the world around us.

Presence at table is an imperative in any household that seeks to walk the path of our Father Benedict.  And by "presence" I mean fully awake, conscious engagement with the realities at hand, seen and unseen.  This is true in a household of one or in a household of many.  The Benedictine is to honor the table as a sacramental focal point wherein the invisible is manifest among the visible.

Br. Chad 2012

 

July 22

Chapter 43 pt. 1

The Rule of St. Benedict July 22

The spiritual formation of the individual and the community is the intention that undergirds each instruction of our Father Benedict, and this passage is no exception.  Discipline is applied to the latecomer, not because he really messes up the vibe, but because "nothing . . . [is to] be put before the Work of God."  As a person who is rarely early, I can easily recognize the preferences and choices that result in my being tardy, and, if I'm honest, they are nearly always self-interested in nature.  I find what Sr. Joan writes to be true, that "Tardiness . . . denies the soul the full experience of anything."

As Benedictines, we are called to consciously prefer and choose the Opus Dei, the communal praying of the Daily Office, over whatever else seems to demand our time and attention.  Again, Sr. Joan's words resonate:

No matter how tired we are or how busy we are or how impossible we think it is to do it, Benedictine spirituality says, Stop. Now. A spiritual life without a regular prayer life and an integrated community consciousness is pure illusion.

Br. Chad 2012

July 21

Chapter 42

The Rule of St. Benedict July 21

Silence is a diversity.  I have heard the silence of anger burning.  I have heard the silence of paralyzing fear or guilt.  I have heard the silence of hopeful anticipation and the silence of green beauty.  I have heard the silence of safety and contentedness in the presence of loved ones and of the Beloved.

The silence after Compline is to be a fertile silence into which are planted words of peace and gentleness from Holy Scripture.  It is to be a silence of soul as well as sound, blooming with joy and love among the community.

Noise is also diverse.  We are each settled upon, like the many-splendored moss covered stones I encountered in Ireland, by the noises that fill the atmosphere of our lives.  But we, unlike stones, are able to adjust the air in which we live.  We can shut the laptop, turn off the television, put down the smartphone.

I long for the fertile silence our Father Benedict seeks to cultivate in and among us.

Pilgrims: Day 3 and Glendalough Day 1

Here are some photos of our third day of walking from Roundwood to Glendalough and from our days among the monastery churches, graveyards, and other ruins.  It is so hard to capture the beauty of this place and impossible to encapsulate its spirit.  I feel blessed to have walked among these sacred stones.

 Up . . . up . . . up . . .

 The mid-way point for the day.  Lunch!

 Down . . .

 down . . .

 down . . .

 And the final climb to . . .

 Our first view of Glendalough.

 And down to our journey's end.

 The gate to the monastic enclosure, the last surviving gateway of its kind.

 St. Kevin's Church

 This cross is found just inside the gateway.  It indicates that the monastery was a place of refuge for all seeking asylum.

 Br. Chad 2012

July 20

Chapter 41

The Rule of St. Benedict July 20

This chapter is a refreshing way to re-enter my dialog with the Rule after having to suspend my postings over the last week due to the lack of consistent Internet access as we walked, bussed, and flew our way back home.

We see in Chapter 41 the priority given to practical, embodied human need over ascetical ideals and structures.  It's not that the structures and ideals are dismissed or worthless, they are much of what shapes the Benedictine soul, but when circumstances and bodily need come into conflict with the ideal in a person's experience, it is the structure that gives way.  Our Father Benedict writes, "Thus it is that [the Abbot] should adapt and arrange everything in such a way that souls may be saved and that the brethren may do their work without cause for murmuring."

Sometimes we expect the impossible from ourselves.  We want to believe that we can keep the regimen up in any circumstances, that we don't need to make adjustments when legitimate difficulties present themselves.  This is pride, pure and simple, and it's not any less self-interested when it's applied to spiritual matters.

St. Benedict gives us permission to acknowledge our weaknesses and humble ourselves.  The goal is the salvation of our souls, the transformation of our consciousness, through the preservation of a balanced life.  This feels like a gift from a master pilgrim to all who walk the Path.

Br. Chad 2012

Pilgrims

Sisters, brothers, friends.  Instead of trying to force into our very full days time to reflect meaningfully on the Rule of our Holy Father Benedict, I will instead post some pictures of our journey thus far.  We have just completed day 2 of our walk from Dublin to Glendalough, and we are at a hostel (w/ wifi) in Roundwood, a little town along the Wicklow Way.  We walked over the highest point in Ireland today, and it was cold, foggy, and rainy all day long.  I'm not complaining . . .  Enjoy.

Day 1: Dublin to Knockree (about 14 miles for us, we took a wrong turn: )

Day 2: Knockree to Roundwood (about 12 miles 100% in the rain!)