April 27

The Second Sunday of Easter

The Rule of St. Benedict: Chapter 69

An unspoken assumption in this chapter provides a key to understanding its deepest meaning.  The assumption is that God is the one against whom any act of defense is undertaken in a Benedictine community.  Each member has handed himself over totally to being formed by God, a sacred pact that must not be compromised by even the best of intentions.  Sr. Joan reflects,

In a life dedicated to spiritual growth and direction, there is no room for multiple masters. Friends who protect us from our need to grow are not friends at all.  People who allow a personal agenda, our need to be right or their need to shield, block the achievement of a broader vision in us and betray us.

It takes profound trust and true discipline both to submit to being formed and to keep from acting in another's defense when we feel as though there is a need for protection or intervention on her behalf.  None of us can do the hard work of another's formation.  Each of us must entrust each other to the Master.

Br. Chad

April 26

Saturday in Easter Week

The Rule of St. Benedict: Chapter 68

Until one faces one's own resistance and overcomes one's own sense of inability, a human being is confined within the boundaries of personal desire, preference, and fear.  We are often in need of a firm shove if we are to transgress those boundaries.  Our Father Benedict desires to lead us beyond our self-imposed borders into an experience of Divine union wherein it is not our personal identities, but God's creative work in the world around us that guides our movement.  We are to become vessels for Spirit, channels of Power through which the Household of Heaven flows into our circumstances.

Each small breakthrough in the matter of prayer practice, in study, in work frees us more and more to listen to and obey God's voice rather than the voice of our resistance.  Each time we find that we were wrong about our inabilities, we find it easier to accept that we are not the designers of our own lives, but that a larger Purpose is at play through us.  Each step outside of our own boundaries confirms the truth of the opening line of Psalm 127: "Unless Adonai builds the house, their labor is in vain who build it."

Br. Chad

April 25

Friday in Easter Week

The Rule of St. Benedict: Chapter 67

Our Father Benedict acknowledges and seeks to deal here with a spiritual reality that I have experienced often in my life and work in churches.  Each person brings with her to church an invisible crowd of other people and past experiences that affect the spiritual climate of the gathering.  Sometimes the presence of this unseen crowd is overwhelming.  Sometimes it's easy to ignore.

In a Benedictine community, ignoring it is not an option, so St. Benedict wisely makes the unseen dynamics explicit by establishing a protocol whereby the spiritual climate of the community can be cleansed. When we commit ourselves to a vowed life in a religious community, we place ourselves at the mercy of each other's inner well-being.  In a significant way, we release our right to carry our baggage alone and claim that its dark contents are nobody's business.  We own the fact that we were never successful in the first place at keeping the contents from spilling out onto the people around us.  With the illusion of independence removed and replaced with mutual commitment and compassion, we are able to unpack our bags in safety and begin the hard work of bringing what has sat in long darkness into the Light.

Br. Chad

April 24

Thursday in Easter Week

The Rule of St. Benedict: Chapter 66

Over the last couple of years, I have felt much like the porter at our parish.  The circumstances of my life have been such that I am physically at the church for most of the working hours of the week.  When I hear the clicking of the latch, the squeaking of the hinges, and the banging of the heavy wooden door against the frame down the hall, I rise from my work and stand to greet whomever will appear momentarily at the entrance to the church office.

The disposition of the porter towards the visitor that our Father Benedict describes in this chapter is a tall order to fulfill.  St. Benedict is not simply interested in a butler's formal, detached politeness, but in a genuine celebration of the presence of Christ in the person of the uninvited guest.  Such a disposition cannot be snapped into place like a clip-on bow tie, but must abide already in one's heart, awaiting the opportunity to be called forth.

The role of the porter offers a view of an inner posture that St. Benedict desires for us all to assume.  It is a posture that receives whatever may come with an eye for where God is in it.  It is a posture that remains free from entanglement within the deadlines and agendas that keep us from perceiving and welcoming Christ in the moment.

Most of us have a busy day ahead of us.  There is a lot to get done.  Nevertheless, let us listen today for when when Christ comes banging through some door, and let us rise to receive his blessing.

Br. Chad

April 23

Wednesday in Easter Week

The Rule of St. Benedict: Chapter 65 pt. 2

Our Father Benedict goes to great lengths in this chapter to make very clear that the Abbot is in charge and that there is no question whatsoever about under whom the Prior serves.  Let us remember, though, that the authority exercised by the Abbot is in the spirit of Christ, not in the spirit of the world around us.  Christlike authority can hold in tension the two statements: "All authority on heaven and on earth has been given to me" and "not my will, but yours be done."

A Benedictine community is to be centered around the mystical reality of a soul's union with God and with others.  Just as Christ lives to remove that which separates from God and each other, the Abbot holds the space in community for this reality to manifest.  Conflicts of the nature described in this passage serve to shift focus from this central intention of the group onto, as Sr. Joan says, "the multiple minor agendas of its members. At that moment, the mystical dimension of the community turns into just one more arm wrestling match among contenders."

Br. Chad

April 22

Tuesday in Easter Week

The Rule of St. Benedict: Chapter 65 pt. 1

St. Benedict was no stranger to the nitty gritty of institutional authority dynamics.  Clearly he had seen enough trouble around the issue of appointing a second in command that he saw fit in this passage to shed light on the primary circumstances surrounding that trouble.  But the root of this trouble is deeper and more basic to the human experience than the circumstances described here.  The root is egoic self-interest attached to a position of leadership.  When leadership is exercised in the interest of the leader, it is not leadership in the Spirit of Christ.

Christ leads as a servant, leads as a slave -- humble, poor, marginalized -- without attachment to the interests of the small self.  A leader with the eyes of Christ perceives the true needs of the one who rises up to usurp her authority.  A leader with the heart of Christ desires to fulfill that true need, even if it is fulfilled at great personal expense.  Such a leader can genuinely utter the words, "Abba, forgive them, for they know not what they do," in the wake of betrayal, a sham trial, and from the midst of a brutal execution.

Br. Chad

April 21

Monday in Easter Week

The Rule of St. Benedict: Chapter 64 pt. 2

This passage paints a picture of authority in the idiom of Christ that is full, wise, and beautiful.  Returning to it three times a year as I read through the Rule clears my vision and strengthens my intention.  Inasmuch as I am called by God into positions of leadership, I desire to lead in this manner and no other.

A poignant example from this passage of our Father Benedict's vision of authority:

Taking [Scriptural] examples of discretion, the mother of virtues, let her so temper all things  that the strong may have something to strive after, and the weak may not fall back in dismay.

And another:

Let her know that her duty is rather to profit her sisters than to preside over them. She must therefore be learned in the divine law, that she may have a treasure of knowledge from which to bring forth new things and old. 

And remembering our host parish priest, Fr. Gil, and his modeling of "non-anxious presence" in our midst:

Let her not be excitable and worried, nor exacting and headstrong, nor jealous and over-suspicious; for then she is never at rest.  

Thanks be to God for wisdom that has cleared a path for us to walk and for those in whose footsteps we can place our own unsteady feet.

Br. Chad