hearts,’ and again, ‘He who has ears to hear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the Churches.’ And what does the Spirit say? ‘Come, my sons, listen to me; I shall teach you the fear of the Lord.’ ‘Run while you have the light of life lest the darkness of death overwhelm you.’
Benedict calls us from spiritual inertia to spiritual initiative; from complacency to action. But there is more here than the summons to a life of faithful good works. Benedict's call to holiness is an alarm – a wake-up call. Like St Paul, Benedict is calling us to rise out of sleep (Rom. 13.11).
All the spiritual traditions teach that the unenlightened state is like being asleep. It has never been more true than in contemporary Western society. Sometimes it seems that the whole modern world is conspiring to weave a magical spell over us. Television, advertising, and all the tools of popular culture continually bombard us with seductive and hypnotic false images. If we are not careful, this false culture can dull our senses and lull us into a kind of trance, and we begin to exist in a nether world of attractive lies and half-truths.
Benedict calls us to awake out of this dozy world and face reality. Beginning the spiritual journey means we must wake up and see ourselves and our world for the first time. We must listen intently to the divine voice which cries out daily (Ps. 95.8). This profound openness to God's voice and God's way of seeing requires a radical transformation in our whole viewpoint. It is like seeing in colour when once we saw in black and white.
To live in this wakeful state is the work of a lifetime, and for the first time Benedict says we must ‘run’ in this path. Run, while you have the light, he says, lest the darkness of death overtake you (John 12.35). Running is an apt metaphor for the spiritual life because running is a discipline which is both exhausting and exhilarating. To run in Benedict's way is to practise the difficult art of contemplation – the art of being spiritually awake and alert.
This sounds the stuff of mystical retreats in caves, but the alert state of mind is most simply cultivated through daily prayer and thankfulness (Col. 4.2). A moment of genuine gratitude to God is a moment of contemplation because in that moment, as in contemplation, we look beyond ourselves in love. As Julian of Norwich writes, ‘Thanksgiving is the deep inward certainty which moves us with reverent and loving fear to turn with all our strength to the work which God stirs us, giving thanks and praise from the depth of our hearts.’
So as we nurture a thankful spirit in ourselves and in our homes, we lay the foundations for the contemplative life. Therefore, the child's first prayer ought to be the simple prayer of thanks. And as we grow to thank God for the small things, it is not long before our awareness grows and we are able to contemplate his mighty hand in all his works.
January 3
May 4
September 3
THE PROLOGUE (C)
And as the Lord seeks his workman in the mass of people, he again cries out to him in the words, ‘Who is the man who desires life and is eager to see Good Days?’ If you hear this and reply, ‘I do’, God says to you, ‘If you want to have true and everlasting life, keep your tongue from speaking evil, and your lips from uttering deceit. Turn aside from evil and do good; seek peace and follow after it.’ ‘When you do this my eyes will be upon you, and my ears will be open to your prayers, and before you call upon me I shall say to you: “Here I am”.’ What can be sweeter to us than this voice of the Lord as he invites us, dearest brothers? See how, in his loving mercy, the Lord points out to us the Way of Life.
Developing a thankful spirit in the home is one of the simplest and most effective ways of promoting an awareness of God's presence and constant love. One hears a lot about the power of positive thinking, but positive thinking on its own is little more than a kind of self-hypnosis. Thankfulness, on the other hand, is God-directed positive thinking.
This kind of spiritually-positive attitude is something Benedict stresses in today's passage from the Rule. The disciple is one who ‘desires life and is eager to see good days’. This kind of disciple keeps his tongue from speaking evil and his lips from uttering deceit. He turns aside from evil and does good; he seeks peace and follows after it (Ps. 34.12–15). Those persons who are running the path with Benedict have a positive outlook because they look for the good not the evil. They seek peace, not conflict. This is supplemented by their thankful attitude because thankfulness helps them see the good side of every person and circumstance.
This isn't to say that the monastery or the Christian home should be a saccharine centre of falsely-grinning Christians. Nothing rings more untrue than artificial religious enthusiasm, and there is no such thing as a community without conflict. However, some people do imagine that the suppression of all anger and bad-tempered outbursts make a home Christian. In fact, this only leads to a false peace and a deeper kind of evil. It does so because the suppression of all conflict and human unpleasantness is an insidious form of untruthfulness.
Benedict doesn't allow such an outwardly pleasant lie. While he stresses that we should keep our lips from speaking evil he also says they should not utter deceit. So conflict must be handled honestly. Anger must be acknowledged and dealt with. The parents who seek peace will also seek justice, knowing that much anger flows from a perception that justice has not been done. The family who seeks this combination of peace and justice, honesty and speaking no evil is bound to flourish. Spiritually speaking, God is right next to them, and promises to hear even before they ask (Isa. 58.6–11).
Benedict is optimistic and moved by the possibilities this promises. He has lifted much of the Prologue from earlier monastic writings, but here his own tender personality shines through in the words fratres carissimi – ‘dearest brothers’. So he calls us with simple and winning enthusiasm as his own dear brothers to listen to the voice of the Lord and to run with him in the path of Christ's abundant life (Ps. 25.10; John 10.10).
January 4
May 5
September 4
THE PROLOGUE (D)
Let us therefore make for ourselves a girdle out of faith and perseverance in good works, and under the guidance of the Gospel let us pursue our way in his paths, so that we may deserve to see him who has called us to his Kingdom. For if we wish to make our home in the dwelling-place of his Kingdom, there will be no getting there unless we run towards it by good deeds. But let us question the Lord with the prophet, saying to him, ‘Lord, who shall make his home in your dwelling-place; who shall rest on your holy mountain?’ And then let us listen to the Lord's answer to our question, as he shows us the way to this dwelling-place, saying, ‘He who walks without fault and does what is right; he who tells the truth in his heart; he who works no deceit with his tongue; he who does no wrong to his neighbour; he who does not slander his neighbour.’ ‘He who casts the wicked devil, even as he beguiles him, out of the sight of his heart, along with the temptation itself, and so reduces him to impotence, and takes the incipient thoughts that he suggests and dashes them against (the rock of) Christ’; those who fear the Lord and do not become conceited about keeping the law well, but realise that the good in themselves cannot be their own work but is done by the Lord, and who praise the Lord working within them, as they say with the prophet, ‘Not unto us, Lord, not unto us, but unto your name, give the glory.’ For neither did the Apostle Paul give himself any credit for his preaching, but said, ‘By the grace of God I am what I am.’ And the same Apostle also said, ‘He who boasts must boast in the Lord.’
