Insights for the Ages

A number of people at Abbey Way sit under the tutelage of Joan Chittister's book Insights for the Ages to understand the Rule of Benedict better. Her book serves our community well in its fodder for lively conversation and prayer. Interpreting the riches of monastic life for contemporary readers, Joan consistently finds the heart of the Gospel when she writes about Benedict's regula. 

Today's daily reading from the Rule and Joan's commentary captures my attention. It challenges me to think differently about what it means to be Christian in community with others. It calls me to make choices with my life that are more consistent with Jesus' call to come and follow. 

What do you hear?

CHAPTER 33. MONASTICS AND PRIVATE OWNERSHIP
March 11 - July 11 - Nov. 10

Above all, this evil practice (of private ownership) must be uprooted and removed from the monastery. We mean that without an order from the prioress or abbot, no members may presume to give, receive or retain anything as their own, nothing at all--not a book, writing tablets or stylus--in short not a single item, especially since monastics may not have the free disposal even of their own bodies and wills. For their needs, they are to look to the prioress or abbot of the monastery, and are not allowed anything which the prioress or abbot has not given or permitted. "All things should be the common possession of all, as it is written, so that no one presumes ownership of anything (Acts 4:32)."

But if any members are caught indulging in this most evil practice, they should be warned a first and a second time. If they do not amend, let them be subjected to punishment.

There are two concerns at issue in this chapter of the Rule: the development of personal freedom and the preservation of human community. Private ownership touches both of them.

The Hasidim tell the story of the visitor who went to see a very famous rabbi and was shocked at the sparsity, the bareness, the emptiness of his little one-room house. "Why don't you have any furniture," the visitor asked. "Why don't you?" the rabbi said. "Well, because I'm only passing through," the visitor said. "Well, so am I," the rabbi answered.

On the journey to heaven, things tie us to the earth. We can't move to another city because we have a huge mortgage on the house in this one. We can't take care of a sick neighbor because we are too busy taking care of our own hedges. We go poor giving big parties in the hope for big promotions. We get beholden to the people who give big parties back. We take things and hoard things and give things to control our little worlds and the things wind up controlling us. They clutter our space; they crimp our hearts; they sour our souls. Benedict says that the answer is that we not allow ourselves to have anything beyond life's simple staples in the first place and that we not use things--not even the simplest things--to restrict the life of another by giving gifts that tie another person down. Benedictine simplicity, then, is not a deprivation. It frees us for all of life's surprises.

Simplicity is more than the key to personal freedom, however. Simplicity is also the basis of human community. Common ownership and personal dependence are the foundations of mutual respect. If I know that I literally cannot exist without you, without your work, without your support, without your efforts in our behalf, without your help, as is true in any community life, then I can not bury myself away where you and your life are unimportant to me. I cannot fail to meet your needs, as you have met my needs, when the dearth in you appeals for the gifts in me. It is my ability to respond to your needs, in fact, that is my claim, my guarantee, of your presence in my own life. In community life, we genuinely need one another. We rely on one another. Community life is based on mutual giving.

The family, the relationship that attempts to reconcile the independent and the independently wealthy, the perfectly, the totally, the smugly self-sufficient, is no community, no family, no relationship at all. Why stay and work a problem out with people when you can simply leave them? And never notice that they're gone.

The preceding excerpt is from Insights for the Ages by Joan Chittister and was found on the web. 

A link to the daily reading from the RB (Rule of Benedict) is listed on the sidebar on the right under "Benedict's Rule: Daily Reading." 

Comments

[Sally]

This really struck me as well. I wanted to read it with my family, but I have yet to revisit it. Some part of me runs away from this, even when my soul yearns for it! I know this is the right way to live, but my I really like my "stuff"...or do I??

[Christi]

Why stay and work out a problem with people when you can simply leave them? I have been praying this question all of my life . . . powerful powerful question!

[JaimeG]

Amen!