Benedictine Spirituality - Moving Beyond Faulty Impressions

The world, and a large part of the Christian world for that matter, lives with a faulty impression of monks, sisters, and monasticism in general. The words seem to somehow conjure up images of suffering, deprivation, sour dourness, and strict punishments for breaking the rules.

Hollywood, along with a lot of well-intentioned but erroneous interpretations by misinformed Christians, has done an excellent job in creating these false impressions.

I, for one, lived with and assimilated these false impressions into my own conception of things monastic. My Protestant background presented nothing positive to encourage me to consider otherwise. I was, as a Protestant minister, steeped in the theologies and doctrines of the Protestant Reformation of the 16th Century and in the subsequent divisional reformations that further subdivided the Protestant movement into what we see of it in these modern times.

The several years that represent the conclusion of the 20th and the beginning of the 21st Centuries were, for me, intense crisis years.

I think of those years as a personal season of death and resurrection – a long and difficult season that involved voluntarily separating myself from all that I had previously known, including people. No one that I had previously known over the course of the 45 years that represented my life at the time, with the exception of my daughter and mother, knew where I was at or how to contact me. It was during this personal season of death and resurrection – nearly two decades ago – that I began discovering the wealth of spiritual health available in the Catholic Church and within the various expressions of monasticism.

All of us human creatures are on a journey through life. An inherent part of this journey, as a result of sin, is that we are all born to die.[1] The reality that death awaits should behoove every human creature to investigate what awaits beyond the door that death opens.

Every journey through life is replete with challenging obstacles. Endeavoring to live a genuine Christian life – pursuing Christlikeness – sets us up for a lot of conflict, not only from the world around us but also within the world of our own self. Benedictine spirituality is a course in dressing ourselves in Christlikeness. The course recognizes that the greatest battle for Christlikeness is on the battleground of self.[2] At times I am on the battle front. At times I am recovering in the infirmary.

God uses the crises in our lives to bring us to the end of ourselves. When we reach the end of ourselves, we discover our need to let go of our cherished preconceived notions and preferences.[3] The tower of the “I” that I make of myself is demolished. I can, if I choose, reclaim it and reassemble it. But why would I want to?

Hollywood and the images painted by misinformed others of monks, sisters, and monasticism?

Some of the happiest and most joyful souls I have ever had the pleasure of meeting happen to reside in monasteries.

[Photo – With Father Thomas O'Connor at Saint Bernard Abbey, Cullman, AL. March, 2007]

[1] “For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ shall all be made alive.” 1 Corinthians 15:22 [2] “This message of mine is for you, then, if you are ready to give up your own will, once and for all, and armed with the strong and noble weapons of obedience to do battle for the true King, Christ the Lord.” RB Prologue 3 [3] “I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me.” Galatians 2:20

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We have recently published my first book, The Less Worn Path, Reflections on My Way, a collection of short essays that I wrote during my transition into the Catholic Church. The personal reflections and thoughts contained in the book are a glimpse of one man's transitional struggle with himself, the reality of God, and with the divisions in the Church. They explore some of the awkward situations that these variables have a tendency to create. These short essays are meant to inspire, provoke thought, and accompany the reader along his or her own less worn path. The Less Worn Path is available in either print or Kindle at Amazon.