The Wisdom of Accommodation

St. Benedict was born in 480, when the Roman Empire was crumbling in the west and Italy was occupied by barbarian tribes like the Goths and the Lombards. It was a chaotic time of war, changing political rulers, famine, and epidemics. You’d think that St. Benedict would have responded to the chaos around him by instituting strict, unyielding rules when he was establishing his monasteries. Instead, as he pieced together his Rule from other sources, he made changes that reflected a spirit of accommodation and moderation rather than strictness and rigidity.

St. Benedict was flexible about times for prayer, eating, working, and sleeping based on the sea-sons. Rules regarding bathing and eating meat were relaxed for those who were sick. When the work was heavier than usual, the abbot had the authority to pro-vide larger meals. Not everyone was treated exactly the same, but the disparity was based on need, not on rank. In several places in the Rule, St. Benedict essentially said that if you can find a better way to do something, go for it.

In our own time of pandemic, we would do well to follow St. Benedict’s example of accommodation. People who are especially vulnerable to the COVID-19 virus should be allowed to vote by mail. Those working with people who are hard of hearing should be given masks with a clear insert or a face shield to allow reading of lips. Resources should be given to schools, teachers, and students to facilitate online teaching.

Chaos and fear are not quelled by rigid implementation of rules but by instilling a sense of safety by meeting people’s basic needs. St. Benedict said, “Whoever needs less should thank God and not be distressed, but whoever needs more should feel humble because of his weakness, not self-important because of the kindness shown him” (RB 34:3-4). We need to remember that one day we ourselves will be numbered among the weak and those in need of accommo-dation. As St. Benedict demonstrated, always opting for kindness is a good “rule” of thumb.

Chaos and the Law of Love

It seems to be a universal principle that chaos precedes creation. Every planet in the universe emerged from a giant, rotating cloud of swirling cosmic debris and gas. All songs, paintings, and poems are the result of a complicated series of electrical impulses and chemical neurotransmitters in our brains. Every good meal begins as a set of disparate ingredients that need to be combined in certain amounts, with varying degrees of heat, in certain sequences. But if chaos is so universal, why does it often make us feel so disoriented and uneasy?

Typically I'm a calm person, but lately I’ve been feeling increasingly anxious as the chaos of election season in the U.S. intensifies. Anxiety often stems from a lack of control, and I certainly can’t control the outcome of the election. However, I can choose to step back and ground myself in God, who ultimately brings good out of any situation, even the death of his Son. I also can choose to emulate Jesus by responding to hatred with love and forgiveness.

Whit Merrifield, a Kansas City Royals baseball player, summed it up well in today’s issue of the Kansas City Star as he reflected on the nation’s racial conflicts: “What I know is that love brings on love and hate brings on hate…. I’m going to go out and try to love everybody. …being the Christian man that I am, that’s the number one rule that I like to live by.”

When we are in the midst of chaos, it is more important than ever to listen to the voice of Christ. As Esther de Waal notes in her book A Life-Giving Way, when I do that, “I realize that what I am being asked to do here is simply to fulfill the law of love, which is where in the end everything in Benedict’s rule of life is leading me.” My responsibility in the midst of the current chaos in the United States is to fulfill the law of love in the daily circumstances of my life. Then I can place my trust in God’s own love, justice, mercy, and sometimes inexplicable timing and gain a measure of peace.

God's Tiny Treasures

The psalms continually invite us to “Come and see the works of God” (Ps 66:3) and then generally mention grand events such as creating mountains, turning the Red Sea into dry land so the Israelites could escape from Egypt, and setting the sun in the heavens. Just as wonderful, however, is God’s attention to the smallest details in creation.

How amazing is it that God created humans in such a way that we use 200 muscles to blink our eyes? Or that God saw a need for fruit flies, which are only about 1/8 inch long and have proved to be an ideal species for biological research into genetics? Did you know that there are 17,000 species of lichens and that the wings of the world’s smallest bird, the bee hummingbird, beat 80 times a second?

We don’t have to make a trip to the Grand Canyon or Niagara Falls to witness the great works of God. God’s marvels surround us and lie within us, but we often overlook them because too often we equate being small with being unimportant. Yet where would we be without humble honey bees, for example, which pollinate 70% of the crop species that feed the world and are responsible for $30 billion a year in crops? We’d be working a lot harder to feed ourselves, for one thing.

Come and see the works of God: ice crystals and aloe plants, eye lashes and pea gravel, toenails and mustard seeds. Nothing in the universe is unimportant and everything has a purpose, for it all springs from God’s fertile imagination—including, quite amazingly, you and me. Do you see?

Allowing Ourselves to Be Surprised

The poet David Whyte says, “I think that a life sincerely followed is always surprising and leads you into places that you did not feel you could either enter or deserve … [you must] allow yourself to be surprised at where you have arrived.”

This statement certainly applies to people with a vocation to religious life. I myself am surprised that I arrived back at the Mount 30+ years after initially deciding it wasn’t the right place for me! However, I did sincerely follow the thread of prayer and desire for community that wove through my life, so I shouldn’t have been surprised to be surprised.

Scripture shows us that people who enter into a relationship with God often end up in surprising places. I’m sure Jacob’s son Joseph didn’t expect to be transported to Egypt, the prophet Jonah didn’t expect to land in the belly of a whale, and Jesus’ mother Mary didn’t expect to be unmarried and pregnant. We can gather from these stories that God often calls us to serve in unexpected ways, for “my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways” (Isaiah 55:8). Although we may not feel up to the task we are asked to perform and often would prefer another one, God knows us better than we know ourselves and understands our capabilities and the challenges we need to grow into fullness of life.

We like to think of God as unchanging, because that idea gives us comfort in trying times. Certainly God’s love, mercy, and presence are constant, but often they appear in our lives in surprising ways, because God is always making things new. Trying to control our lives every step along the way restricts us to the limits of our own imagination and prevents us from experiencing the joy and delight that await us when we discover the surprises God has in store for us.

Fostering Good Zeal

On June 18, 1983, Dr. Sally Ride became the first American woman in space as a crew member on the space shuttle Challenger. According to Wikipedia, after earning a PhD in physics in 1978, she was selected to be an astronaut as part of the first class to select women. She applied after seeing an advertisement in the Stanford student newspaper and was one of only 35 people selected out of 8000 applications. After completing training in 1979, she served as the ground-based capsule communicator for the second and third Space Shuttle flights and helped develop and operate the space shuttle’s robot arm.

Ride became a role model for girls, but her attitude also offers wisdom for all of us. After completing her first mission, Ride said, “The thing that I’ll remember most about the flight is that it was fun.” Often we can become overly serious in our quest for holiness and forget that a spirit of zest and joy feeds the “good zeal” St. Benedict refers to in his Rule.

I suspect that one reason Ride was so enthusiastic about her flight is that it allowed her to use her scientific skills in one of the most challenging and adventurous environments imaginable. St. Paul said, “Do not neglect the gift that is in you” (1 Tim 4:14). When we aren’t able to use our gifts because of societal or financial restrictions or because of our own lack of courage and persistence, life becomes lackluster.

In general, people who have fun while working are not neglecting the gift that is in them. Joy is a sure sign that we are not neglecting our gift. The world needs what God has implanted within us, and giving it feeds our happiness. Like Sr. Sally Ride, may we foster and use the gift that is in us with good zeal!

Pray As You Can

A friend recently told me that although some members of her church have been participating in peaceful protests in support of racial justice, “I have not felt the call to protest as I have in the past and am feeling a little guilty about it.” However, she is promoting racial justice in another way by tutoring two young women from Ecuador and Cairo who are in the process of becoming U.S. citizens. Her situation makes me think of a statement by Abbot John Chapman that was quoted by Fr. Jerome Kodell, OSB, in a recent Being Benedictine online forum: “Pray as you can, not as you can’t.”

People with a heightened sense of compassion and responsibility often judge themselves for what they are not doing. We generally think of responsibility in positive terms, but as Fr. Jerome cautions, “There is a pitfall in responsibility if it is not enlightened by discernment.” The desire to respond to all the needs we encounter (and be praised for doing so) can lead to the trap of overrespon-sibility, which often results in wasted energy, anger, depression, and exhaustion.

Fr. Jerome notes that the discernment advocated by St. Benedict in his Rule fosters moderation and helps us avoid the dangers of overresponsibility. St. Benedict encourages us to listen to what we are called to do in our present circumstances, develop the humility to recognize our limitations, and acknowledge the validity of our elders’ experience so we can learn from their wisdom.

Pray as you can, not as you can’t. Today, perhaps that means recognizing that we don’t have to do everything because (a) God is God and we are not and (b) the Body of Christ has more than enough diverse, talented, and helping hands to respond to the needs of the world.

Letting God Be God

Because he was human, Jesus had to learn—as all humans must—that God’s mercy has no boundaries. The culture in which Jesus was raised emphasized that the Israelites alone were God’s chosen people. It is natural, then, that Jesus believed his mission was only “to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.” As we see in Matthew 15: 21-28, it took the fierce love of a Canaanite woman for her daughter to open Jesus’ eyes to God’s love and mercy for all people.

In a reflection on this gospel story, Sr. Esther Fangman noted that the Canaanite woman responded in a nonviolent manner to the disdain she was shown by Jesus and his disciples. She did not bristle at or attempt to refute their characterization of her, but neither did she withdraw; she stood her ground and persisted in her call for mercy. She humbly but insistently noted that all people, even the lowly, have a claim on God’s providence: “Please, Lord, for even the dogs eat the scraps that fall from the table of their masters.” Her response helped Jesus realize that non-Israelites also can have faith in God’s mercy, and he healed her daughter.

In this encounter, Jesus learned to set aside judgment and let God be God. If God wished to rescue a Canaanite girl from a demon, so be it. We, too, need to stop judging who “deserves” to be included in our vision of God’s kingdom and instead imitate God’s mercy when we encounter people who are suffering and in need. As Thomas Merton said, “Our job is to love others without stopping to inquire whether or not they are worthy. That is not our business, and in fact, it is nobody’s business. What we are asked to do is to love, and this love itself will render both ourselves and our neighbors worthy if anything can.”

Seeing God From a Different Perspective

Our life in God is like a prism. Although we can look at it from many different angles, we tend to view it from only one perspective: what it is like to be a human with my particular body, culture, beliefs, and desires.

From time to time in scripture, we see people who are invited to view the prism from a different perspective. It happened to Peter, James, and John when they saw Jesus transfigured and, as Malcom Guite says, “The love that dances at the heart of things / Shone out upon us from a human face.” It happened to the disciples in the midst of a storm when Jesus walked toward them on the water, which led them to proclaim, “Truly, you are the Son of God!” It happened to Mary when she saw an angel who asked if she would be the mother of Jesus and told her, “The power of the Most High will overshadow you; therefore the child to be born will be called holy, the Son of God.”

In his book The Lord, Romano Guardini describes such occasions in this way:

“In the midst of everything that [we] may think or experience, in the midst of all that is known as the “world,” there rises a point that does not belong to the world, a place into which one may step, a room one may enter, a power on which one may lean, a love to which one may give oneself. This is reality, a reality different from the reality of the world, more real than the world. Faith is the act of seizing this reality, of building one’s life on it, of becoming a part of it.”

When Mary was invited to consider a different aspect of God—a God who wanted to become flesh and live among us—she saw the truth of this reality and seized it, built her life on it, became a part of it. As we celebrate the Assumption of Mary tomorrow, we can ask her to invest us with her vision, courage, and trust so we too can see how things really are beyond the confines of our human lives and become part of the love that dances at the heart of things.

Wisdom from St. Jane de Chantal

Because my middle name is Jane, I chose August 12 to be my “name day,” for it is the memorial of St. Jane Frances de Chantal. This saint had an unusual life; at age 20 she married Baron de Chantal and they lived in the feudal castle of Bourbilly, which was on the brink of ruin. A gifted manager, Jane restored order in the household  and returned it to prosperity. She had six children, two of whom died in infancy, and she was widowed at age 28, when her husband was killed in an accident.

To safeguard her children’s inheritance after her husband’s death, Jane had to move to the home of her ill-tempered father-in-law and his servant, who ruled the roost. As the Catholic Encyclopedia remarks, “This was real servitude, which she bore patiently and gently for seven years. At last her virtue triumphed over the ill will of the old man and housekeeper.” In 1604 Jane met Francis de Sales, who became her spiritual advisor. With his assistance, she founded the Congregation of the Visitation, which welcomed women whom other orders rejected because of their age or health problems. By the time she died, the Congregation had 86 houses, and there were 164 houses when she was canonized in 1767.

Jane entrusted the education and care of her 14-year-old son to her father and brother before she left for Annecy to found her Congregation. The story goes that her son tried to prevent her from leaving by lying across the threshold of their home. She stopped briefly, overcome with sorrow, but then stepped over him and proceeded on her journey.

St. Jane de Chantal’s story is instructive on a number of counts. She shows that we can start new chapters when tragedy or other circumstances prevent our lives from unfolding according to our plans. Although we may have to bear with disagreeable people at various times, St. Jane teaches that we can still maintain peace of mind and a kind and gentle spirit. When we hear a call to a particular vocation, some people may try to keep us from responding because it will mean a change for their lives as well, but St. Jane demonstrates that we must be true to our calling. Finally, St. Jane's ministry as founder of a new congregation shows that when we reach out to bring excluded people into God’s kingdom, our efforts will be blessed. St. Jane de Chantal, pray for us!

Get Out of the Boat

Yesterday’s gospel reading recounted a time when Jesus’ disciples were out in a boat during a storm and saw Jesus walking on the water toward them. Peter issued a challenge to this seeming apparition: “Lord, if it is you, command me to come to you on the water,” and Jesus replied, “Come” (Mt 14: 22-33). In her reflection on this gospel, one of Sr. Esther Fangman’s takeaways was, “At some point, you have to get out of the boat.”

What boat do we need to get out of to be a disciple of Jesus? What do we cling to because we believe it will keep us safe? Perhaps we need to get out of the boat of the culture we grew up in, which feels comfortable and familiar but limits our understanding of the inclusiveness of the Body of Christ. Maybe we need to stop clinging to our nest egg and the thought that we can stuff money into any holes in our boat to keep it from leaking.

Stepping out of our boat is similar to being the grain of wheat that falls to the ground and dies. Once we leave our boat, we are no longer capable of steering it to where we want to go. Once we die to our old self—our desires, our pride, our self-preoccupation—we have no control over what new life awaits us.

What we do have is the words of Jesus: “Whoever serves me must follow me, and where I am, there also will my servant be. The Father will honor whoever serves me.” We may not know where we will end up when we leave the comfort of our boats to follow Jesus, but we must keep our eyes on the prize: to be Christ’s traveling companion and know fullness of life in Christ’s presence.

Using What Is Within Us

In her book Scivias, the mystic Hildegard of Bingen said, “You understand so little of what is around you because you do not use what is within you.” What is within us? Nothing less than our connection to God!

Hildegard of Bingen, "Werk Gottes"

In our creativity we are connected to the Creator of the universe. In our physical body we are connected to Jesus, Word made flesh, who is the Bread we eat. In our breath we are connected to the Holy Spirit, who gives us insight and energy to act. How can we ever say we don’t have what we need for fullness of life?

Here at the Mount, the pandemic has demonstrated that through our connection to God within, we have what we need to stay safe and continue our life of prayer and ministry. We have tapped into God’s creativity to make homemade masks, hand sanitizer, and protective gowns. We stay nourished through the Word and Eucharist at communion services. We have been energized to provide a food pantry for our employees and continue some of our Keeler Women’s Center and Sophia Spirituality Center programs online.

St. Paul says, “God is able to make every grace abundant for you, so that in all things, always having all you need, you may have an abundance for every good work” (2 Cor 9:8). Often we fear we won’t have enough of what we need, so we hoard our resources and our energies. If, as St. Hildegard says, we use what is within us—our connection to God who is creative, nurturing, and generous—then we will understand how God’s kingdom of abundance operates: it is in giving that we receive, it is in pardoning that we are pardoned, and it is in dying that we are born to eternal life.

Reinventing Ourselves

Did your life turn out the way you thought it would when you were a teenager—or, heck, at the beginning of this year? No? Well, welcome to the kingdom of heaven!

As John Shea notes, “The kingdom of heaven entails an ongoing process of putting together the new and old, of finding, selling, buying our lives, of reinventing ourselves in the light of the ongoing revelation of God.” How can we expect our lives to follow a prescribed path when God—the God who makes all things new—is constantly revealing new things to us?

Today is the four-year anniversary of my entrance to Mount St. Scholastica as a postulant. I never imagined I would be joining a Benedictine community in my mid 50s, but to my astonishment, that is the calling that was revealed to me. It has opened a rich new world of prayer, relationships, and insight that I never would have experienced had I stayed on my former path.

We need to be alert to what God may wish to reveal to us. For me, writing poetry is one way to maintain that alertness. I do not so much write to produce a poem but to be aware of what is going on around and within me. As Kim Addonizio has said, “Poetry is not a means to an end, but a continuing engagement with being alive.” Similarly, the kingdom of heaven is not a destination but a way of living that opens us to an ever-expanding circle of God’s love and wisdom.

We needn’t worry if our plans change or fall apart. When we accept the invitation to flow with life’s mystery, we can relax, because the One at the helm knows us intimately and desires fullness of life for us.

Beholding and Blessing

It is traditional for the Mount to have a “blessing of ministries” ritual at its August community meeting. Typically, the prioress blesses each sister and her ministry individually, but that wasn’t possible this year because sisters who live in Kansas City and in Dooley Center are isolated from the monastery to help prevent the potential spread of the COVID-19 virus. Therefore, via Zoom, the sisters recog-nized the work and prayer of each community member and blessed each other.

Before the blessing, Sr. Esther encouraged us to “behold” each other in the scriptural sense of paying attention to something important. We generally think of using sight to “behold,” as illustrated by the following vignette by an anonymous writer in the August 2020 issue of the Sun magazine:

When I asked the custodial staff at my university what the worst aspect of their jobs was, I expected to hear about working alone at night, the tediousness of the tasks, or the low pay. Instead they said it was that they were treated as if they were invisible. No one looked them in the eye or said, “Hello,” or, “Thank you.”

In my experience, the sisters in the monastery are very faithful in seeing and affirming each other. However, to “behold” includes listening as much as seeing. I realized this at the agape and storytelling after our vigil for Sr. Agnes Honz, who died on July 9.

I knew from attending midday prayer and compline in Dooley Center that Sr. Agnes liked to sing. However, I was surprised to learn that she had been in numerous choirs, played both piano and organ, and taught music for years. Not only that, but among her pictures was a photo of her as a high school senior leading Sammy Kaye’s band in The Johnson Rag at a talent show at the Orpheum Theatre in Omaha, Neb. She won first place! I didn’t know all this because I had never taken the time to sit and behold Sr. Agnes by listening to her talk about her life.

From what I gather, Jesus was an excellent beholder. He saw people on the margins, asked what was troubling them, listened, and responded. During the pandemic, many of us have more time to imitate Jesus and behold each other. With God’s grace, this will become an ingrained habit that will help us create a more Christ-centered post-pandemic world.