The Ways of Peace

A prayer to St. Benedict by Deacon Allen Tatara includes this line: “You walked the paths of peace your whole life long and led all who came to you into the ways of peace.” This was quite a feat, because Benedict lived during a time of war between Emperor Justinian and the barbarian Goths, who swept down into Italy in the year 568, killing and pillaging as they went along.

In the second book of his Dialogues, Pope Gregory the Great includes a story of how Benedict led one particularly cruel Goth, Zalla, into the way of peace. Zalla took a farmer captive and brought him to Benedict, demanding money for the man’s release. Upon glancing at the cord that bound the farmer’s hands, it fell miraculously to the ground. Then, “Without rising from his place, Benedict called for his monks and had them take Zalla inside for some food and drink. After that he urged him to give up his heartless cruelty. Zalla went away thoroughly humbled.”

You and I may not be capable of the miracles that Benedict is said to have performed, but we can cultivate a peaceful spirit that allows us to defuse tense situations with equanimity. We can choose to offer hospitality to those who oppose us, as did some Ukrainians who offered food to young Russian soldiers they encountered — killing them not with bullets but with kindness. Jesus often ate with sinners and was quite successful at converting hearts; wouldn’t it be wise, then, to adopt his strategy?

Walking the way of peace takes great strength of character that is built through small choices we make every day — the choice not to gossip, not to retaliate for perceived slights, not to let our heart be clouded by envy. In consistently cultivating a peaceful spirit, we too can lead those we encounter into the way of peace and enjoy the blessing that Jesus promised to peacemakers. 

Inspiration That Never Ends

Sr. Anne Shepard told me that she recently visited a friend and her four-year-old grandson, who enjoyed looking at the pictures in the most recent Mount magazine and made up stories about them as he went along. When he came to the photos of the (mostly) elderly sisters in the obituaries at the end of the magazine, he said, “And these are the grandmothers who wrote the stories that go with the pictures!”

As I approach my 60th birthday, I’ve been thinking a lot about family and friends who have died and yet continue to help me write my story. How would I know how to live in community without the example of my grandmothers, who did their daily chores without complaint for years on end and kept their counsel in the midst of life in a large family? How would I know how to find peace in nature without watching my mom tend her flowers and my dad his vegetable garden? How would I know how to enhance my life with poetry without listening to Sisters Celine Carrigan, Jeremy Dempsey, and Mary Faith Schuster quoting lines from their favorite poems?

An oblate of the Mount, Dick Brummel, died unexpectedly last week at the age of 71. His social justice advocacy won’t come to an end, however, because through his efforts he has shown others how to become advocates themselves. Just so, we need to give ourselves wholeheartedly to our calling, whatever it may be — parent, teacher, environmentalist, advocate — because (a) we don’t know when death will come calling and (b) we don’t know how our daily faithfulness to our vocation will help others write their own story for generations to come.

I’m deeply grateful for all those who continue to help me write my story, and I hope that in my remaining years (however long that may be), I can follow their example and do the same for others.

Servant Leadership

Volodymyr Zelensky was a comic actor before being elected the president of Ukraine—not exactly stellar credentials for running a country, one might suppose. However, Zelensky has several very Benedictine qualities that have served him in good stead:

• Humility. From the beginning of his term of office, Zelensky acknowledged how little he knew and eschewed the trappings of office; for example, he reduced his motorcade to two cars without sirens.

• The ability to listen. As John Herbst, a former U.S. ambassador to Ukraine, has noted of Zelensky, “He’s a very intent listener.”

• Care for the sick and vulnerable. Zelensky recently risked his life to visit wounded soldiers in a hospital and, according to The New York Times, when he took office “He told government officials to remove presidential portraits from their offices and replace them with pictures of their children, to remind them of the stakes of their work.”

Zelensky may very well have approached the presidency as a new role to play, but somewhere along the way, he transformed from an actor playing a president to a bona fide leader who is courageously resisting the subjugation of his people by a murderous, ambitious dictator.

Neither becoming the president of a country nor following in the way of Jesus is easy. However, Zelensky has shown us a way forward: with humility, deep listening, and a heart for the vulnerable, start by playing the part and eventually we will live our way into being the  servant of others that we are called to be.

 

 

A Lenten Course Correction

If our soul has a navigation system, such as GPS, the message we are likely to receive on Ash Wednesday is this: “rerouting.” As Pope Francis said in his 2021 Ash Wednesday homily, “Lent is not just about the little sacrifices we make, but about discerning where our hearts are directed…. Let me ask: Where is my life’s navigation system taking me — toward God, or toward myself?”

The “little sacrifices” we make during Lent may seem inconsequential; what difference does it really make if I turn off the radio while I’m in the car, limit my screen time or the amount of sugar I eat, do some spiritual reading, or make a donation to a food pantry? Such practices are more important than we might think, because they direct us away from our desire for distraction, self-satisfaction, and control and the belief that we are the center of the universe. When our vision isn’t clouded by our preoccupation with ourselves, we are more likely to see the signposts that lead us to the fulfillment of life with God.

Journeying toward God is only possible because, as Pope Francis said, “God first journeyed to us.” Jesus came to provide a custom-made navigation system to the kingdom of God, with the key components being love of God (expressed through prayer), love of neighbor (expressed through almsgiving/service), and  humility (expressed through fasting/surrender). Thus our Lenten practices serve as a course correction and lead us on a straight path to the heart of God.

The road is bound to be narrow at the outset, as Saint Benedict noted in his Rule; after following our own whims for so long, our new path can’t help but feel constrictive. However, our Lenten practices will guide us through tight turns and detours until we reach our destination at the empty tomb on Easter Sunday, where we are invited to share in the new life and boundless love of the risen Christ.