Hospitality: A Benedictine Path to Peace

Although we pray to live out the end of our days in peace, it doesn’t always work out that way. Such was the case for St. Benedict, whose Feast we celebrate today.

As Dom Brendan Thomas explains, “There were two natural disasters that afflicted Benedict in his time. The first was a climate crisis, an extraordinary change of weather patterns. In 536 the sun disappeared for nearly a year behind a veil of dust, shining feebly with a strange blue light, not global warming but global cooling. There were volcanic eruptions, floods and earthquakes, crop failures and famine. Today we mark the death of Benedict around 547, but he lived through a pandemic in his final years. The plague of Justinian from 541-42 is estimated to have killed 30 to 50 million people.”

Given the fear that these events generated, it is remarkable that St. Benedict makes hospitality one of the hallmarks of his Rule. Instead of turning people away from the monastery door during times of famine and plague, Benedict said, “All guests who present themselves are to be welcomed as Christ, for he himself will say: I was a stranger and you welcomed me (Mt. 25:35). … Great care and concern are to be shown in receiving poor people and pilgrims, because in them more particularly Christ is received….” (Rule of Benedict 53: 1, 15).

St. Benedict formed monastic communities because he knew that we need each other during our time on earth. Those of us who have homes, jobs, health insurance, and full tables might question why we need the homeless, the unemployed, the sick, and the hungry who come to us seeking aid. Perhaps we need them to teach us how to be grateful, how to live simply, and how to take care of the earth that provides us with food and water.

Toward the end of his life, St. Benedict was blessed with a vision in which he saw the whole world gathered up in a single ray of light. He was bathed in God’s light, which encompasses all humans and all creation. When we come to recognize the Christ light not just in ourselves but in everyone we meet, we too will extend hospitality in good times and in bad and will live out the end of our days in peace.