Wisdom Distilled from the Daily
Page 19
Benedict of Nursia was born in Italy in ca. 480. He went to school in Rome when the Empire was in a state of material prosperity but moral decline. In the midst of all of that, he decided that life lived in that fashion was not the fullness of life at all. He left Rome and went to a rural area south of the city to contemplate the meaning of life, to simplify its demands, and to refashion his own attitudes and lifestyle.
It wasn’t long until he was sought after by multitudes of other people who were also uneasy with the secular climate of the day but unsure as well of what ought to be its spiritual character. Out of this came what we know today as Western monasticism, the pursuit of the spiritual life in community, rather than in the secluded cells of the solitaries, which was the form of religious life that had been prevalent in the deserts of Egypt and in the East. Under the influence of Pope Gregory the Great, the Benedictine Rule began to be widely diffused in Europe. The Rule was embraced due to its moderation, its popularity among average people, and its endorsement by rulers who saw the values of work and stability essential to the development of the area. As time passed, Benedictine monasteries became the anchor points and centerpieces of whole villages in Europe. From the monastics of the place the people learned to live and to work and to pray. As a result, the Benedictine Order has often been credited with having saved Western Europe after the barbarian invasions, and Benedict himself was named the patron of Europe. To Benedict and to the monastics who followed him, in other words, spirituality had a highly social dimension.
As a result, the Rule that arose out of life lived in common consists of seventy-two chapters on how to live with others, how to deal with life’s normal demands, and how to develop a spiritual life capable of living in the real world and being attentive to the Spirit at the same time.
The Rule is best understood when it’s seen in four parts: Part One, chapters I —7, the spiritual document, sets out the basic values of Benedictine life; Part Two, chapters 8–20, structures the prayer life of the community; Part Three, chapters 21–70, demonstrates how the values of the Rule are to be applied in the daily life and structure of the monastery; and Part Four, chapters 71–72, reflect on the place of a Rule in life and the nature of good zeal, or real spirituality, in a sea of counterfeits.
From its earliest beginnings, the Rule was lived both by monastics in their monasteries and by consecrated virgins in their homes. It became in fact the spiritual model and leader of whole areas, much as parish models and diocesan directives have been in our own time. From France in the sixth century to Ireland to England and then, under the patronage of Charlemagne, to the continent as a whole, the Benedictine Rule of life had by the eighth century slowly and steadily replaced all other monastic documents of the time as the Rule of choice in monasteries throughout Europe. By the eleventh century a great outpouring of Benedictine life among both men and women, nobles and commoners, elite and uneducated— black Benedictines and Cistercians,—gave witness to the vitality of the Rule and its widespread spiritual appeal.
A plethora of social changes—the rise of nation-states, urbanization, democratization, and massive emigration patterns—led to the rise of multiple other forms of religious life. At the same time, the Black Death and the Hundred Years War resulted in the loss of vitality and, in some cases, even the extinction of some Benedictine houses. Almost half of the monasteries disappeared in the sixteenth century due to the repressive measures of the Reformation. In England, for instance, Benedictine monasteries were totally suppressed and later, in France, the Revolution closed the monasteries en masse. But by the nineteenth century, a Benedictine revival led by Dom Prosper Gueranger in the monastery at Solesmes, France, began a new period in Benedictine history. Most of the monasteries existing today can trace their own beginnings to this nineteenth century renewal of Benedictine life.
At this same time, a reemphasis on the missionary spirit of Benedictinism coupled with the increasing numbers of German emigrants to the New World led to the implantation of Benedictine monasticism from Germany to the United States. Abbot Boniface Wimmer of Metten Abbey in Bavaria and Prioress Benedicta Riepp of St. Walburga Abbey in Eichstatt, Bavaria, began the first foundations of Benedictine monks and nuns in the United States in Pennsylvania in the 1850s.
Now, according to the 1985 Catalogus of the Benedictine Order published by the Benedictine Confederation in Rome, there are 373 communities of Benedictine men with 9,453 monks and 478 communities of Benedictine women with 19,989 nuns and sisters in the world today. Of those, 50 communities of Benedictine women with 5,123 sisters and 47 communities of Benedictine men with 2,316 monks are in the United States. Each of them follows the Rule of Benedict to this day.
In addition to these individual communities, many of the monasteries sponsor groups of lay Oblates and Associates who are formally committed to the individual monastery in question and who apply the Rule of Benedict to the married or single state of life.
Glossary
ABBESS. The elected leader of a Benedictine community of nuns.
ABBOT. The elected leader of a Benedictine community of monks.
ACEDIA. A lethargy that makes the continued efforts of the spiritual life too much for the soul.
BASIL. Bishop of Caesarea and a Doctor of the Church, that is, a major teacher, he was born in Asia Minor about 329 C:E. He preached a communal use of property, charity as an incentive to labor, and opposed the disparity among social classes.
BENEDICTINE ASSOCIATE. A lay person who interacts with the Benedictine community in prayer, community’ life and ministry.
BENEDICTINE OBLATE. A lay person who shares the spiritual life of the monastic community.
BREVLARY. A book which contains the seasonal parts of the liturgy of the hours, the breviary appeared as the Divine Office became fixed in form and content.
CASSIAN. A fifth century monk and spiritual writer whose works contain historically important descriptions of monasticism and statements of the problems of the spiritual life.
CENOBITE. A member of a religious community whose chief ministry is community itself. Cenobitic communities differ from apostolic institutes in that, for cenobites, their apostolic ministries flow from their community lives.
CENOBITIC. Adjective describing those who live in a monastic community under a rule and an abbot.
CENSER. A vessel in which incense is burned.
CHAPTER. The deliberative body of a monastic community. It is made up of the perpetually professed members of the community and is called and led by the abbot, the abbess, or the prioress.
CTSTERCIANS. A monastic order founded at Citeaux in France in 1098 to live a life of poverty, simplicity and solitude under the Rule of Benedict as strictly interpreted. The Trappists are an offshoot of the Cistercians who dedicated themselves to living a contemplative life when the Cistercians became pastors and teachers.
COMMUNITIES, CLOISTERED. When a community is cloistered, a part of their house and grounds, the enclosure, is reserved to their exclusive use. Such a community rarely leaves their own house and grounds.
COMMUNITY CUSTOMS, BOOK OF. A Collection of the specific practices of a particular communirty.
CONVERSION CONVERSATIO MORUM, Vow of The vow by which Benedictines commit themselves to follow the monastic way of life, its attitudes and values and practices, in order to come to spiritual fulfillment and development.
DESERT MONASTICS. Men and women who went into the desert and lived deeply ascetic lives devoted to prayer and manual work, often under the direction of a spiritual master. Many of their sayings and stories have been preserved.
DIVINE OFFICE. The traditional term for the Liturgy of the Hours, the choral prayer of a Benedictine monastic community that is comprised of psalms and readings from Scripture. Morning praise and evening praise are the basic hours of the Divine Office though monastic communities commonly pray one or more of the other five traditional hours as well. These are prime, terce, sext, none, and matins.
EASTER VIGIL. The liturgical celebra
tion, on the night before Easter, of the Resurrection of Jesus. Vigil in this context refers, not to the day before Faster, but to the fact that the liturgy is held at night, as is the more familiar vigil. Midnight Mass on Christmas.
EREMCAL. LIFE. Religious life distinguished by solitude and austerity.
EREMITICAL. TRADITION. The manifestation of solitary life more than two thousand years old. By the fourth century, church authorities began to regulate hermits’ lives, requiring them to live near a monastery under the supervision of the abbot. The Carthusians and Camaldolese maintain this form of the eremitic life today.
FEAST DAYS. Days of religious celebration, usually annual, which honor a saint or memorialize an event.
FORMATION PROGRAM. Several years of study and experience intended to teach the fundamentals of Benedictinism and monastic practice to those preparing for perpetual profession.
GLORY BE: The first words and, by extension, the title of a short prayer in honor of the Trinity; i.e., Glory be the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit.
HOLY DAY. A holiday or feast day on which attendance at a particular religious observance is obligatory.
HOLY WATER. Water blessed for use in religious observance.
HORARIUM. The daily schedule of activities.
JANSENISM. A seventeenth century European heresy which saw human nature as corrupt, to be kept under control by rigorous penance and rigid insistence on the pursuit of perfection.
LECTIO. The meditative reading of the Scriptures in order to gain inspiration and understanding of the Christian life through the filter of the Word of God.
LITURGY OF THE HOURS. Current term for Opus Dei, or Divine Office, the choral prayer common to monastic life.
MAGNIFICAL. The hymn of Mary, recorded in Luke 1:46–55, named by its first word in the Latin version.
MONKS. Benedictine men who are either engaged in public ministries or who live a cloistered life, according to the historical nature of the community and the decision of the monastic chapter itself.
MONASTICS. Men or women who live together in community and follow a monastic way Rule of life.
NOVENA. A nine day series of prayers.
NOVICE. A beginner, a neophyte. A monastic novice lives with the community and must fulfill certain canonical regulations prior to full incorporation into the community
NOVICE MISTRESS, A sister who directs the novices in their preparation for the monastic life. The term “novice director” is commonly used today.
NOVITLATE. Novices collectively, or that part of the house used primarily by the novices.
NOVITIATE TABLE. That table in the dining room where the novices sit. Today, the novices are not usually confined to a specific table.
NUNS. Benedictine women who live a cloistered life.
OBEDIENCE, VOW OF. The VOW by which a monastic promises to follow the Rule, the leader of the monastery, and the community in the faithful living of the monastic life.
OPUS DEI. The Latin words used by Benedict in his Rule to describe the choral prayer of the Benedictine community as “The Work of God.”
PASCHAL MYSTERY. Refers to the events of Christ’s death and resurrection and to the consequent redemption of humanity.
PERPETOAL PROFESSION. The formal act of pronouncing religious vows not limitcd as to time.
PRIME. See Divine Office.
PRIOR. An official of a house of monks appointed by the abbot or elected by the community, who exercises a determined degree of authority
PRIORESS. The elected leader of a Benedictine community of sisters.
PRIVATE DEVOTIONS. The individual devotions of a single person, rather than the liturgy of the community together.
RELIGIOUS LIFE. The following of Christ in a way characterized by public commitment to a group, service to the people of God and approval by the Church.
SCAPULAR. That part of the traditional Benedictine habit which, worn over the shoulders, hung to the floor in a straight strip in front and back. It developed from the work apron, later becoming a part of the full habit.
SCHOLASTIC DIRECTOR. One who oversees the formation of scholastics. A scholastic is a Benedictine who has completed the novitiate and has professed vows for a specific period of time as part of the preparation for final, or perpetual, profession.
SCHOLASTICA. Benedict’s twin sister, the first Benedictine nun.
SEXT. See Divine Office.
SISTERS. Benedictine women who participate in public ministries.
STABILITY, VOW OF. The VOW that binds a monastic to the community life of a particular monastery.
STATIO. The practice of gathering in silence outside of the monastic chapel in order to achieve a spirit of recollection before the community enters the body of the church for choral prayer.
TALMUD. The ancient collection of rabbinic writings which is, for Judaism, the repository of religious authority second only to Sacred Scripture.
TRAPPISTS. See Cistercians.
VIGIL LIGHTS. The Small candles left burning in churches and shrines as signs of the prayer of the faithful.
About the Author
JOAN CHITTISTER is a member and former prioress of the Benedictine Sisters of Erie and the founder and current executive director of Benetvision, a resource and research center for contemporary spirituality. She has authored forty books, including Called to Question: A Spiritual Memoir, The Rule of Benedict, and In Search of Belief.
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Credit
Cover design: Nita Ybarra
Copyright
References to the Rule are from Fry, Timothy, O.S.B., et al. RB80. Collegeville, MN: Liturgical Press, 1981 and Schauble, Marilyn, O.S.B., and Wojciak, Barbara, O.S.B., eds. A Reader’s Version of the Rule of Saint Benedict in Inclusive Language. Erie, PA: Benet Press, 1989.
The stories and references of the Desert Monastics are taken from The Sayings of the Desert Fathers translated by Benedicta Ward, S.L.G. Kalamazoo, MI: Cistercian Publications, Inc., 1975.
Basic scriptural reference is The New American Bible. Nashville: Thomas Nelson, Inc., 1971.
Source of reference on Page 104 is Butler, Cuthbert, O.S.B. Benedictine Monachism. London: Longmans, Green and Co., 1919.
WISDOM DISTILLED FROM THE DAILY: Living the Rule of St. Benedict Today. Copyright © 1990 by Joan D. Chittister, O.S.B. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this ebook on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins ebooks.
FIRST HARPERCOLLINS PAPERBACK EDITION PUBLISHED IN 1991.
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Chittister, Joan.
Wisdom distilled from the daily : living the Rule of St. Benedict today / Joan D. Chittister. — 1st HarperCollins pbk. ed.
p. cm.
Reprint. Originally published: San Francisco : Harper & Row, 1990.
ISBN 0-06-061399-8 (alk. paper)
Epub Edition © MARCH 2013 ISBN 9780062284501
1. Benedict, Saint, Abbot of Monte Cassino. Regula.
2. Benedictines—Rules. 3. Benedictines—Spiritual life.
4. Spiritual life—Catholic authors. I. Title.
[BX3004.Z5C36 1991]
255’.106—dc20
90-55779
CIP
* * *
05 RRD H 30
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