Work
27/November/2007 Filed in:
Chapter TalksSt Benedict's chapter on manual labour, which we begin reading today, is a remarkably straightforward expression of the value of work. Not for Benedict the false "mysticism" that informs some writing about work (usually from those so fascinated by the subject that they can sit and look at it for hours). Instead, we have an honest recognition that work needs to be done and is an essential ingredient of the spiritual life. That is not always easy to accept. How many a fledgling monastic vocation has foundered on being shown a broom or a hoe! In the monastery, we do not choose our work: it is given to us; and sometimes, seemingly impossible things are asked of us (see chapter 68). What matters is that, whatever our task, we accept it as the perfect means of forming in us dispositions pleasing to God. Our whole life is to be a search for him. No point in wanting to be rapt in choir if God is waiting for us among the soapsuds in the scullery.