November 16-30

Excerpts from
THE RULE OF BENEDICT: INSIGHTS FOR THE AGES
Joan Chittister, OSB

CHAPTER 38. THE READER FOR THE WEEK
March 17 - July 17 - Nov. 16

Reading will always accompany the meals. The reader should not be the one who just happens to pick up the book, but someone who will read for a whole week, beginning on Sunday. After Mass and Communion, let the incoming reader ask all to pray for her so that God may shield her from the spirit of vanity. Let her begin this verse in the oratory: "O God, open my lips and my mouth shall proclaim your praise (Ps. 51:17)," and let all say it three times. When she has received a blessing, the reader will begin her week of reading.

Let there be complete silence. No whispering, no speaking-only the reader's voice should be heard there. The members should by turn serve one another's needs as they eat and drink, so that no one need ask for anything. If, however, anything is required, it should be requested by an audible signal of some kind rather than by speech. No one should presume to ask a question about the reading or about anything else, "lest occasion be given to the Evil One (Eph. 4:27; 1 Tm. 5:14)." The prioress, however, may wish to say a few words of instruction.

Because of Communion and because the fast may be too hard for her to bear, the one who is reader for the week is to receive some diluted wine before she begins to read. Afterward she will take her meal with the weekly kitchen servers and the attendants.

Members will read and sing, not according to rank, but according to their ability to benefit their hearers.

This chapter is a lesson in the way that gentleness softens rigor without destroying either the practice or the person. Legalists too often opt for practice, whatever the cost to the people who are trying to do it; liberals too often opt for people's convenience, whatever the loss of spiritual practice. Benedict, on the other hand, opts for a way of life that cares for people physically while it goes on strengthening them spiritually.


CHAPTER 39. THE PROPER AMOUNT OF FOOD
March 18 - July 18 - Nov. 17

For the daily meals, whether at noon or in mid-afternoon, it is enough, we believe, to provide all the tables with two kinds of cooked food because of individual weaknesses. In this way, a monastic who may not be able to eat one kind of food may partake of the other. Two kinds of cooked food, therefore, should suffice for all, and if fruit or fresh vegetables are available, a third dish may also be added. A generous pound of bread is enough for a day whether for only one meal or for both dinner and supper. In the latter case the cellarer will set aside one third of this pound and give it to the community at supper.

Should it happen that the work is heavier than usual, the prioress may decide - and she will have the authority-to grant something additional, provided that it is appropriate, and that above all overindulgence is avoided, lest anyone experience indigestion. For nothing is so inconsistent with the life of any Christian as overindulgence. Scripture says: "Take care that your hearts are not weighted down with overindulgence (Lk. 21:34)."

The young should not receive the same amount as their elders, but less, since in all matters frugality is the rule. Let everyone, except the sick who are very weak, abstain entirely from eating the meat of four-footed animals.

Exceptions. Exceptions. Exceptions. The Rule of Benedict is full of rules that are never kept, always shifting, forever being stretched. Only two Benedictine principles are implied to be without exception: kindness and self-control.


CHAPTER 40. THE PROPER AMOUNT OF DRINK
March 19 - July 19 - Nov. 18

"Everyone has their own gifts from God, one this and another that (1 Cor. 7:7)." It is, therefore, with some uneasiness that we specify the amount of food and drink for others. However, with due regard for the infirmities of the sick, we believe that a hemina of wine a day is sufficient for each. But those to whom God gives the strength to abstain must know that they will earn their own reward.

The prioress will determine when local conditions, work or the summer heat indicates the need for a greater amount. She must, in any case, take great care lest excess or drunkenness creep in. We read that monastics should not drink wine at all, but since the monastics of our day cannot be convinced of this, let us at least agree to drink moderately, and not to the point of excess, for "wine makes even the wise go astray (Sir. 19:2)."

However, where local circumstances dictate an amount much less than what is stipulated above, or even none at all, those who live there should bless God and not grumble. Above all else we admonish all to refrain from grumbling.

It is so easy to make cosmetic changes in the name of religion. It is so easy to make up rules and keep them so that we can feel good about doing something measurable in the spiritual life. We can fast and fast and fast from food or drink and nothing changes because fasting from food is not what we really need at that moment to turn our hearts of stone to hearts of flesh.


CHAPTER 41. THE TIMES FOR MEALS
March 20 - July 20 - Nov. 19

From Easter to Pentecost, the members eat at noon and take supper in the evening. Beginning with Pentecost and continuing throughout the summer, the members fast until mid-afternoon on Wednesday and Friday, unless they are working in the fields or the summer heat is oppressive.

On the other days they eat dinner at noon. Indeed, the prioress may decide that they should continue to eat dinner at noon every day if they have work in the fields or if the summer heat remains extreme. Similarly, she should so regulate and arrange all matters that souls may be saved and the members may go about their activities without justifiable grumbling.

From the thirteenth of September to the beginning of Lent, they always take their meal in mid-afternoon. Finally, from the beginning of Lent to Easter, they eat towards evening. Let Vespers be celebrated early enough so that there is no need for a lamp while eating, and that everything can be finished by daylight. Indeed, at all times let supper or the hour of the fast-day meal be so scheduled that everything can be done by daylight.

The first principle of Benedictinism is to do what must be done with special care and special zeal so that doing it can change our consciousness and carve our souls into the kind of beauty that comes from simple things. It is so easy to go through life looking feverishly for special ways to find God when God is most of all to be found in doing common things with uncommon conscientiousness.


CHAPTER 42. SILENCE AFTER COMPLINE
March 21 - July 21 - Nov. 20

Monastics should diligently cultivate silence at all times, but especially at night. Accordingly, this will always be the arrangement whether for fast days or for ordinary days. When there are two meals, all will sit together immediately after rising from supper. Someone should read from the Conference or the Lives of the early Church writers or at any rate something else that will benefit the hearers, but not the Heptateuch or the Books of Kings, because it will not be good for those of weak understanding to hear these writings at that hour; they should be read at other times.

On fast days there is to be a short interval between Vespers and the reading of the Conferences, as we have indicated. Then let four or five pages be read, or as many as time permits. This reading period will allow for all to come together, in case any were engaged in assigned tasks. When all have assembled, they should pray Compline; and on leaving Compline, no one will be permitted to speak further. If anyone is found to transgress this rule of silence, she must be subjected to severe punishment, except on occasions when guests require attention or the prioress wishes to give someone a command, but even this is to be done with the utmost seriousness and proper restraint.

Silence has two functions. The first effect of exterior silence is to develop a sense of interior peace. The second value of silence is that it provides the stillness that enables the ear of the heart to hear the God who is "not in the whirlwind."


CHAPTER 43. TARDINESS AT THE OPUS DEI OR AT TABLE
March 22 - July 22 - Nov. 21

On hearing the signal for an hour of the divine office, the monastic will immediately set aside what she has in hand and go with utmost speed, yet with gravity and without giving occasion for frivolity. Indeed, nothing is to be preferred to the Opus Dei.

If at Vigils anyone comes after the Doxology of Psalm 95, which we wish, therefore, to be said quite deliberately and slowly, she is not to stand in her regular place in choir. She must take the last place of all, or one set apart by the prioress for such offenders, that they may be seen by her and by all, until they do penance by public satisfaction at the end of the Opus Dei. We have decided, therefore, that they ought to stand either in the last place or apart from the others so that the attention they attract will shame them into amending. Should they remain outside the oratory, there may be those who would return to bed and sleep, or, worse yet, settle down outside and engage in idle talk, thereby "giving occasion to the Evil One (Eph. 4:27; 1 Tm. 5:14)." They should come inside so that they will not lose everything and may amend in the future.

At the day hours the same rule applies to anyone who comes after the opening verse and the Doxology of the first psalm following it: she is to stand in the last place. Until she has made satisfaction, the monastic is not to presume to join the choir of those praying the psalms, unless perhaps the prioress pardons her and grants an exception. Even in this case, the one at fault is still bound to satisfaction.

Benedictine life centers around the chapel and chapel must never be overlooked. What is being asked for in monastic spirituality is a life of fidelity to prayer and to the praying communities of which we are a part. Prayer is a community act in Benedictine life. It is at community prayer, in the midst of others, that we are most reminded that we are not a world unto ourselves.


CHAPTER 43: TARDINESS AT THE OPUS DEI OR AT TABLE-continued
March 23 - July 23 - Nov. 22

If someone does not come to table before the verse so that all may say the verse and pray and sit down at table together, and if this failure happens through the individual's own negligence or fault, she should be reproved up to the second time. If she still does not amend, let her not be permitted to share the common table, but take her meals alone, separated from the company of all. Her portion of wine should be taken away until there is satisfaction and amendment. Anyone not present for the verse said after meals is to be treated in the same manner.

No one is to presume to eat or drink before or after the time appointed. Moreover, if anyone is offered something by the prioress and refuses it, then, if later she wants what she refused or anything else, she should receive nothing at all until she has made appropriate amends.

The Rule is at least as firm on presence at meals at it is about presence at prayer. No one is to be late. No one is to eat before or after meals, or on her own, or on the run because monastic spirituality doesn't revolve around food, either having it or not having it. Monastic spirituality revolves around becoming a contributing part of a people of faith, living with them, learning with them, bearing their burdens, sharing their lives.


CHAPTER 44. SATISFACTION BY THE EXCOMMUNICATED
March 24 - July 24 - Nov. 23

Anyone excommunicated for serious faults from the oratory and from the table is to prostrate herself in silence at the oratory entrance at the end of the celebration of the Opus Dei. She should lie face down at the feet of all as they leave the oratory, and let her do this until the prioress judges she has made satisfaction. Next, at the bidding of the prioress, she is to prostrate herself at the feet of the prioress, then at the feet of all that they may pray for her. Only then, if the prioress orders, should she be admitted to the choir in the rank the prioress assigns. Even so, she should not presume to lead a psalm or a reading or anything else in the oratory without further instructions from the prioress. In addition, at all the hours, as the Opus Dei is being completed, she must prostrate herself in the place she occupies. She will continue this form of satisfaction until the prioress again bids her cease.

Those excommunicated for less serious faults from the table only are to make satisfaction in the oratory for as long as the prioress orders. They do so until she gives her blessing and says: "Enough."

Benedict argues that the community enterprise is such an important one that those who violate their responsibilities to it must serve as warning to others of the consequences of failing to carry the human community. The point, of course, is not that the group has the power to exclude us. The point is that we must come to realize that we too often exclude ourselves from the relationships we promised to honor and to build by becoming the center of our own lives and ignoring our responsibilities to theirs.

CHAPTER 45. MISTAKES IN THE ORATORY
March 25 - July 25 - Nov. 24

Should anyone make a mistake in a psalm, responsory, refrain or reading, she must make satisfaction there before all. If she does not use this occasion to humble herself, she will be subjected to more severe punishment for failing to correct by humility the wrong committed through negligence. Youth, however, are to be whipped for such a fault.

If anything, this chapter requires us to ask even to this day how it is that we can hear the scripture but never study it, pray prayers but never contemplate the universal implications of them, go through rituals but never immerse ourselves in their meaning. How is it that we too pray without thinking, pray carelessly, pray poorly or pray without thought?


CHAPTER 46. FAULTS COMMITTED IN OTHER MATTERS
March 26 - July 26 - Nov. 25

If someone commits a fault while at any work - while working in the kitchen, in the storeroom, in serving, in the bakery, in the garden, in any craft or anywhere else-either by breaking or losing something or failing in any other way in any other place, she must at once come before the prioress and community and of her own accord admit her fault and make satisfaction. If it is made known through another, she is to be subjected to a more severe correction.

When the cause of the sin lies hidden in her conscience, she is to reveal it only to the prioress or to one of the spiritual elders, who know how to heal their own wounds as well as those of others, without exposing them and making them public.

There is nothing in community life, Benedict implies here, that is so unimportant that it can be ignored or overlooked. Nothing in life is so meaningless that we have the right to do it unthinkingly. What each of us does affects all the others and it is to everyone that we owe accounting and apology and reparation. Clearly, Chapter 46 is not about punishment. Chapter 46 is about social consciousness.


CHAPTER 47. ANNOUNCING THE HOURS FOR THE OPUS DEI
March 27 - July 27 - Nov. 26

It is the prioress' care to announce, day and night, the hour for the Opus Dei. She may do so personally or delegate the responsibility to a conscientious member, so that everything may be done at the proper time.

Only those so authorized are to lead psalms and refrains, after the prioress according to their rank. No one should presume to read or sing unless she is able to benefit the hearers; let this be done with humility, seriousness and reverence, and at the bidding of the prioress.

Prayer in a Benedictine community is to be both regular and artistic and it is the role of leadership to see that this is so. ... The message under the message is that unless the group becomes more and more immersed in prayer and the scriptures, giving them priority no matter what the other pressures of the day, the group will cease to have any authenticity at all. It will cease to develop. It will dry up and cave in on itself and become more museum than monastery.


CHAPTER 48. THE DAILY MANUAL LABOR
March 28 - July 28 - Nov. 27

Idleness is the enemy of the soul. Therefore, the community should have specified periods for manual labor as well as time for prayerful reading.

We believe that the times for both may be arranged as follows: From Easter to the first of October, they will spend their mornings after Prime till about the fourth hour at whatever work needs to be done. From the fourth hour until the time of Sext, they will devote themselves to reading. But after Sext and their meal, they may rest on their beds in complete silence; should anyone wish to read privately, let her do so, but without disturbing the others. They should say None a little early, about midway through the eighth hour, and then until Vespers they are to return to whatever work is necessary. They must not become distressed if local conditions or their poverty should force them to do the harvesting themselves. When they live by the labor of their hands, as our ancestors and the apostles did, then they are really monastics. Yet, all things are to be done with moderation on account of the fainthearted.

The monastic engages in creative work as a way to be responsible for the upbuilding of the community. Work periods, in fact, are specified just as prayer periods are. Work and prayer are opposite sides of the great coin of a life that is both holy and useful, immersed in God and dedicated to the transcendent in the human. It is labor's transfiguration of the commonplace, the transformation of the ordinary that makes co-creators of us all.


CHAPTER 48. THE DAILY MANUAL LABOR-continued
March 29 - July 29 - Nov. 28

From the first of October to the beginning of Lent, the members ought to devote themselves to reading until the end of the second hour. At this time Terce is said and they are to work at their assigned tasks until None. At the first signal for the hour of None, all put aside their work to be ready for the second signal. Then after their meal they will devote themselves to their reading or to the psalms.

During the days of Lent, they should be free in the morning to read until the third hour, after which they will work at their assigned tasks until the end of the tenth hour. During this time of Lent each one is to receive a book from the library, and is to read the whole of it straight through. These books are to be distributed at the beginning of Lent.

Above all, one or two elders must surely be appointed to make the rounds of the monastery while the members are reading. Their duty is to see that no one is so apathetic as to waste time or engage in idle talk to the neglect of her reading, and so not only harm herself but also distract others. If such a person is found - God forbid - she should be reproved a first and a second time. If she does not amend, she must be subjected to the punishment of the Rule as a warning to others. Further, members ought not to associate with one another at inappropriate times.

It is the single-minded search for God that defines Benedictine spirituality. That is what the monastic pursues behind every other pursuit. That is what gives the monastic life meaning. That is what frees the monastic heart. The monastic does not exist for work. Creative and productive work are simply meant to enhance the Garden and sustain us while we grow into God.


CHAPTER 48. THE DAILY MANUAL LABOR-continued
March 30 - July 30 - Nov. 29

On Sunday all are to be engaged in reading except those who have been assigned various duties. If anyone is so remiss and indolent that she is unwilling or unable to study or to read, she is to be given some work in order that she may not be idle.

Those who are sick or weak should be given a type of work or craft that will keep them busy without overwhelming them or driving them away. The prioress must take their infirmities into account.

The Rule of Benedict treats work and lectio interchangeably. One focuses the skills of the body on the task of co-creation. The other focuses the gifts of the mind on the lessons of the heart. One without the other is not Benedictine spirituality. To get the wheat of life we need to work at planting as well as reaping, at reaping as well as planting. And everyone in the community is expected to do both.


CHAPTER 49. THE OBSERVANCE OF LENT
March 31 - July 31 - Nov. 30

The life of a monastic ought to be a continuous Lent. Since few, however, have the strength for this, we urge the entire community during these days of Lent to keep its manner of life most pure and to wash away in this holy season the negligences of other times. This we can do in a fitting manner by refusing to indulge in evil habits and by devoting ourselves to prayer with tears, to reading, to compunction of heart and self-denial. During these days, therefore, we will add to the usual measure of our service something by way of private prayer and abstinence from food or drink, so that each of us will have something above the assigned measure to offer God of our own will with the joy of the Holy Spirit (1 Thes. 1:6). In other words, let each one deny herself some food, drink, sleep, needless talking and idle jesting, and look forward to holy Easter with joy and spiritual longing.

Everyone should, however, make known to the prioress what she intends to do, since it ought to be done with the prioress’ prayer and approval. Whatever is undertaken without the permission of the prioress will be reckoned as presumption and vainglory, not deserving a reward. Therefore, everything must be done with the prioress’ approval.

Benedict wants us to do something beyond the normal requirement of our lives "of our own will." Not forced, not prescribed for us by someone else. Not required by the system, but taken upon ourselves because we want to be open to the God of darkness as well as to the God of light.