Monks according to St. Benedict

The New Theological Movement has this article on the community life in the Rule of St. Benedict. I found the classification of monks very enlightening.

"It is well known that there are four kinds of monks. The first kind are the Cenobites: those who live in monasteries and serve under a rule and an Abbot.
“The second kind are the Anchorites or Hermits: those who, no longer in the first fervor of their reformation, but after long probation in a monastery, having learned by the help of many brethren how to fight against the devil, go out well armed from the ranks of the community to the solitary combat of the desert. They are able now, with no help save from God, to fight single-handed against the vices of the flesh and their own evil thoughts.
“The third kind of monks, a detestable kind, are the Sarabaites. These, not having been tested, as gold in the furnace (Wis. 3:6), by any rule or by the lessons of experience, are as soft as lead. In their works they still keep faith with the world, so that their tonsure marks them as liars before God. They live in twos or threes, or even singly, without a shepherd, in their own sheepfolds and not in the Lord's. Their law is the desire for self-gratification: whatever enters their mind or appeals to them, that they call holy; what they dislike, they regard as unlawful.
“The fourth kind of monks are those called Gyrovagues. These spend their whole lives tramping from province to province, staying as guests in different monasteries for three or four days at a time. Always on the move, with no stability, they indulge their own wills and succumb to the allurements of gluttony, and are in every way worse than the Sarabaites. Of the miserable conduct of all such it is better to be silent than to speak.
“Passing these over, therefore, let us proceed, with God's help, to lay down a rule for the strongest kind of monks, the Cenobites.”

Secularism as the Enemy of the Word of God

We cannot deny the waning of the Catholic faith in many parts of the globe. The recent legalization of divorce in Catholic Malta is a recent proof of this claim. The world is rapidly sliding into secularism where the teachings of our Lord which once preserved social order is being discarded and rendered irrelevant.

Is it true that the word of God has lost the power which was referred to in the first reading? What stifles the word of God? The parable of the Sower gives us answers worth considering. “Some seed fell along the path...others on rocky ground…others fell amongst the thorns.” The seed is the word of God and the various kinds of soil upon which the seed fell stand for the different hearts of men. Of course, the word of God did not survive in the hearts of those who outrightly rejected it. But there are those who have accepted the word of God and yet, end up stifling that word they received. These are the ones represented by the rocky ground and the thorns. In the Gospel, the Lord mentions 2 factors that stifle the word of God: love for the things of the world and fear of suffering.

Basically, these two characterize the secular spirit of the world: worldliness and fear of suffering. We have a term for this – we simply call it the “good life.” This kind of life is one that mistakenly associates comfort with goodness and, on the opposite end, suffering (or inconvenience) with evil. Pleasure is something which we should pursue and discomfort should be avoided. Basically, this is the fear of the Cross. This mentality is all around us. Artificial contraception is attractive because it separates sexual pleasure from the responsibilities that go with it. Now, you can enjoy the sex without worrying about its consequences – parang Coke Zero: real coke taste without the calories. Divorce is very attractive because it separates the pleasures of marriage from the obligation of “till death do us part.” I once heard a DJ over the radio say that he is allergic to sacrifice. “Basta enjoy lang nang enjoy. Pag naging mahirap ang sitwasyon, talikuran mo.”

And this is dangerous because secularization shortens our vision and limits it to the horizons of the visible world. Secularization falsifies reality by limiting it to only what is visible and makes us oblivious of the greater part of reality which is the invisible world. By instilling in us too much love for the things of the world, secularization condemns us to the world that passes away. By instilling in us the fear of suffering, secularization deprives us of that one instrument by which man is truly saved by Christ – and that is the Cross. In our shortsightedness, we fail to appreciate the redemptive value of our sufferings when they are endured in union with Christ. “Our sufferings in the present are nothing as compared to the glory that is waiting to be revealed in us,” so said St. Paul to the Romans in the 2nd reading. Remember that our sufferings and sacrifices are good for us. On the human level, such create in us a sense of character. On the supernatural level, such prepare us for the glory of our revelation as children of God.

If we want the word of God to bear fruit in us, we have to engage in self denial as an antidote to worldliness. We have to face our fear of suffering and carry our Cross because only in such way can we follow Christ who conquered the world and makes all things new. St. Paul tells us that athletes deprive themselves of many things in order to win a crown of leaves. Let us do the same. Let us cast away everything that encumbers our steps. Let us run the race so as to receive from him the crown of victory.

Casting out Evil Spirits

"Jesus summoned his Twelve disciples and gave them authority over unclean spirits to drive them out..." (Mt. 10:1)

Unclean spirits (demons) possess the angelic nature which is superior to the human nature. Scripture speaks of man as made "lower than the angels." And so, when our Lord bestowed the authority to drive away evil spirits to his apostles who were mere human beings, he gave creatures of inferior nature the authority to cast out creatures of superior nature. In this way, the Lord humiliates the pride of Lucifier."He has cast down the mighty from their thrones and has lifted up the lowly."

The humiliation of Lucifer began with the promise of the Woman who will crush the serpent's head. Not only did the Lord give this sublime honor of crushing the serpent's head to a human being who was created "lower than the angels." He made the humiliation even worse by declaring that this human being be a Woman.

Christ gave bishops and exorcists this power to cast out evil spirits. Bishops and exorcists are ordained men. Those who have engaged in this ministry have constantly called upon Our Lady to assist them in casting out demons. And those who call on her do not call in vain. To his most humble of all creatures, the Lord has bestowed the singular dignity of crushing the serpent's head.

A Beautiful Prayer to the Blessed Sacrament

"O living Host, O hidden Jesus, You see the conditions of my soul. Of myself, I am unable to utter Your Holy Name. I cannot bring forth from my heart the fire of love but, kneeling at your feet, I cast upon the Tabernacle the gaze of my soul, a gaze of faithfulness. As for You, You are ever the same, while within my soul a change takes place. I trust that the time will come when You will unveil Your countenance, and Your child will again see Your sweet face. I am astonished, Jesus, that You can hide Yourself from me for so long and that You can restrain the enormous love You have for me. In the dwelling of my heart, I am listening and waiting for Your coming, O only Treasure of my heart.

St. Faustina, Diary, 1239

The Wise and Fools

More than a hundred years ago (1904), Pope Pius X was lamenting about the world that has grown tired of the light of the Christian faith and has engaged in an outright rejection of the supernatural order which is falsely regarded as knowledge. The rejection of the existence of God, of the Divinity of Jesus, his Incarnation and his Resurrection, the supernatural origin of the Church, and the other dogmas of holy religion is deemed intellectually fashionable and those who are swayed by such modern erudition find themselves losing their faith or at least, feel that their faith is shaken. So many so–called “enlightened” people “now shout around Us proclaiming that the Church has gone beyond her time, that her doctrines are passed away for ever, that the day is at hand when she will be condemned either to accept the tenets of a godless science and civilization or to disappear from human society.” (Pius X, Iucunda Sane, 9.) To those men who arrogantly bask in their new-found “intelligence” Pope Pius applied the words of St. Paul: “it is painful to have to apply to men not lacking in acumen and application the rebuke addressed by St. Paul to those who fail to rise from earthly things to the things that are invisible: ‘They became vain in their thoughts and their foolish heart was darkened; for professing themselves to be wise they became fools’ (Rom. i. 21, 22). And surely foolish is the only name for him who consumes all his intellectual forces in building upon sand.” (Pius X, Iucunda Sane, 18.)

The wise and the learned in the ways of the world turn out to be the real fools, deprived of the wisdom of Christ. For all their arrogance and erudite arguments, they have not received the secrets which the Lord reveals only to the little ones: “I give praise to you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, for although you have hidden these things from the wise and the learned, you have revealed them to little children.” What the world-wise people regard as valuable information turn out to be trivialities for the Lord – knowledge that does not save nor gives eternal life. And they are going to oblivion where their predecessor are now: “Kingdoms and empires have passed away; peoples once renowned for their history and civilization have disappeared; time and again the nations, as though overwhelmed by the weight of years, have fallen asunder; while the Church, indefectible in her essence, united by ties indissoluble with her heavenly Spouse, is here today radiant with eternal youth, strong with the same primitive vigor with which she came from the Heart of Christ dead upon the Cross. Men powerful in the world have risen up against her. They have disappeared, and she remains. Philosophical systems without number, of every form and every kind, rose up against her, arrogantly vaunting themselves her masters, as though they had at last destroyed the doctrine of the Church, refuted the dogmas of her faith, proved the absurdity of her teachings. But those systems, one after another, have passed into books of history, forgotten, bankrupt; while from the Rock of Peter the light of truth shines forth as brilliantly as on the day when Jesus first kindled it on His appearance in the world, and fed it with His Divine words: ‘Heaven and earth shall pass, but my words shall not pass’ (Matth. xxiv. 35).” (Iucunda Sane, 8.)

Anyone who wishes to receive the wisdom that counts must turn to Jesus who said: “Learn from me, for I am meek and humble of heart.” “No one knows the Father except the Son and anyone to whom the Son wishes to reveal him.” And to whom did the Son reveal the Father? He revealed the Father to the Church – to his disciples whom he called his friends “for I have revealed to you everything I received from the Father.” Mankind can learn from Christ only by turning to the Church. We need to be reminded of “the absolute necessity of having recourse to this Church in order to have eternal salvation, to follow the right road of reason, to feed on the truth, to obtain peace and even happiness in this life.” (Iucunda Sane, 9.) “Wherefore, to use the words of the Holy Pontiff (Gregory the Great), ‘Turn your steps towards this unshaken rock upon which Our Savior founded the Universal Church, so that the path of him who is sincere of heart may not be lost in devious windings’ (Reg. viii. 24, ad Sabin. episcop.). It is only the charity of the Church and union with her which ‘unite what is divided, restore order where there is confusion, temper inequalities, fill up imperfections’ (Registr. v. 58 (53) ad Virgil. episcop.). It is to be firmly held ‘that nobody can rightly govern in earthly things, unless he knows how to treat divine things, and that the peace of States depends upon the universal peace of the Church’ (Registr. v. 37 (20) ad Mauric. Aug.).” (Iucunda Sane, 10.)

As for ourselves, it would do us well to keep in mind what St. Paul said to the Romans: “You are not in the flesh; on the contrary you are in the Spirit…We are not debtors to the flesh, to live according to the flesh. For if you live according to the flesh, you will die, but if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live.” Let us learn not from the world but from the Lord who is meek and humble of heart. In him let us find our rest for his yoke is easy and his burden is light.

Our Lady of Manaoag in PLDM

Thanks to Karen Buensuceso for the pictures!

Sacred Heart, Precious Blood

The feast of the Sacred Heart of Jesus this year coincides with what was formerly known as the Feast of the Precious Blood of Jesus. This coincidence emphasizes so much the humanity of the Lord for when you speak of heart and blood, you speak of components of the human body. While we are accustomed to look at the Sacred Heart as the symbol of the love of the Lord, let us not forget that “the proper and direct object of (the devotion) is the physical heart of Christ.” (C. Marmion, Christ in his Mysteries, 423.) And heart and blood belong to each other inasmuch as the heart is the organ that pumps blood to the various parts of the body. Biologically, the beating of one’s heart is actually the pumping of blood. Blood, which is the life force of the human body, flows through the veins by means of the beating of the heart. When the heart stops beating at death, the blood stops flowing through the veins. When the Lord died, his Sacred Heart stopped beating and when it was pierced open by the lance of a soldier, it brought out blood and water. The heart was drained of its blood – this is the mark of the consummation of Christ’s sacrifice and the fulfillment of what St. John said, “He loved his own even unto the end.”

“The Lord has set his heart on you and chose you,” Moses affirmed in the first reading. “God loved us,” John affirmed in the second reading. But with what did God love us? “He has loved us with a human heart. For this reason, the Sacred Heart of Jesus, pierced by our sins and for our salvation is quite rightly considered the chief sign and the symbol…of that love with which the divine Redeemer continually loves the eternal Father and all human beings without exception.” (CCC, 478.) He, who in his divinity is so much unlike us in every way, loved us with a human heart, that is, loved us in his humanity which is so much like us in every way except in sin. That is why he tells us: “Come to me, all you who labor and are burdened.” He invites us to draw to him – not as someone who does not understand human toil and burden. He understands our toil and burden because he has his own: “Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am meek and humble of heart; and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden light.”

Indeed, the human heart of Christ, as well as his blood, are worthy of our adoration “because it is part of Christ’s human nature, and because the Word united himself to a perfect nature. The same adoration we give to the Divine Person of the Word extends to all that to which he is personally united, all that subsists in and through the Person of the Word. This is true of Jesus’ human nature as a whole; it is true of each of the parts of which it is composed. The heart of Jesus is the heart of one who is God.” (Marmion) The blood of Jesus is the blood of one who is God. Because this is the heart of one who is God, it is the symbol of the love which the Incarnate Word bears for us. Because this is the Blood of one who is God, it is the price of our redemption.

Before this tremendous mystery of the Divinity and the humanity of Christ, let us humble ourselves like little children – for only by doing so will we be the objects of his love: “The Lord set his heart on you and chose you, for you are really the smallest of all nations.” He reveals the secrets of his heart to children: “although you have hidden these things from the wise and the learned, you have revealed them to little children.” We toil and bear our burdens like adults. Let us surrender these “adult things” to him who, though is Lord and God, is also meek and humble of heart. From him, let us learn. In him, let us rest “for my yoke is easy, and my burden light.”