Browsing tag: Church

  • Worthy Oratory

    An oratory is a physical structure constructed to demarcate a sacred space dedicated to prayer. There, members of a community can come and go freely to pray individually, without disturbing or being disturbed by the bustle of ordinary life.

    Without the interior compunction that recognizes the worth of the sacred, no physical structure can by itself make holy a location. But holiness exists wherever the hearts of human beings apprehend the worth of God. The sacred space is the place where the One who bestows all worth communes with the person who apprehends his worth.

    We apprehend the worth of God when we entrust to him our agonies and acknowledge his answers to our earlier entreaties.

    To apprehend the worth of God is to worship God.

    To apprehend the worth of anything is to distinguish its inherent value from any use it might afford to us.

    God, the creator and sustainer of all things is of all the most useless, because God cannot be used. No person or group owns God or controls him. No one can summon God, because he is always already everywhere present.

    God is not useful, but worthful. From him and by him all things receive their worth. And everything he has called into being is worthy to exist. Every person who apprehends the worth of God is free to worship him.

    Of all his creatures, only the human ones have this capacity to apprehend worth. Therefore of all creatures, human ones are the most worthy. Wherever a human being lives, there exists the holy presence of God willing to share worth with his creature.

    To acknowledge the worth of another human being is to apprehend the order of God’s creation, which is another act of worship. To circumscribe with compunction your own actions, for the sake of the worth of another person is again an act of worship. And this is how, when you allow another person to pray, you participate in marking out a sacred space for oratory.

    God knows individuals, so when we worship him, we do so each as a separate person. When we come together to agree in prayer, we become a community. Just as common prayer builds community, so individual prayer builds personal worth. So oratory includes both individual and communal prayer.

    Our deepest need is to know that we are worthwhile. Our deepest agony is to feel worthless. In a world where only usefulness is acknowledged, no one is worthy, and no life is inherently worthwhile. Without a sense of worth, not all the wealth in the world can save you from despair. But with worth, you can live well, and worthily, even through want and turmoil.

    So, everyone benefits when the worth of each is acknowledged. And the most elementary enactment of this apprehension in society is to protect prayer.

    Time spent in prayer may be useless, but it is worthwhile. Such time is not a waste but a sacrifice. Time is the only thing meted out, in equal measure, minute by minute, to all creation. The same minute is meted out to you as to anyone else, anywhere on earth. And a worthy sacrifice of it is a word to the One who endows you with the apprehension of Worth.

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  • Choose Your Destination

    Their law is what they like to do, whatever strikes their fancy.  Anything they believe in and choose, they call holy; anything they dislike, they consider forbidden (RB 1.8-9)

    So . . . if you’re thinking that this is a description of our culture today, actually it’s not.  This is Saint Benedict describing corrupt monks in the sixth century.  The mentality that surrounds us now was already an option then.  

    The monks that St. Benedict does approve of are the coenobitarum, which is Latin for koinos bios, which is Greek for common life, which is English for what I aim to discuss here. Life in community is the focus of St. Benedict’s Rule.  He invites us to choose community with our fellow human beings in this world, but it’s clear that the community depends on each individual’s commitment to follow Christ. St. Benedict’s Rule explicates the practical living out of “the communion of saints” of the Apostle’s Creed. This communion joins those on earth with those in heaven, but those on earth are the ones who need help trying to figure out how to live.

    There is another kind of monk that St. Benedict refers to: the eremitarum, which is the Latin transliteration of the Greek eremitēs, which means “one who lives in the desert” and gives us the English word hermit.  He himself lived as a hermit for three years.  He describes the hermit as ready with God’s help to grapple single-handed with the vices of body and mind (RB 1.5).

    When I first started to think of the housewife-mother as a domestic hermit, it was because of the sense of isolation I experienced.  I faced many struggles that didn’t seem to be addressed by the Church.  I don’t think my experience is unusual.  I think that many people flee the domestic life exactly because of the combination of exterior harassment and interior aridity that afflicts people whose vocation is neither respected by the world nor adequately addressed by religious authorities.

    My goal here is to provide some support for this double challenge of Christian families who are attempting both to sustain a personal spiritual vitality and also to create community within a materialistic, competitive culture.  I’m going to write from the perspective of someone who finds Christian goodness difficult and not always attractive.  If you don’t feel that you need help in this area, nothing I say will be of much interest.  But if you’re hanging on by your fingernails and thinking of letting go, I have a few tips for how to claw your way to survival.

    Jesus said, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life” John 14:6.  But his way of life is one among many options, in the post-Christian West, and not the one that the cool people choose.  Many nice people are rushing off along other paths, and they certainly don’t intend to destroy themselves.  But Jesus insists that only his path leads to life: Matthew 7:13-14. If you’ve watched as dreadful consequences play out around you, it’s already clear that not all paths are equally good. But it’s not necessarily obvious either how to live out the life that Christ talks about.

    If your desired destination is eternal community with those you love and with your Creator, then you’re in the company of St. Benedict.  What follows will be my interpretation of some of the principles he wrote about.

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  • Persevere

    For Scripture has it: Anyone who perseveres to the end will be saved, [Matthew 10:22]and again, Be brave of heart and rely on the Lord. [Psalm 27:14].  (Rule of St. Benedict 7.36-37)

    Discipline for a goal always was, and still is worth it.

    People with ordinary faces get up every day and keep going: for the sake of their children; for the sake of what is right and true and good; for love.

    Any goal worth reaching will point you uphill.  Hell is the other way.  There’s a broad, paved road with a gentle slope downhill, and all the cool people are on it, crowds of them.  If you were drifting with them but decide to turn around, you’ll have to fight your way through them, and they shove hard.  You will impede their fun.

    The question that pulses and pants and gets a headache is: what am I doing this for?

    Heaven beckons like a five-star vacation.  The Church promises that it’s already booked and paid for.

    But you’ve got to do the walking.  It’s a long hike through tough terrain.  Hardship doesn’t mean you’re guilty.  Hardship means you’re human, and still trying.

    God is always at work everywhere for good: within you too.  He will sustain you.  Bet your life on it.

    Sure, take a break and see if you can prove something.  But the choice always comes down to going on or giving up.  Therefore, people who are sweating uphill are probably honest when they offer help. Try being grateful, and accept it.  Hoist yourself to your feet.  It’s called perseverance. In other words, it means sending weight to bear on your forward foot when your toes pinch and your heel blisters.

    There’s a clear enough path when you start out. But then it wears thin and blends into the rock you’re balancing on.  Next thing you know, you’re craning your neck up a cliff face.  Walking was the easy part. You tell yourself it’s time to turn around and find that highway you were too good for.

    Others have been this way before: learn from them.  For instance, wear the harness.  Use the ropes.  You will surely slip and fall, but humility will save your life every time.  Free solo climbers will not pray or obey.

    Muscles clench that you didn’t know were in you.  The hissing sound is your own breath.  Fingertips are all the grip you’ve got.

    Someone slips and showers you with dirt and fragments.  The echo of that scream does not fade away.

    Or was that a jumper?  Jumpers are never alone.  They always drag a few others who were strapped to them.

    Certainly there are prayers that God seems in no hurry to answer. But when you pray for strength to do the right thing, he comes through, especially when there’s someone else roped to you and your fingers have gone numb.

    Sometimes he answers so fast that by the end of the day you’re kicking back on a plateau, enjoying the view.  When everyone you care about is getting along and helping each other, you might as well be in heaven.  You’ve already got what it’s all about.

    Pace yourself.  The tough parts push you beyond your limits.  That’s what getting stronger feels like.

    For a long time it’s awful, but the day comes when you flex your fingertips and don’t cramp.  You’re hanging off the next cliff, but it’s your cliff.  You own it.

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  • Silent Night, Holy Dawn

    Elegant Definition

    We absolutely condemn in all places any vulgarity. . . .  (Rule of St. Benedict 6.8)

    In the beginning, the Spirit of God hovered over the waters.  He spoke, and called forth formed things. To live a holy life is to move within these forms willingly.

    A holy life is an elegant life.

    The savor of elegance blends qualities of restraint and creativity.  Vulgarity glaringly lacks both.

    What is vulgarity?

    Vulgarity displays itself verbally in language; visually in esthetics.  Jokes can be crass, but so can architecture.  Clothing but also conversation can be indecent.  The vibe of vulgarity involves an absence of restraint along with a will to self-assertion, especially in a group.  Crude people do not call themselves into question, because everyone they notice is doing the same thing.  A sort of pushy smugness combines too much confidence with too little content in too callous a crowd.

    Profane people do not stop.  They stampede in the direction of a boundary and trample it deliberately, because they can.  It’s also the only thing they know how to do.  They tend to be the set in power at the moment.  

    With no respect for boundaries, there’s no sense of danger.  Uncouth people back off the edge of the Grand Canyon taking selfies.  They die on a ledge a few hours later because the lives of paramedics can’t be risked for anyone that graceless.  Their barbaric friends take more pictures, then go on their way just as before.

    Base people do not feel grief.  Mourning requires sensitivity to the border between life and death, and even this line of demarcation they do not perceive.  How could they?  All they’ve ever been taught is that they emerged randomly from nothing.  They fully expect to dissolve into nothing again, and not be missed.  Randomness is a brutal philosophy.  Its adherents show no pity.

    Elegant people are gracious

    In contrast, gracious people voluntarily honor boundaries: the lines between right and wrong; good and evil; being and nothing; beauty and ugliness.

    The antidote to vulgarity is humility.  If you treat other people with respect, you won’t commit obscenities, even though you make mistakes.  If you’re not trying to assert yourself over others, you’re not likely to infringe.  Minding limits, you engage your whole life in a practice of discipline.  This reeling in of yourself on the verge of a boundary is the essence of modesty.  It’s an active compliance that trains self-control, so you can live a graceful life.

    Elegant, definition: Elegance involves a sense of risk.  It’s a challenge to thread your way through without transgressing.  Who can do it?  But each attempt develops ability.  There are some who succeed beautifully.  We admire them and strive to imitate their technique.  Artistry is not the province of flippant violators.  Creativity does not ignore principles but rather applies them.

    For the Christian, beauty includes paradox.  The Word became flesh and dwelt among us.  The greatest was the servant of all.  The virgin gave birth.  The creator of the universe chose human parents who couldn’t afford anything better than an animal shed to shelter in.  Again and again, Christian teachings balance improbable truths on a fulcrum of miraculous possibility.

    As we make our way, we search for this narrow ridge of redemption.  We find it, and then our feet slip out from under us, and we slide off.  But there is someone to rescue us.  Holiness is not only practiced but bestowed.  Failure climbs back as resilience.

    Within the ways of God we exercise complete freedom to create.  He is the one who called us into being, gave us shape and endowed us with talents.  Vulgarity is not our destiny.

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  • Redemption

    Place your hope in God alone.  If you notice something good in yourself, give credit to God, not to yourself, but be certain that the evil you commit is always your own and yours to acknowledge. (Rule of St. Benedict 4. 41-43)

    Glaciers are receding, and at first the mountains they leave behind are as bare as the moon.  But up the stark cliffs the lichen first, then the wild sweet peas, then the alders grow.  Evergreen forests, moose and bear come to thrive on slopes relieved of eons of ice.  Grizzlies, bald eagles and salmon multiply, given a habitat and half a chance.  What about us, can we come back?

    It’s a spiritual ice age, these days.  Cool people tell us that we emerged randomly from nothing, will soon dissolve into nothing, and that no one cares anyway.  They say we’re helpless to control our own impulses; cannot alter our destructive habits; might as well yield to what’s killing us.  Give up and despair.  Do violence to yourself.  End it.

    But the Church holds onto the warmth of love and holds out for the thrill of life lived in harmony with our Creator.  The Christian hope is redemption.

    Redemption is a process, sometimes a slow one.  Glaciers and fingernails grow at about the same speed. So do souls.  But redemption is a transformation we willingly engage in.  We surrender the parts of ourselves that are mean or petty, that clash with the character of our Creator.  The God who formed the universe and who endows each tiny creature with its own particular beauty also called each one of us into being.  He wants to pull us back from the brink, but he gives us our freedom.  We participate willingly or not at all.

    First we must reconcile with the source of goodness, in order to develop goodness ourselves. Then we let our old identity die away even as a new identity forms within us. The new person gets up every day and struggles to do the right thing. It’s not a futile struggle. It’s the exertion of a caterpillar morphing into a butterfly. Every decision you make against evil, for good participates in your eternal formation. What you will be has not yet been revealed, but your new form will be glorious. Look around and observe glimpses of glory. God is always at work everywhere for good. Contemplate what he has already done.

    Right now you may feel slimy, constrained and exhausted. The effort is part of the process. You get stronger as you try. This is because you’re not just achieving an objective. You’re becoming someone. Morphing from one state of being to a new one, temporarily you have fewer powers, not more. The force of rage has dissipated, because you experience peace within. Your new movements may be awkward at first, but soon enough you’ll stretch wings and be flying. It’s a whole new experience of reality. No regrets for the dry husk left behind.

     

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  • Endure Persecution For The Sake Of Justice

    Endure persecution for the sake of justice (Matthew 5:10).  (RB 4. 33)

    Brace yourself.  To endure implies time, maybe a long time.  Persecution is not a one-off, an insult from a passing stranger, a violation of a specific right on a particular occasion.  Persecution involves systematic, sustained, deliberate attack, targeting you.  So we’re talking about a long ordeal with no end in sight.

    In such a time, when there’s nothing to see but darkness, we fix our eyes on our purpose, the thing we love more, the justice without which we’d have no reason to keep going even if things were easy.  This is justice in the large sense.  That is to say, righteousness.  Righteousness simply means doing the right thing.  If everyone did the right thing, justice would flourish everywhere.  There are many opportunities to exercise it, in any human life.  It’s the thing you do because it’s right, before you realize you’ll be punished for it.

    Perhaps you speak out honestly, and the person in authority doesn’t want to hear it.  Someone pulls you aside, talks down to you, and gives you to understand that you are not at the level of those who have interesting contributions to make.  You are at the level of those who shut up and listen.  Fall in line, and maybe you’ll get somewhere.

    So you try.  And you fail.  You have no knack for nonsense phrases.  You keep searching for a way to express the truth that will get someone to listen.  But there is none, not where you are.

    For example, when you walk through the door, no one sees you.  You greet them, but they don’t remember having met you.  They don’t seem to hear you when you speak.  You don’t exist for them, and nonexistence is a terrible strain.  It melts your whole sense of self.

    What’s wrong with you?  Why can’t you just get along?  What is it that prevents you from fitting in?

    It’s the element of righteousness within your character. The justice of God is embodied in you. It’s the stuff you’re made of.

    And so you pray, “Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven,” because now you realize there’s a difference. Tension between earth and heaven is heating up. Where on earth is God’s will being done?

    Within you.

    God is truth, and the Spirit of Truth cannot abide lies, nor dwell within the liar. So you feel sick and sicker at hollow words you can no longer repeat. You can’t collude with what repels you.

    But when the heat is on, and the blows are hammering, something within you glows to life. Most surprisingly, the thing that should break you actually strengthens you. Your whole substance responds and alters. You don’t recognize yourself anymore, and neither do the people who know you. Sparks fly. You lose friends.

    It should not be so painful to do right. Hold out for the way things should be. Something in you does not belong in this world. Glow brighter. The darkness is very dark, and what you don’t see is that the only light in the room is emanating from you.

    You take the plunge to escape, because that’s the only path forward. When the steam clears, you’re still in one piece, but you feel defeated. You do have a future ahead of you, but it’s not the one you had planned. Not only your shape but your elemental structure has changed. Impurities are gone. Alloys are added. There’s no going back to what you were before. Not now, not ever.

    The One who is forging your character knows what he means to make of you, and your story isn’t over yet. Some day the form of you will find its function. You may still have further refinements to undergo. God will make your suffering count for justice.

     

     

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  • Love Your Enemies

    Love your enemies (Matthew 5:43-48; Luke 6: 27-35)

    (Rule of Saint Benedict 4. 31)

    Loving your enemies sounds like a nice idea until you actually have enemies yourself.

    When someone asked Jesus, “who is my neighbor?” he responded with the parable of the Good Samaritan, which turns the question on its head. We are to be neighbors even to inveterate cultural enemies. But no one ever asked Jesus, “who is my enemy?” This, it seems, we are left to figure out.

    An enemy is not merely someone with whom you disagree. You can disagree passionately with friends on all sorts of topics, as long as you have something more important in common.

    Nor is an enemy an opponent in a game. An opponent recognizes the same boundaries you do and does not harm you in real life.

    An enemy is not even necessarily someone with whom you are in conflict. Sometimes the angry person turns out not to be a beast. If you give the benefit of the doubt, engage, and communicate what’s going on from your perspective, sometimes you find that the enemy is a neighbor after all.

    An enemy, in brief, is someone who acts deliberately on the intent to harm you. After you’ve attempted to resolve a conflict peacefully, the person who stabs you in the back can fairly be called an enemy.

    And this is the person we’re called to love.

    A Christian concept of love is essentially voluntary. We know that God is love. But we also know that God is not our slave. So, neither are we enslaved to those we love. Love ends where coercion begins.

    Therefore, if you are going to love anyone, first you must be free. More to the point: you must be free from the enemy in question. If your enemy is more powerful than you are, escape is the first order of business. Extricate yourself, and then work on making new friends, because even evil people tend to avoid attacking someone who has relationships with others.

    If you are, then, free to love, the question becomes, what is love?

    We know that “the Lord disciplines those he loves” (Hebrews 12:6; Proverbs 3: 12). Therefore a Christian concept of love includes setting boundaries and enforcing standards. Love sets aside the self-interest of the moment for the good of the other person. But the good of the other person is not always what that person demands. When someone wants something that is not good, you say no, for love’s sake.

    The most terrible enemies are the ones you always loved, and who, you thought, also loved you. Those are the ones who break your heart. There’s nothing quite like the distress of loving the antagonist who once was dear. The world roils with enemies who are exes.

    Whether the situation is tragic or merely wearisome, loving any sort of enemy requires a combination of efforts. First, you must finesse your way out of range of whatever harm your enemy might inflict. Further, you must refrain from inflicting whatever revenge is within reach. Ultimately, you must make the extra effort to be the sort of person your enemy is not.

    Your enemy is enraged, but you must be respectful. Your enemy is vindictive, but you must be peacable. Your enemy is selfish, but you must be generous. Your enemy is false, but you must be true.

    Nothing anyone can say will ever make this easy, but the Holy Spirit can make it possible.

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  • Bear Injuries Patiently

     

    Bearing injuries patiently is not a sign of weakness.  It’s a sign of goodness.  Only the strong bear up.  Only the good restrain themselves when evil beckons, because evil is not their master.

    This isn’t about defending yourself in the moment of attack.  You have the right to self-defense.  This is about the aftermath: now what?

    Weak people fall apart and lash out at everyone around them as they disintegrate.  For a brief moment, they enjoy an experience of power: the power to destroy.  There’s something appealing about power, even when you know it’s fleeting, even when you know it’s hateful.  The Church calls this appeal the glamor of evil.  As Christians, we reject it, along with Satan and all his works.

    Strong people hold themselves together, hold onto what they know is good and hold out for what they know is right.  Sometimes they hang on by their fingernails.  As Christians, this is the character we aspire to, and God knows it’s hard.  Sometimes the path leads straight up the face of a cliff.

    You can be on the right path and still fall and get hurt.  Getting hurt doesn’t mean that God is against you.  It means that there’s an inherent risk to living at all.  You were thrust into existence without being consulted.  But now that you’re here, you’re free to venture your all for the good.  The promise of Christ is that ultimately your venture will pay off.  Death is not the end.

    People who have only this world to live for figure that nothing they do matters.  But the Christian message is that everything you do matters, even the tiny things.  Even a small creature can live in harmony with its Maker.  He is always at work everywhere for good, and he invites you to participate in that work, wherever you are, whoever you are.

    You’re free to reject his offer.  You can rage against your Creator.  He allowed evil into this world, and now you can increase the sum of evil.

    But know that if you choose for what is right and true and good, God is on your side, even when everything else in the universe seems to be against you.  And he promises that the pain will last only as long as this life.  You will emerge into peace for eternity.

    That leaves now, and everything we have to face in this moment in time.  Sometimes we can’t understand why God does what he does.  Why does he hurt us?  Why make us stay in our place in a corner with a cone around our necks?  We didn’t do anything wrong.  

    Heave a big sigh and wait: maybe something good will come along next.

    Don’t fret.  Don’t chew on your hurt and make it worse.  Save your energy for the good you can do.  If the path before you is clear, and if you have the strength, get up every day and keep going.  Be patient.  Bear up.  There’s no quick fix to any complex problem, and you will encounter many problems along the way.

    When you’ve done everything you can do, then stand firm and wait for God himself to act on your behalf.  If you can’t stand up anymore, sit down.  If even sitting is too much, lie still and be who you are where you are.  There’s a time to let people who love you take care of you.  You’re not alone in this.  Fix sad eyes on your Maker.  Remain alert to his call.

    An injury can happen in an instant.  The healing takes a long, long time.  It saps all the strength you’ve got.

    Healing is your job now.  We want you back.

     

    Do not repay one bad turn with another 1 Thessalonians 5:15; 1 Peter 3:9.  Do not injure anyone, but bear injuries patiently.  (Rule of St. Benedict 4. 29-30)

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  • Curb Your Urge

    For this reason Scripture warns us, Pursue not your lusts Sirach 18:30.  (Rule of St. Benedict 7.25)

    We live in a culture where it’s supposed to be fun to let yourself go.  People announce that they’re about to let themselves go, and then they do it.  Not only do they not feel shame: they expect you to pat them on the back.  Most of the time they act with good humor, and with no thought of harming themselves or anyone else.  The binge is benign these days.

    Until it’s not.  The fact is that we have countless people who are suffering the tragic consequences of their own impulses–or worse, of someone else’s.  Some of them refuse to admit responsibility.  But others are discouraged, because they’ve tried and failed to change.

    Self-control is not an instant thing.  It’s the work of a lifetime.  It’s the practice of a life well-lived.

    If you want to be an athlete or an artist or any sort of skilled worker, you start at the beginning and practice basic moves first.  Checking your own impulse is one of the most basic moves of all.  It’s an element of any future action.  It’s not just that refraining from one action frees up time and energy for an alternative.  Curbing your impulse also builds strength and skill.  These in turn open up new possibilities that would otherwise have remained out of reach.

    A century of Freudian psychology has led us to assume that checking an impulse means repressing desire.  When you repress a desire, you don’t act on it, but it comes out in some other, weird way that you don’t control and that you may not even be aware of.  So you might as well let yourself go.

    Suffering the consequences?  That’s someone else’s specialty.  Next, please.

    The difference between self-control and repression is that self-control does not suppress desire.  Self-control nurtures and trains desire.  While the binge lets desire loose, without regard for other people, self-control keeps desire on a leash and exercises it with consideration for others.

    The lure of the binge is easy pleasure fast.  But the thrill tends to decrease with repetition.  You work harder to get less.  And you suffer the side effects.  With self-control, on the other hand, you start small, but the enjoyment increases with practice.  And the horizons are infinite.

    The best the binge can claim is not to have harmed anyone else.  But self-control allows you to do good to others actively.

    People who can’t control their impulses only get along with others who want to do the same thing at the same time in the same way.  When a whole collection of individuals are all out of control together, they meld into a mob.  The mob tramples any divergent individual.  But then the frenzy burns out, and the mob disperses.  The same individuals go back to competing ruthlessly against each other.  They separate, each alone with an ungoverned desire.  The endpoint is a life without any relationships at all: just interactions that serve the appetite.

    But self-control allows you to live in community.  Christian community aims not to meld but to harmonize individual desires.  It’s a complex challenge, but by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, we do make a life together.  This calls for active participation on the part of each one, rather than a passive letting go.

    Life in a family is a training ground for harmony.  Baby learns to sleep at night long enough for Mom to get the rest she needs.  Baby learns to go for longer without eating, so that eventually the child’s habits match the habits of the family.  In practice this effort takes years, and every time a new baby arrives, another individual process is thrown into the mix.  Easy is not part of the deal.

    But the endpoint is paradise, which Jesus describes as a banquet Matthew 22:1-14; 25:1-13.  A banquet is a fancy dinner where people dress their best, eat together and enjoy each other’s company.  When you have a family sitting down to a meal together, you have a foretaste of heaven.  The food may be simple.  The clamor around your table may not sound divine.  But consider what you’ve achieved: you’ve taken human beings from a state of chaos to a state of sociability.  Even if it’s not yet heaven, it is the foundation of civil society, and that’s something no one should take for granted.

    Ultimately: heaven.  Here and now: a functioning society.  Earliest of all: a family meal.  But it all begins with harmonizing individual impulses.  And so, each one of us must achieve a measure of self-control.

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  • Wholly Holy And Hale

    Do not aspire to be called holy before you really are, but first be holy that you may more truly be called so.  Live by God’s commandments every day. (Rule of St. Benedict 4. 62-63)

    Of all the archaic vocabulary words that have become vestigial, holy has to be the most vacuous.  We have no idea what it means, but we’re pretty sure we don’t want to go there.  It’s probably the Christian equivalent of a no fat, no sugar, no salt, gluten-free, vegan blueberry muffin.

    You try it.

    (They make it look like a blueberry muffin, but a deep human instinct tells you that it’s going to be a bad experience.)

    What we’ve heard about holiness is that there’s no money, sex or power in it.  It’s sinless and spiritual.

    Definitely go for it.

    Naturally there are people who want to be holy, just as there are people who try to make you eat their special muffins.  You pay attention to who they are, and you make a mental note to breakfast elsewhere next time.

    (Of course we’re still friends!)

    Although we don’t take the word “holy” seriously anymore in everyday speech, its cognate, “whole” is a workhorse we use all the time.  Whole and holy are linguistic twins, but over the course of nine hundred years, the version without the W specialized as a religious term, while the other one got a regular job and put food on the table.  At birth their meaning was: entire, unhurt, healthy, free of wound or injury.  Whole also originally meant “restored,” in the sense of having recovered from a wound or injury, being healed.

    As a matter of fact, the Old English parent word is still alive and kicking, pronunciation unchanged through the centuries.  It is “hale,” as in hale and hearty, free from defect, disease or infirmity, retaining exceptional health and vigor.  You could still use this word, if you ever met anyone who fit the description.

    Linguistically it’s entirely plausible to assert that a holy life is a life restored to wholeness, a healthy, vibrant life.

    Of course, St. Benedict was writing several centuries before any version of English existed at all.  In Latin, his choice was “sanctum,” a word that English eventually swallowed whole to mean “sacred place.”   For him and still for us, it means dedicated or set apart for the service of deity.

    Latin was a pagan language.  In Latin it’s possible to be sacred to the deity and therefore murdered; pimped out as a temple prostitute; locked in an iron cage and suspended over toxic fumes to induce entertaining prophecies for the pilgrims.  No one ever claimed that the pagan gods were faithful friends. On the contrary, they were reputed to be fickle, capricious, cruel.  You sacrificed to the gods in order to buy their favor, or to buy off their wrath.  The thing (or the person) you gave was then sacred to the god. To be sacred to the god was to be consumed by the god.

    But English developed as a Christian language and follows a different logic.  Holiness merges the concepts “sacred” and “hale” inextricably.  This is because our deity wants our good.  He doesn’t want to consume us.  He flaunts the whole concept of religion by requiring us to consume him.  What he wants from us is an interior change of heart that produces action for good.  When we’ve done wrong, he wants us to feel remorse and apologize to the person we’ve hurt.  He wants us to feel pity and do something to help when we see someone suffering.  When he gives us opportunities and resources, he wants us to feel responsible and work to establish justice.

    In exchange for dedicating your life to him, he offers to make your death temporary.  You will pass through death and emerge immortal.  As for your experience in this life, the language itself bears witness that when you offer yourself to the service of Christ, resolving to live by his commands, you will experience a restoration to wholeness.

    Live whole.  Die good.  Be hale forever.

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