WCCM Oblate Blog: Reflections from Daily Reading of the Rule of St. Benedict

WCCM Benedictine Oblates are encouraged to read a designated portion of the Rule daily, and to write a brief, personal response. I hope that this blog will support our Oblate community in this practice. Please, keep blog entries brief and in a first-person ("I") voice. Refrain from discussing, offering an opinion, or commenting on other entries. Simply consider how a particular section of the Rule is speaking to you in your present circumstances.

Monday, May 20, 2013

Chapter 4: Guidelines for Christian and monastic good practice (paragraphs 3-5)

Don't let your actions be governed by anger nor nurse your anger against a future opportunity of indulging it.

(From para. 3 of Ch. 4 of Saint Benedict's Rule, trans. by Patrick Barry OSB, 1997.)

I've experienced the raw, destructive power of anger -- my own, and that of others. The strange image of "nursing anger" reveals for me the seductive qualities of the ego, trying to make me believe that a volatile, self-centered emotion could somehow be nurturing to me. Meditation helps me to recognize, and accept, an ego in need of transformation, and to grow in self-knowledge. Meditation also helps me to recognize who truly and tenderly dwells in my heart.

1 comment:

val latonaMay 22, 2013 at 2:31 AM
"Speak the truth with heart and tongue." My heart and my tongue are like two knitting needles and the meditation practice is the knitting activity. As I meditate my heart and my tongue are brought closer together by the yarn which is Christ. Truth in words is the product whether on paper or in speech. My whole being becomes the truth, the reality of who I am.
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