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.

Saturday, October 5, 2013

Chapter 7: The value of humility (paragraph 14)

In the end we may learn to say: it was good for me, Lord, that you humbled me so that I might learn your precepts. (From para. 14 of Ch. 7 of Saint Benedict's Rule, trans. by Patrick Barry, OSB, 1997.)

I can feel a blow to my ego, especially as I become more aware of my thoughts and how they reflect my self-centered view of the world. Little by little, my awareness of these "blows" is waking me up to reality, to creation as ordered by God.

1 comment:

valOctober 16, 2013 at 8:34 AM
It is not easy talking about humility, but Benedict does step by step showing me the way through self-complacency and over-estimation of any good done by the self.
Luke 17:10 tells me through the words of a servant what more or less Benedict is saying, "I am an unprofitable servant doing what I was obliged to do." Any good I do for another is first of all my duty as a follower of Christ to do (essential in all discipleship), and secondly, as in this parable, I am powerless to achieve any good unless I am fully responsive and open to the Spirit of Christ.
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