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.

Sunday, January 19, 2014

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.)

Resentment can grow like a tightening band around my heart. To forgive another or myself allows my heart to beat strong and free, and in this pulse of Christ I become kind.

2 comments:

Wally SaundersJanuary 19, 2014 at 4:32 AM
Joan Chittister titles these Guidelines “Tools for Good Works”: “The monastic heart is not just to be good. The monastic heart is to be good for something.” This reminds me of John Main’s surprising reply to the question, “What is the best way to prepare for meditation?” “Doing simple acts of kindness,” was his prescription. Lord, help me to remember this with whomever you put in my path today.
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Melanie CondesJanuary 20, 2014 at 3:28 AM
I didn’t have appetite for breakfast. I felt sad. So I decided to stroll along the beach. As I walked, I couldn’t contain my tears for losing something. As I gazed in the vastness of the ocean, I felt like someone whisper in my heart… “why mourn for something that in the first place has never been yours.” So true. God’s whisper liberated my ego. When I get back from my walk, I read from the Rule “… to recognize always that the evil is one’s own doing, and to impute it to oneself.”
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