Chapter 25: Punishment for more serious faults
None of the community should associate with or talk to the guilty person, who is to persevere alone in sorrow and penance in whatever work has been allotted, remembering St Paul's fearful judgement when he wrote to the Corinthians that: such a one should be handed over for the destruction of the flesh so that the spirit may be saved on the day of the Lord. (From Ch. 25 of Saint Benedict's Rule, trans. by Patrick Barry, OSB, 1997.)
At first this passage sounds almost horrible to me, like shunning. But this is different; this is surrounding the suffering one with self-controlled love and respect and the means of redemption. Sorrow and penance -- silence and solitude -- these are requirements for self-knowledge, and for finding God within.
I remember learning what most adolescent and family therapists have learned: that the etiology of “a problem child” often comes down to a “problem parent” or two. Problem teenagers’ path to help is dependent on a parent’s willingness to examine their own behavior. And that—I had to learn with my own sons—is what makes “”tough love” tough. Tough love does not mean becoming tough with my kids but becoming tough with myself, that is, humble and teachable, less egocentric. Benedict expresses this quite clearly here.
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