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.

Wednesday, August 30, 2017

Chapter 72: The good spirit which should inspire monastic life

It is easy to recognize the bitter spirit of wickedness which creates a barrier to God's grace and opens the way to the evil of hell. But equally there is a good spirit which frees us from evil ways and brings us closer to God and eternal life. (From Ch. 72 of Saint Benedict's Rule, trans. by Patrick Barry, OSB, 1997.)

I know that I have both the good and the evil in myself -- being both loving and alienating, creating both belonging and exclusion. But the practice of meditation has the power to wipe away even these labels, and open me to the power of the liberating Spirit.

1 comment:

Wally SaundersAugust 30, 2017 at 4:56 AM
Abba, you gently invite me to embrace your Good Spirit, with that good zeal that enables me to find you here, now, in the sacrament of the present moment. Once more, as your little one, receive me in your loving, fatherly, arms.
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