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.

Tuesday, December 11, 2018

Chapter 58: The reception of candidates for the community (paragraphs 1-3)

The entry of postulants into the monastic life should not be made too easy, but we should follow St John's precept to make trial of the spirits to see if they are from God. (From para. 1 of Ch. 58 of Saint Benedict's Rule, trans. by Patrick Barry, OSB, 1997.)

The trials of my spirit, of my faith, are often those self-generated trials of my own obsessions, fears, fantasies, sense of isolation. I must not give up on my pilgrimage of meditation, so that I may be led to realize the waywardness of the ego as well as the resources of love.

1 comment:

Wally SaundersDecember 11, 2018 at 5:27 AM
You invite me to join you on this, your joyfully challenging, less-traveled road, in the Spirit of Benedict, Abba. Grant me the wholehearted willingness, just for today, to answer your call.
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