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.

Thursday, July 25, 2019

Chapter 45: Mistakes in the Oratory

Anyone who makes a mistake in a psalm, responsory, antiphon or reading must have the humility to make immediate reparation there before all the community in the oratory. A failure to do that so clearly shows lack of the humility to put right a fault which was due to carelessness that it must incur a more severe punishment. (From Ch. 45 of Saint Benedict's Rule, trans. by Patrick Barry, OSB, 1997.)

I think about how my distracted state of mind -- a lack of being totally present -- interferes with meditation or other work I do. But am I alert to how my distracted state of mind diminishes my community?

1 comment:

Wally SaundersJuly 28, 2019 at 4:54 AM
Kindness, consideration, courtesy, humility, freedom from the bondage of self: all lessons I continue to learn simply by showing up on time for family meals and events.
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