Chapter 32: The tools and property of the monastery

The superior should keep a list with the details of what has been issued to them so that, when one member of the community succeeds another in any responsibility, there may be no doubt about what items have been entrusted to each individual and what they have returned at the end. (From para. 1 of Ch. 32 of Saint Benedict's Rule, trans. by Patrick Barry, OSB, 1997.)

I often make to-do lists, but the way I use them can be rather inconclusive. In this chapter, however, St Benedict suggests to me that even keeping a list can have a purpose beyond the self, for the good of others, and even as part of the mystical vision of everything belonging in the Body of Christ.