St Benedict (4) - Obedience

ST. BENEDICT (4) - VOW OF OBEDIENCE

ALL CHIEFS BUT NO INDIANS

Wouldn't life be easy if there were no other people!

Unfortunately, the minute we come together, everyone wants to be boss and no one wants to obey. We find that we are all chiefs but no Indians.

The result is, that we shout louder and louder in order to make ourselves heard, or else we can give up the fight and retreat into our corner and grumble away inwardly. Neither course of action leads to lasting happiness and ultimate satisfaction.

This can happen in a marriage, a family and even in the life of the church, where you would expect people to be able to live happily together.

St Benedict found this out to his own personal cost.

Many of the early Christians, who took the spiritual life seriously, tried to find God by themselves. They often lived in lonely and isolated places where they would not be distracted. Occasionally they would leave their retreat and seek help and guidance from an experienced person,

Such a person was St Benedict, whose wisdom concerning the spiritual life was greatly respected, and whose fame spread far and wide.

So respected was he that, in the fifth century, many of his solitary disciples decide to come together and share with him, and each other, their common search for God. Thus Benedict became the founder of 'Western Monasticism'.

However, as soon as they came together there was trouble! Yes, trouble, even amongst monks! Everyone began to think that they knew better. In fact, the situation eventually got so bad, that Benedict decided to leave the monastery which he had founded in Subiaco, and move further south to Monte Cassino.

There he started all over again, drawing upon his previous experience in Subiaco.

The answer to the problem of ‘all chiefs but no Indians’ was to introduce the monastic vow of Obedience, in addition to the vows of Stability, and Openness to Change.

What then did Benedict mean by his vow of Obedience, and what is its value to us today in our search for God?

First of all, Benedict did not suggest that people were so ignorant by nature that they could not come to know the will of God unaided. Obedience to a particular person, whether it be to an Abbot, a Vicar or someone else is not based upon the premise that they have a 'hot line' to God which others do not have.

Secondly, as far as Benedict was concerned, obedience was not just about getting things done. Obviously, when people come together to live in Community, someone has to be in charge, whilst others in the community, respond to their leadership by some form of obedience. This was never more so than in a monastery where the monks elected one of their number, because of his Christlike qualities, to be their spiritual father. Thus the Abbot was seen to represent Christ in their midst, and in obeying him, they believed that they were obeying Christ.

So, obedience, as far as Benedict was concerned, was not just about the illumination of ignorant minds, nor getting things done. It was first and foremost about the cultivating of an inner attitude of the heart and mind, whereby a person is enabled to respond, cheerfully and generously, to the will of God.

To Benedict, external obedience without inward obedience, achieved nothing since it lacked integrity. So he writes, "If a disciple obeys grudgingly and grumbles, not aloud but also in his heart, then, even though he carries out the order, his action will not be accepted with favour by God, who sees that he is grumbling in his heart."

How then, do you and I go about developing this inner attitude of the heart which enables us to be obedient to the voice of God?

Firstly, obedience involves a willingness to listen to the voice of God.

The very first words of the Rule of St Benedict are "listen carefully." So we need to cultivate the art of listening to the voice of God speaking to us, through the Bible, upon which Benedict laid great emphasis, and through other people and the circumstances in which we find ourselves.

Incidentally, this includes listening to non-verbal communication - the sort of thing which we call body language. For instance, the ache in your back need not necessarily be dismissed as lumbago; it may be telling you about strain and stress, and be a signal that it is time to stop and be kind to your body and nerves, and not make impossible demands upon yourself. In other words, we need to cultivate that art of listening attentively with every fibre of the body.

This also means being prepared to listen to the things which we do not like to learn about ourselves. This is probably the hardest of all - to listen to that which is often disagreeable or even threatening. After all, we much prefer to turn a deaf ear to the many unexpected and, perhaps, unacceptable ways in which God tries to reach out to us. In doing so, we run the risk of not hearing the voice of God speaking to us. As one Benedictine writer has said, "We're likely to pass God without even noticing him".

It is interesting to note, in passing, that the Latin verb which means 'to listen', comes from the same root as the verb 'to obey'. In other words, it not just enough to listen to the voice of God, for listening also involves a response in terms of obedience.

Secondly, obedience involves a letting go of self-will.

In his discussion of the virtue of humility in chapter 7 of his Rule, St Benedict asks that, "a man loves not his own will nor takes pleasure in the satisfaction of his desires; rather he shall imitate by his actions that saying of the Lord: 'l have come not to do my own will, but the will of him who sent me."'

Now there is an awful danger that we perceive of such a person as being a spiritual whimp. We tend to think of a humble person as being limp and ineffectual. In actual fact, a truly humble person is exactly the opposite. Humility demands enormous strength of purpose.

You see, when Benedict talks about 'renouncing our will', he is not talking about renouncing our free will so that we become like spiritual robots. After all, the exercise of free will is one of the greatest gifts which we have to offer to God. Much rather he wants us to free ourselves from the possessive self which is only concerned about getting its own way. In other words, it is the use we make of our will which is the point at issue. Are we going to use it to serve our own needs, or are we going to use it as a means of turning to Christ?

You know, as well as I do, more often than not we use our will to serve our own needs. Afraid of being overlooked and trampled upon in the crowd, we use it to assert ourselves. In other words, we use our will as a form of self-protection. So we allow ourselves to become prickly, touchy, moody and sulky if we cannot get our own way.

It is this 'self-will' that obedience challenges us to let go of, so that we can begin to bend our will to the will of God, as we seek to respond to his voice.

Thirdly, obedience involves a willingness to be a collaborator with God.

As I said earlier, obedience is not about becoming spiritual robots. We do not surrender our freedom to choose. Much rather, we embrace the opportunity to try and bend our will to the will of God.

Now that is easier said than done. If your experience is anything like mine, discerning the will of God in any given situation, is extremely difficult. It is seldom a question of this being the right course of action, and that being the wrong course of action. It is seldom a question of black and white but rather different shades of grey, and therefore we must work at the decision as collaborators with God.

The Benedictine monk, Daniel Rees, writes, "The Christian and monastic model for discerning God's will in a given situation is not that of finding the solution to a crossword puzzle where the answer must be exactly right, fitted to some preconceived plan. A better model is that we are given building blocks and have to see what can be done with them, using in the task all our intelligence, sensitivity and love."

In other words, obedience does not involve blind obedience which treats us as less than human, but rather invites us to become responsible; collaborators with God, as we seek to do his will.

There is therefore a sense in which our obedience must always be provisional. We obey in the light of the available evidence before us and our particular limitations, This must always be open to change as the vision unfolds before us.

To sum up then, by the vow of Obedience, St Benedict was concerned about the developing of an inward attitude of the heart and mind, whereby a Christian is enabled to respond freely to the will of God.

Obedience involves a willingness to listen, to let go of self-will, and to be a collaborator with God.

This obedience we see supremely displayed in the life of Jesus Christ, who listened to the voice of God, surrendering his self-will and collaborated with God, so that he bent his will to the will of God. Even at the darkest moment in his life, he was still able to say, "not my will, but thine be done."

At the end of the day, we are all Indians, and there is only one chief, and that is God himself.

Almighty God, by whose grace alone we are accepted and called to your service: strengthen us by your Holy Spirit and make us worthy of our calling; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen