I gave the weekend to reading Evangelii gaudium. Broad and unfailingly positive, it is exactly what it says it is, an 'Apostolic Exhortation.' It is a plea that the Church and all her members might become evangelical and missionary in everything. There is much that strikes; for example, the length of the section on homily preparation or how, when Francis speaks of the option for the poor, divine and ecclesial, he speaks first not of helping or even of justice, but of inclusion in society. I was especially grateful for sections that gave expression to certain concerns that have troubled me over the years, such as much of what Francis says about 'pastoral acedia.' (n. 81 ff.)
Given those things, as well as the important passages already reported in a widespread way, here are some of my favorite quotes:
Showing posts with label Acedia. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Acedia. Show all posts
December 2, 2013
November 14, 2013
Ramble On My Slow Posting
This blog has really slowed down. Some of it I attribute to my use of Twitter, which, as I have shown, is eminently suited to Franciscan preaching. Not that most of what I do on Twitter is preaching, but the tweets I might consider preaching always end up as the ones that get the most retweets and favorites. But some of the slowing of the blog has also certainly come from changes in my life.
I started blogging during the Easter season of 2006, just when I was edging toward a series of intense transitions: from a temporarily professed religious to a perpetually professed one, from a layman to a cleric, from a friar in formation to one in his first assignment, and finally from a deacon to a priest.
October 16, 2010
Bernard, Gyrovagues, and Acedia
Just one more post before I leave my little St. Bernard theme. In Jean Leclercq's classic The Love of Learning and the Desire for God I came across Bernard's commentary on the four kinds of monks from the Rule of St. Benedict.
Here's what Bernard says about one of the bad sorts, the gyrovagues:
As I have continued to puzzle through the mysterious passion of acedia, this is another text that makes me think it might just be one of the primary spiritual dangers of our time when the dissipation of attention through hyper-stimulation, "multi-tasking" and constant connectivity is becoming the norm.
Here's what Bernard says about one of the bad sorts, the gyrovagues:
Then come the spiritual gyrovagues: their inconstancy carries them from reading to prayer, from prayer to work, preventing them from obtaining the benefits of their undertakings: stability in effort and perseverance in devotion. Victims of acedia, they think it better at one moment to do one thing, and, at another, something else; they begin everything and finish nothing.
As I have continued to puzzle through the mysterious passion of acedia, this is another text that makes me think it might just be one of the primary spiritual dangers of our time when the dissipation of attention through hyper-stimulation, "multi-tasking" and constant connectivity is becoming the norm.
September 9, 2009
Acedic Community
Lately for my subway and bus reading I have been working through Sr. Mary Margaret Funk's Humility Matters for Practicing the Spiritual Life. Her books have been a real treasure for me over the years in my own spiritual practice, especially Thoughts Matter, and she is one of the contemporary writers on the Christian spiritual life whom I most hope to meet one day.
This midday, sneaking out for confession and tacos al pastor I arrived at this stinging passage on the recently popular topic of acedia:
Wow. When have I been patient zero in this scenario? Have I repented?
Click here for Sister's Amazon page, from which you should shop or add to your wish list, and which in the course of looking up I found also her blog!
This midday, sneaking out for confession and tacos al pastor I arrived at this stinging passage on the recently popular topic of acedia:
...once this affliction has been detected, action must be taken before the whole community becomes infected. I've seen entire communities caught in these chronic acedic patterns. No one knows exactly what's wrong, but the virtuous or zealous newcomer is jeered, and any new leader that takes on the crowd is met with disdain... Zeal is loathed, deprecating talk saturates conversations, and expectations are low. Comfort-seeking replaces mission and self-seeking pleasures replace spiritual practice. (60-61)
Wow. When have I been patient zero in this scenario? Have I repented?
Click here for Sister's Amazon page, from which you should shop or add to your wish list, and which in the course of looking up I found also her blog!
September 3, 2009
Acedia and Distraction
After yesterday's post and some clarifying comments, it seemed like a good idea to me to continue on the topic of acedia, especially in its distinction from ordinary distraction and other troubles and challenges in the spiritual life.
Acedia is a slippery term, for sure. In the monastic tradition it refers to a kind of spiritual sickness by which we lose our taste for spiritual things and thus become spiritually lazy or find ourselves in a spiritual torpor--here we can see the relationship by which acedia gets transformed into sloth in standard lists of "deadly" sins. Acedia leaves us joyless in--or even disgusted with--the things of God and our spiritual practice, even though we might be dutifully fulfilling them all the same. This is very dangerous for anyone, but especially for those who preach the Word of God and minister the Church's sacraments, for they may be 'going through the motions' or simply acting as a technician who lacks any genuine savor or spiritual unction.
It is critical, in our own discernment or in spiritual direction, that ordinary sadness or even depression not be confounded with spiritual acedia. Acedia must also be distinguished from certain positive movements in the spiritual life that may bear some resemblance to it, like an invitation into John of the Cross's "Night of Sense."
Acedia must also be distinguished from the ordinary experience of distraction, both in prayer itself but also in our desire to be recollected in God during the rest of our day. While acedia is a dangerous passion, a 'bad thought' or a 'demon' as our monastic fathers and mothers call it, distraction is a normal part of human experience flowing from the mutability of our wills and bodies. In fact, distraction--when used properly--is no danger to the spiritual life at all, but is actually one of its most important helps. By using our distractions well, we refine and purify our intention toward God and become more durable in our recollection. In other words, distractions are the daily workout and exercise of our souls; they are always an opportunity to strengthen our intention and attention to the God Who is the true Desire of our hearts and Delight of our minds.
Nevertheless, there are dynamics that occur between acedia and distraction, and we should be aware of them in our daily practice. On the one hand, if we are not vigilant in our guard of our hearts and do not use our distractions well, instead allowing our hearts and minds to rest in whatever random thing arouses their interest, we will eventually discover ourselves to be slaves of concupiscence and sensual appetite. This is one way that the poor use of the opportunity of distractions can help us 'catch' the spiritual disease of acedia. If we follow every distraction and take worldly delight in every curiosity that invites our attention, we will find that when we do try to return to our piety we have lost some of the savor and joy we used to have in spiritual things. We will discover to our horror that even our desire for spirituality is selfish and sensual and that God no longer delights us in the way we had previously imagined.
On the other hand, for one who is already sick with acedia, distractions from prayer or from our recollection in general become that much more dangerous. This is because, according to Evagrius and Cassian at least, the remedy for acedia is to get to our spiritual work as diligently as we can, especially if we don't feel like it. Once I told one of my first spiritual directors that I had not prayed one day because I didn't feel like it. He told me that such a time was the most important time to pray. To pray when we want to and when we are full of the taste for the things of God is always to risk praying in order to have these delights. To pray when we don't feel like it, and when--as the world says--we don't 'get anything out of it' is the real ascesis of the spiritual life. So, distractions and temptations that would be the plain, ordinary tools of spiritual growth become that much more dangerous to the one afflicted with acedia, because of the risk of failing to do the one thing that needs to be done: getting back to work.
Acedia is a slippery term, for sure. In the monastic tradition it refers to a kind of spiritual sickness by which we lose our taste for spiritual things and thus become spiritually lazy or find ourselves in a spiritual torpor--here we can see the relationship by which acedia gets transformed into sloth in standard lists of "deadly" sins. Acedia leaves us joyless in--or even disgusted with--the things of God and our spiritual practice, even though we might be dutifully fulfilling them all the same. This is very dangerous for anyone, but especially for those who preach the Word of God and minister the Church's sacraments, for they may be 'going through the motions' or simply acting as a technician who lacks any genuine savor or spiritual unction.
It is critical, in our own discernment or in spiritual direction, that ordinary sadness or even depression not be confounded with spiritual acedia. Acedia must also be distinguished from certain positive movements in the spiritual life that may bear some resemblance to it, like an invitation into John of the Cross's "Night of Sense."
Acedia must also be distinguished from the ordinary experience of distraction, both in prayer itself but also in our desire to be recollected in God during the rest of our day. While acedia is a dangerous passion, a 'bad thought' or a 'demon' as our monastic fathers and mothers call it, distraction is a normal part of human experience flowing from the mutability of our wills and bodies. In fact, distraction--when used properly--is no danger to the spiritual life at all, but is actually one of its most important helps. By using our distractions well, we refine and purify our intention toward God and become more durable in our recollection. In other words, distractions are the daily workout and exercise of our souls; they are always an opportunity to strengthen our intention and attention to the God Who is the true Desire of our hearts and Delight of our minds.
Nevertheless, there are dynamics that occur between acedia and distraction, and we should be aware of them in our daily practice. On the one hand, if we are not vigilant in our guard of our hearts and do not use our distractions well, instead allowing our hearts and minds to rest in whatever random thing arouses their interest, we will eventually discover ourselves to be slaves of concupiscence and sensual appetite. This is one way that the poor use of the opportunity of distractions can help us 'catch' the spiritual disease of acedia. If we follow every distraction and take worldly delight in every curiosity that invites our attention, we will find that when we do try to return to our piety we have lost some of the savor and joy we used to have in spiritual things. We will discover to our horror that even our desire for spirituality is selfish and sensual and that God no longer delights us in the way we had previously imagined.
On the other hand, for one who is already sick with acedia, distractions from prayer or from our recollection in general become that much more dangerous. This is because, according to Evagrius and Cassian at least, the remedy for acedia is to get to our spiritual work as diligently as we can, especially if we don't feel like it. Once I told one of my first spiritual directors that I had not prayed one day because I didn't feel like it. He told me that such a time was the most important time to pray. To pray when we want to and when we are full of the taste for the things of God is always to risk praying in order to have these delights. To pray when we don't feel like it, and when--as the world says--we don't 'get anything out of it' is the real ascesis of the spiritual life. So, distractions and temptations that would be the plain, ordinary tools of spiritual growth become that much more dangerous to the one afflicted with acedia, because of the risk of failing to do the one thing that needs to be done: getting back to work.
September 2, 2009
Acedia on the Web
When I was on retreat recently, the monk who heard my confession suggested to me that I pay attention to struggles with the vice of acedia. As I have tried to do so, one thing that has occurred to me over and over in my examinations is that the internet is a very dangerous tool in the hands of this particular 'bad thought.'
The great Evagrius Ponticus describes the struggle with this most dangerous passion:
This resonates very much with my own experience of struggles with this particular passion. The beginning of the attack of acedia comes as an invitation to divert one's attention from the prayer, work, or charity at hand and to pay attention to something else, which might be entirely innocent or even useful in itself. This is what Evagrius is talking about when he says that acedia urges the monk to look at the window to see if anything is going on, and finally to gaze about to see if anyone is coming to visit him.
It's very easy to let one's web browser become one of Evagrius's windows out of the cell. Even though I know that there are prayers to be made, things to do, people and projects to look after and books to read, something inside suggests that it would be good to open up some Firefox tabs and check the tropical storm activity out in the Atlantic one more time, check for Roman-Seraphic liturgical books on Ebay, or read another Wikipedia article about some entirely random topic, like the history of Dr. Pepper, the Gregorian calendar reform, or the geology of the moon.
Then, just as Evagrius outlines, the next thing you know is that you find yourself distracted and spiritually dissipated. And if you're anything like me, it's difficult to get a day back on track once this happens. This is why acedia has to be discerned quickly through a practice of vigilant guard of the heart, so that it may be cut off at its seemingly innocent beginning.
The great Evagrius Ponticus describes the struggle with this most dangerous passion:
The demon of acedia, also called the noonday demon, [see Psalm 91:6] is the most oppressive of all the demons. He attacks the monk towards the fourth hour and besieges the soul until the eighth hour. He begins by giving the impression that the sun is hardly moving, or not moving at all, and that the day has at least forty hours. After this, he continually draws the monk to his window; he forces him to go out of his cell to look at the sun and calculate how much time still separates him from the ninth hour (the hour of Vespers and the meal), and finally to look about here and there to see if some brother is not coming to see him...
This resonates very much with my own experience of struggles with this particular passion. The beginning of the attack of acedia comes as an invitation to divert one's attention from the prayer, work, or charity at hand and to pay attention to something else, which might be entirely innocent or even useful in itself. This is what Evagrius is talking about when he says that acedia urges the monk to look at the window to see if anything is going on, and finally to gaze about to see if anyone is coming to visit him.
It's very easy to let one's web browser become one of Evagrius's windows out of the cell. Even though I know that there are prayers to be made, things to do, people and projects to look after and books to read, something inside suggests that it would be good to open up some Firefox tabs and check the tropical storm activity out in the Atlantic one more time, check for Roman-Seraphic liturgical books on Ebay, or read another Wikipedia article about some entirely random topic, like the history of Dr. Pepper, the Gregorian calendar reform, or the geology of the moon.
Then, just as Evagrius outlines, the next thing you know is that you find yourself distracted and spiritually dissipated. And if you're anything like me, it's difficult to get a day back on track once this happens. This is why acedia has to be discerned quickly through a practice of vigilant guard of the heart, so that it may be cut off at its seemingly innocent beginning.
July 27, 2009
Retreat Notes: Quotes
A collection of quotes read and heard that I wrote down during the retreat.
"...it's when I am with people that I am lonely, and when I am alone I am no longer lonely."
--Thomas Merton, The Sign of Jonas
"The Word of God is a light to the mind and a fire to the will."
--St. Lawrence of Brindisi, from his sermons for Lent
"I cannot think what harsher curse I could call down upon a man than that he should always get what he asks for when he tears away from sweet repose out of a curiosity which revels in restlessness."
--St. Bernard of Clairvaux, On Conversion, a Sermon to Clerics (trans. Bernard Saïd, OSB) (In my margin it says, "like when you realize you've been surfing Wikipedia articles for 20 minutes".)
"Grammar is not for me. I am a free dancer. Life begins beyond the rules. I am a free dancer."
--Foreign born, not so young Trappist opening an Amazon box containing a book of English grammar, after explaining, in perfect English, that he now has to learn English.
"I think it is likely that much of the restless boredom, frantic escapism, commitment phobia, and enervating despair that plagues us today is the ancient demon of acedia in modern dress."
--Kathleen Norris, Acedia & Me
"Luminous beings are we; not this crude matter!"
--retreatant waiting for the dishwasher, quoting Yoda in half-mockery of the taped lecture we heard during the meal.
The tools of retreat: The Sacred Scriptures, breviary, rosary, and journal.
"...it's when I am with people that I am lonely, and when I am alone I am no longer lonely."
--Thomas Merton, The Sign of Jonas
"The Word of God is a light to the mind and a fire to the will."
--St. Lawrence of Brindisi, from his sermons for Lent
"I cannot think what harsher curse I could call down upon a man than that he should always get what he asks for when he tears away from sweet repose out of a curiosity which revels in restlessness."
--St. Bernard of Clairvaux, On Conversion, a Sermon to Clerics (trans. Bernard Saïd, OSB) (In my margin it says, "like when you realize you've been surfing Wikipedia articles for 20 minutes".)
"Grammar is not for me. I am a free dancer. Life begins beyond the rules. I am a free dancer."
--Foreign born, not so young Trappist opening an Amazon box containing a book of English grammar, after explaining, in perfect English, that he now has to learn English.
"I think it is likely that much of the restless boredom, frantic escapism, commitment phobia, and enervating despair that plagues us today is the ancient demon of acedia in modern dress."
--Kathleen Norris, Acedia & Me
"Luminous beings are we; not this crude matter!"
--retreatant waiting for the dishwasher, quoting Yoda in half-mockery of the taped lecture we heard during the meal.
The tools of retreat: The Sacred Scriptures, breviary, rosary, and journal.
December 14, 2007
Christmas Acedia
One of my favorite things about maintaining a blog is watching the search engine results that refer visitors to it. And one of my recent favorites is the visitor who came here after putting "Acedia Christmas" into their Google.
I feel for this person, because acedia is the real danger we face in our struggle against the secular holiday the world insists on calling "Christmas."
All of the noise, the lights, the outrageous consumerism and continuous pushes toward conspicuous consumption, it can easily drive from us our taste for prayer and spiritual things, leaving us in the dangerous state of acedia. And there we can easily fail to notice the God who decided to be born in secret, away from home and in a place that nobody in that world considered to be of any consequence. And that's something we should keep in mind when the constant din of commercials try to play on nostalgia for a sense of home.
I feel for this person, because acedia is the real danger we face in our struggle against the secular holiday the world insists on calling "Christmas."
All of the noise, the lights, the outrageous consumerism and continuous pushes toward conspicuous consumption, it can easily drive from us our taste for prayer and spiritual things, leaving us in the dangerous state of acedia. And there we can easily fail to notice the God who decided to be born in secret, away from home and in a place that nobody in that world considered to be of any consequence. And that's something we should keep in mind when the constant din of commercials try to play on nostalgia for a sense of home.
July 19, 2006
Surprise and Humility
Once in a while I'm surprised by grace. It just goes to show how little I actually believe in the faithfulness of God.
Yesterday I suffered through a mis-communication with another friar. My schedule of things to do was disrupted and I felt a little slighted. So immediately comes the temptation to all kinds of afflictive emotions: self-criticism, anger, bitterness, acedia, etc.
Instead I just quietly returned to some other work and put my mind and heart into something else. I'm not usually able to brush things off so easily. It's because I'm not yet humble.
And here we enter into one of those paradoxical truths of the spiritual life. When people fail to treat us according to our unrealistic and idiosyncratic expectations, we are reminded of how little humility we actually have. But the acceptance of how impoverished we are spiritually can propel us into true spiritual humility.
Yesterday I suffered through a mis-communication with another friar. My schedule of things to do was disrupted and I felt a little slighted. So immediately comes the temptation to all kinds of afflictive emotions: self-criticism, anger, bitterness, acedia, etc.
Instead I just quietly returned to some other work and put my mind and heart into something else. I'm not usually able to brush things off so easily. It's because I'm not yet humble.
And here we enter into one of those paradoxical truths of the spiritual life. When people fail to treat us according to our unrealistic and idiosyncratic expectations, we are reminded of how little humility we actually have. But the acceptance of how impoverished we are spiritually can propel us into true spiritual humility.
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