I teach a course called ‘The Inner Transformation of a Peacemaker’ in the online Certificate program of the Institute for Religion, Peace and Justice at St. Stephen’s University (irpj.org/certificate). The foundation of this course is Christian contemplation and asceticism as the basis for our intuitive peacemaking and love of enemies to the extent that we have been transfigured rather than an artificially contrived imitation of Jesus’ more difficult commandments (among many other applications).
But I often have students in this course who don’t hail from a high church tradition or otherwise a tradition that has created space for the contemplative life of mystics and monastics.
As a result, I encounter bouts of trepidation from these students when I invoke monastics, both past and present, as unencumbered and undistracted models of attentiveness to one’s inner life as the ontological — or essential and existential — basis for genuine peacemaking that emanates from who we are rather than merely from what we try to do.
I therefore wanted to address this suspicion of the life of a monastic, eremitic (solitary) or otherwise. As I often encounter those who either forcefully or subtly condemn monastics because they ostensibly flee their responsibilities to our world and society, I have a few points to make below that I hope will prove helpful to some.
I could, of course, draw attention to the mendicant monks whose original monastic flavour was to live outside cloistered walls and minister to the poor and marginalized, or nuns who engage in “holy mischief” and participate in protests against the mistreatment of refugees, environmental degradation, ongoing colonialism, war and empire-building, or any other destructive actions and policies in our world. Or I could underscore how monastics show us that Christianity “works” if we also seriously, attentively, and consistently use what the Church gives us as tools for our transformation and salvation (cultivating the divine virtues of humility, patience, self-control, mercy, forgiveness, compassion, and so on).
They (the good ones anyway) are our goal and show us that our own attentiveness to the inner life, even if more piecemeal and sporadic, is not in vain, that Karl Rahner’s remark that “the Christian of the future will be a mystic or he will not exist at all” is actually a hopeful observation.
And yet, this still falls into the same trap of believing that a vocation is worthy only if it proves to be useful. The countercultural and radical monastic vocation eschews modernism’s idolatry of achievements and admiration for human “doings” rather than human beings. But we may also discover that if one truly stops to think about it and considers the points below, devoted monastics — from hermits who live in isolation to coenobites who live in community — do more good and less harm in our world than either you or I could ever hope.
The following, then, is a balance of form and function, being and doing, or what might be called “ontological utility,” on a level most of us could only dream of realizing in our own distracted and self-centred lives:
1. We often identify too readily with Martha than we do with Mary.
The common charge against the monastic vocation reminds me of the episode in the gospels of Mary and Martha. And this is precisely the paradigm that the Orthodox Church points to when navigating the balance we’re called to strike and the parts of the whole we’re called to affirm (more on that below). In Luke’s gospel, this episode is outlined as follows:
“Martha was distracted by all the preparations that had to be made. She came to him and asked, ‘Lord, don’t you care that my sister has left me to do the work by myself? Tell her to help me!’ ‘Martha, Martha,’ the Lord answered, ‘you are worried and upset about many things, but few things are needed—or indeed only one. Mary has chosen what is better, and it will not be taken away from her’” (Lk. 10:40–42).
This is also reflected in the saying of Christ that we often don’t like to hear (or know what to do with), “The poor you will always have with you, but you will not always have me” (Mt. 26:11). Often in the midst of the busyness of life, our distractions become like water to a goldfish — we’re so ensconced and manipulated by their relentless presence in our lives that we often underestimate their power over us.
The above passage uses the word “distracted” to describe Martha’s preparations in the presence of Christ, even though many of us would be quick to commend the way that Martha was engaged in service to others as central to a life in Christ. But given this context, I often lament that devoting one’s life entirely to God — like Mary was expressing — is frequently viewed as inferior to serving people. One could argue that these aren’t mutually exclusive or that serving people is serving God, but this isn’t what Mary is exhibiting in this scene and is instead a way to explain away Jesus’ favourable attitude towards Mary who’s doing nothing else other than sitting at the feet of Christ and devoting her full attention to him alone.
My question, then, is when do we sound more like Martha than we act like Mary? Do we sound like Martha because we view the “Marys” of the world as useless, i.e., they serve no “practical purpose”? What aspects of our Western Enlightenment modernist culture might compel us (often without knowing it) to value the practical over the innately good, or the “useful” over the simple embodiment of truth and beauty?
2. The example of Jesus’ prayer life and cross-bearing is for us too.
Since Jesus commends Mary’s devotion, it’s also no surprise that Jesus reflected this periodic voluntary isolation, prayer, and devotion to the Father at various points in his life. His forty days in the desert in preparation for his public ministry (Mt. 4:1–11; Lk. 4:1–13) and his prayer in the Garden of Gethsemane before his arrest and crucifixion (Mt. 26:36–46; Mk. 14:32–42; Lk. 22:39–46) are perhaps the more commonly known examples, but many other times he needed to steal away from the crowds to pray as well (Mt. 14:23, Mk. 1:35, 6:46, Lk. 5:16, 6:12, 9:18).
St. Paul, too, is traditionally thought to have prepared for his public ministry for three years in Arabia and Syria before he met up with any apostles after his encounter with Christ (cf. Gal. 1:11–24).
And recall too that (very importantly when you stop to think about it) Jesus didn’t begin his public ministry until he was about 30 years old, and then his public ministry lasted only two or three years until he voluntarily absorbed our violence, died, was resurrected, and ascended to the Father. So, when we recount the entire span of his life and public ministry, he seems to have used the first 30 years of his life to prepare himself for only a few short years of public ministry. And then, when he presumably could have continued to help the poor, perform healing miracles, or otherwise “save the world” until a ripe old age, he allowed himself to be killed and leave behind a broken, hurting world in need of his healing — the elevation of humanity to the throne room of God and the descent of the Holy Spirit notwithstanding.
One could even make the argument that if the monastic vocation is inferior because many monks and nuns don’t directly engage the world, this might mean that martyrdom (after which monasticism is modelled) or otherwise getting ourselves killed — like Christ did — by standing in the way of the violence of others, and therein bearing our own crosses, could likewise be construed as irresponsible since it forces us to retire to the “monastery of the hereafter” too soon, and therein removes us from our responsibilities in this life.
3. Monastics don’t spend all or most of their money on themselves like we do.
Monastics give up many pleasures, distractions, and conveniences (sacrifices that we don’t make), and they often give all their wealth to the poor before entering the monastic way of life. So, rather than spending all (or most of) their financial resources on themselves to sustain their own lives or otherwise ensure themselves comfort and security like we do, they give this all up and reallocate them to those who are more marginalized and vulnerable than they are … an act that, if we spend the majority of our financial resources on ourselves in one form or another (like I do), none of us perform.
This selfless act is, for example, what St. Anthony (the traditional founder of Christian monasticism in the Egyptian desert) performed as soon as he heard a homily on Mt. 19:21: “If you want to be perfect, go and sell all your possessions and give the money to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven.”
Even while still a monk and a bishop, St. Basil of Caesarea used his vast family wealth and estate to set up a city called Basiliad that deliberately ministered to the poor, widows, and orphans; provided free health care for anyone who needed it; and offered stable employment opportunities for those pushed to the margins of society and therefore couldn’t survive in their current political economy.
4. Monastics are less entangled in systems and institutions of injustice and violence than we are.
And after giving everything away, monastics also don’t engage in many of the destructive, violent, and unjust activities we participate in frequently and relentlessly (often involuntarily or without thinking about it, or with unintended consequences and reverberations that monastics don’t need to worry about) due to their self-sufficiency and isolation — They don’t fly gas-guzzling jumbo jets as we globetrot to “save the world,” buy consumer products manufactured in inhumane working conditions or as the result of deforestation and destructive mining practices (and other devastating processes), participate in or otherwise benefit from empire antics and the colonial undermining of indigenous rights, and many, many other similar actions.
As an eyeopener, you can, for example, take this test to see how many slaves you have: https://slaveryfootprint.org/. Needless to say, monastics likely have far less or none, and they don’t participate in the many systems and institutions that destroy God’s creation and strip humans of their dignity and that perpetrate various forms of injustice and violence … systems and institutions that we are all entangled in to varying degrees due to competing personal priorities and responsibilities despite our best efforts to emancipate ourselves.
5. The original ubiquity of monasticism spilled over into and blessed the world around them.
There was a time when monastics numbered literally in the thousands and surrounded cities, towns, and villages and were therefore available and accessible as sources of deep and rich wisdom and spiritual insight, advice, counsel, and guidance to a world clouded by the cacophony of influences and distractions with which the kingdoms of this world inundate us.
This mutually life-giving dynamic was in many ways one of the original intents of monasticism, and many, especially in the Orthodox and Catholic traditions, who still live in the world will visit monasteries for short or long term stays for this very purpose. I personally visit the local Orthodox monastery for such visitations, and the confessor of my own confessor priest is a hermit in the woods of British Columbia’s interior. One of my closest confidants is a monk in the Hebrides of Scotland.
So, even if these monastics lead lives that are isolated from the outside world, the influence of their interior lives bubbles over and extends beyond their cells to our exterior lives in this world in profound ways.
6. Prayer is actually pretty important.
Monastics pray … a lot. Their entire days and lives are filled with prayers and services, and when the succession of all the services and time zones are accounted for, there is never a time when a monastic’s prayer does not lift as incense into the throne room of God. So, for those of us who do care about results, practicality, and usefulness, we would do well to remember that “the prayer of the righteous is powerful and effective,” as it says in James 5:16.
I would hope that we would acknowledge the importance of prayer and learn to value those who are unseen, hidden in isolation throughout the world who nevertheless offer up their prayers on behalf of the entire world, from those in positions of influence to those on the margins, and for all of creation. This life of prayer may in fact be more effective than anything my own brain, hands, and feet could ever hope to accomplish.
7. An eclectic ecclesiology doesn’t look down on anyone.
I think perhaps most importantly — or at least a foundational polity that is important to operate within when relating to one another — the Church has many parts, as St. Paul famously wrote about in 1 Cor. 12:12–27. The middle portion is particularly worth quoting in its entirety:
“Suppose the foot says, ‘I am not a hand. So I don’t belong to the body.’ By saying this, it cannot stop being part of the body. And suppose the ear says, ‘I am not an eye. So I don’t belong to the body.’ By saying this, it cannot stop being part of the body. If the whole body were an eye, how could it hear? If the whole body were an ear, how could it smell? God has placed each part in the body just as he wanted it to be. If all the parts were the same, how could there be a body? As it is, there are many parts. But there is only one body. The eye can’t say to the hand, ‘I don’t need you!’ The head can’t say to the feet, ‘I don’t need you!’” (2 Cor. 12:15–21).
It’s important, therefore, that we don’t fall into the trap of becoming an eye who says that we don’t need the hands, or vice versa. This is similar to when
“the twelve called together the whole community of the disciples and said, ‘It is not right that we should neglect the word of God in order to wait on tables. Therefore, friends, select from among yourselves seven men of good standing, full of the Spirit and of wisdom, whom we may appoint to this task, while we, for our part, will devote ourselves to prayer and to serving the word’” (Acts 6:2–4).
So, here again, we see very clearly that even the apostles decided to devote their lives to prayer and preaching but didn’t perform the works of serving in ways that deacons were appointed to serve (mostly on behalf of the poor, widows, and others who were marginalized and vulnerable). This didn’t and doesn’t mean that the apostles devalued this responsibility and vocation, but instead means that they understood that there are others who can perform these responsibilities while they “stick to their own lane” vocationally.
And one of the main points of this dynamic is that we need to learn to operate within the confines of our vocational calling in order to fulfill it well — whether serving the poor directly or praying on behalf of those who serve the poor, or any other calling of the many parts that make up the body of Christ — without placing undue pressure on ourselves or on others to function as the whole body all at once rather than just one part of the body. This is also an exercise in cherishing community by scanning the body of Christ for its many parts — the many different vocations — and valuing their various functions in affirming love, whether active in the ways we normally conceive of this or as expressing the goodness, truth, and beauty of God’s kingdom in its fullness in ways that perhaps we can’t.
So, am I arguing that no one should serve the poor, marginalized, vulnerable, voiceless, oppressed, and victims of violence, that we shouldn’t work for peace and justice in our world? Of course not! But I am saying that those of us who value this participation with God in kingdom work also shouldn’t condemn monastics who, at first blush, appear not to engage in the work that we think is so important (especially since, as I hope to have demonstrated above, this isn’t true). I’m also saying that we shouldn’t be too Pelagian in our effort to advance kingdom work and too confident in our words, emotions, and actions before, or even as we’re somewhere on the continuum of, sincere and consistent attentiveness to our inner lives, lest we fall into the trap of epistemological hubris and the resulting actions that can often be more destructive than they are helpful.
Yet, this also doesn’t mean that we are all called to be monastics — i.e., this one part of the body of Christ — or else the Church would be all heart and soul with no (or at least fewer) hands and feet. But this also doesn’t mean that we should scold the heart and soul of the Church for not being the hands and feet.
As I insinuated at the outset, much of the criticism of monasticism is often based on modernity’s bias toward “usefulness” or utility, wherein the value we assign to human beings is based on their practical contributions and outcomes. Alarmingly, these assumptions also underlie our addiction to violence as the means by which we mistakenly think we can achieve “peace through force,” whereas Christlike enemy-love simply asks us to do what’s right — true, beautiful, and good — as a witness to the kingdom of God rather than always what we, in our limitations, think will “work” according to the misguided priorities and very low standards of the kingdoms of this world.
The monastics show us what this looks like, especially since their vocational goal is ultimately the same vocational goal as those of us who try to cooperate with divine grace to advance the kingdom of God in a broken, violent, and convulsing world: union with God, whether that of a single monk isolated deep in the forests of Russia or a relationship between former enemies in the midst of a combat zone in Yemen. All is ripe for transfiguration.
As I read the section, "Prayer is actually pretty important" I was also reminded of the call to "bear one another's burdens". I am comforted to know that this devoted prayer is occurring around the world on our behalf. I think too often we forget the very real spiritual reality we live in and how Jesus is transforming that reality through us and the prayers of those we may not see or be aware of. I'm grateful for their gift and how they help to lift the burden of the world upward into God's hands and Love.
Posted by: Eric H Janzen | February 02, 2021 at 07:30 PM