July 16, 2011

“All the things I was most afraid of as a young monk - never happened!”  Having a few days ago celebrated the Feast of St. Benedict, the Father of Western monasticism, I'm remembering monks I have known. These words were spoken by Brother Charles. He was probably 89 years old at the time; the monk responsible for doing the laundry at Gethsemani Abbey, back in 1987 when I visited there for the first time as a junior monk. He spoke to me in a confidential tone; his voice hushed with astonishment as if hearing the words for the first time himself, and yet, I had the impression they were spoken for me alone. I'll never forget the transparent quality of his gaze as the words formed on his lips; the eyes looking more inward than outward. I realized he was testifying to some unspeakably mysterious transformation he had undergone in the monastery. Brother Charles wasn't afraid anymore. He was telling the truth. I still marvel at it. To be no longer afraid! How Love must have enlarged his heart! At age 89, it was bigger than all his fears; so big he could look down at these fears with the benevolent understanding of a mother watching over a gaggle of unruly children. How big must a heart be that isn't afraid anymore? We talk about “globalization” as if a new religion had begun; a religion whose adherents are obligated to worship in awe the expansive hugeness of the globe on which we live. One follower of St. Benedict, surrendering him or herself to conversion in the “school of love” can grow a heart like a globe. How? I don't know. How did Benedict, a one-time hermit, gather to himself a community perpetuated over fourteen centuries and across the whole world? I met a monk doing laundry whose heart had grown so big, it swallowed up all his fear. On the Feast of St. Benedict, I want to say to the world: “Before I kneel in homage and do obeisance to your greatness of your “globe”, take a look at the heart of this humble monk who fears nothing and you tell me which is the bigger globe?”