Reflections

An Abbey through Changing Epochs M y Benedictine abbey, Kremsmünster Abbey, has existed for 1,200 years in a variety of cultural settings that called the monks to genuinely respond to different cultural challenges. Early on they cultivated the land and Christianized recent settlers. Over time, Benedictine abbeys embodied the heritage of antiquity and implanted it into the Middle Ages, becoming cultural centers and employing many. The Reformation brought a rupture. My monastery shrunk to three monks. The abbot married because he believed monastic life was a medieval remnant. But reforms fueling the Baroque era (deeper than the so-called CounterReformation) led to a surge of Benedictine life. My abbey counted more than 100 monks. Buildings of this epoch—far from what St. Benedict would have envisioned in the 6thcentury—dominate the perhaps all-too-splendid site and are today a major tourist destination.

Our observatory and the chalice of our founder, Duke Tassilo, is particularly pertinent to the relation of faith and culture. The seven-story observatory was built in the 1750s to house geological findings, animals from far and wide, a sarcophagus from Egypt, and astronomical instruments. Since 1762 we have continually measured the weather (a data-set relevant to climate change). This observatory is an expression of the Enlightenment. Monks became natural scientists and worked with peers across Europe. Even today the confrere in charge of the observatory holds a doctorate in biology and maps regional plant distribution. The building maps a union of faith and reason: on top there is a chapel; the altar picture depicts St. Benedict and his cosmic vision, where he saw the whole world in a single ray of the sun.

Bernhard Eckerstorfer earned graduate degrees in Austria and the U.S., with post-doctoral studies on patristic and monastic theology in Rome. At Kremsmünster Abbey he was director of vocations, novice master, formation director, and spokesman for the abbey. He is now rector of the Benedictine University Sant’Anselmo in Rome.

Every era shows coherences and oppositions between faith and culture. In the 1780s Emperor Joseph II suppressed contemplative monasteries in the AustroHungarian Empire. From an Enlightenment perspective, they were useless. My abbey escaped this fate by staffing more parishes in order to be valuable for society. However, the spirit of the times shaped even the monks. Influenced by the Enlightenment, many gave up common prayer and became skeptical of monastic life.

We are experiencing another time of change. The epoch when church and society were closely interrelated is over. Hardly anyone regrets this, for in Europe we were taught the hard lesson that a major cause of secularization is the union of altar and reign. We must be fair, however, and not underestimate the richness and beauty of a homogeneous Catholic culture. Visitors from America marvel at the faith embedded in European culture for centuries, but we have to acknowledge the price paid. My abbey has been shaped by the centuries of supremacy it shared with ecclesial and political powers. This is visible in the imperial apartments that every Benedictine abbey in Austria still maintains. Bishops and abbots, enthroned and often equipped by the aristocracy, had power over both religious and worldly affairs.

Theology in a Postmodern Setting The dean of a theological faculty at a state university in Austria lamented to me recently: “The public does not recognize anymore what we accomplish as theologians.” This is true with regard to both technical and popular publications. With a few exceptions, theological thinking has lost its formative power in Western Europe.

It might be instructive to reconsider monasteries. An abbey like mine fascinates people seeking a Christian alternative in an increasingly post-Christian world. Yes, the transmission of the faith in its established institutional forms is undergoing a deep crisis, both in traditionally Catholic and Protestant European lands. However, the search for an experience of transcendence (vaguely named “spirituality”) endures. Many people are looking for an authentic Christian existence that can give new meaning to their lives and bring them closer to God.

Monasteries are increasingly visited for precisely this reason. Courses on Benedictine spirituality are popular, as are retreats (even among young people). Times devoted to personal reflection and prayer in a monastic setting are sought after. Men and women devoting time and money to these desert experiences make clear that the atmosphere of an ancient abbey or the oratory of a faith community can change minds and hearts. They are drawn into a presence that transcends them and gives new significance to their daily routine. They often make an interesting observation: The monks or nuns are there and pray whether guests are present or not. It is not a performance. It is their form of life. Visitors also like that they are not asked about church affiliation at a monastery. This gives them a freedom they want to associate with religion.

To be sure, monastic life is in crisis. It must leave well-trod paths and take up the charism of its formative origin. But it is illuminating that the monks of

my abbey can hardly meet the demands for spiritual direction and leading retreats and invitations to conferences. Theology today has significant influence beyond the classroom. Consider, for instance, the writings of the German Benedictine Anselm Grün, who holds a doctorate in systematic theology. He has sold 20 million books. His books do not contribute to academic theology, but they show how theological concepts are meaningful to multitudes today. On a smaller scale, I was surprised how well radio shows on desert monasticism on Austrian public radio were received. I was initially invited to deliver reflections for a few minutes for one week. I ended up doing twelve series over several years! The transmissions tied the experiences and teachings of ancient Egyptian monks to everyday life, and I did not hesitate to allude to my own monastic life. The point: the public wanted to hear me reflect as a monk-theologian.

Monasticism has not found the secret to bridge the gap between theology and culture. But I propose there is value in re-capturing the relationship between a religious form of life and a theological form of thought, that a certain Lebensform (“form of life”) needs its Denkform (“form of thought”) and vice versa. If theological understanding is explicitly connected to a form of concrete existence that testifies to the transforming power of the faith, it is of great value to church and world.

Theology as Religious Practice My monastery tried hard to respond to successive epochs, ages that shaped it in turn. In every epoch theological reflection was a decisive factor in faithful adaptation. New members were formed according to established tradition, but there was also serious reflection on the word of God, upon the liturgy, and upon the other rites and rituals that were celebrated and interiorized. This theological reflection was not accidental. St. Benedict demands monks read at least three hours a day. The Benedictine way was also transmitted through traditional practices. But with every new member, it was also updated. I propose this as a useful model. Even as we surrender to and are formed by a tradition, the given tradition is—or at least should be—adjusted, newly appropriated, embodied by each person according to their unique Gestalt and informed by theological reflection.

The transmission process in a monastery takes many forms, including teaching. My abbey has run various schools. The current Gymnasium was founded in 1549, its degrees ever since recognized by state authorities. Especially in the Baroque era, our monks taught at the universities of Salzburg, Vienna, and Prague. Our monks still engage in scholarly reading and writing. Study and research are essential as the monastery responds to needs and challenges in diverse epochs. Let me add that even if a monastery or the church is compromised by historical circumstance or human failure, the faithful individual seeking God is still a locus theologicus, a place where God the Father pours out his Spirit through Christ. In our current age we should investigate anew what theology can and should be. My abbey hosts a three-day conference featuring lectures by theologians and professors of other disciplines. For the past twenty years, this symposium has annually attracted 300-400 participants. Part of the attraction of this ecumenical

Christian conference is its monastic setting. This is one example of how academic theology can engage in dialogue with other disciplines when it is tied to a living faith tradition.

Theology should stem from living faith and be practiced in service to believers and the church. Theology is an act of belief and a way to worship God and prepare God’s kingdom. Theology, then, has to be distinguished from religious studies (though religious studies may supply valuable insights).

In sum, theology grounded in religious practice is vital for the faith, as is religious practice informed and transformed by theology. Current renewals in monasticism in the Western world are tied to a strong theological enterprise. Religious practice needs theological reflection with its critical edge and its keen awareness of our time. Monastic life is in need of theology—both academic and non-academic— that has this outlook. v

Ministerial Calling in Today’s World T he call to serve God is a deeply personal one, usually driven by one’s own faith in the divine and personal experience of a faith community. Whether through inspiration stretching from childhood or in response to an adult epiphany of God’s presence, theological students come to seminaries seeking to integrate religious doctrine with their personal experience. Today’s religious leaders choose this path because they genuinely want to make a difference. Most hope at the individual level to attend to every needy person God puts in their path, and at the societal level they hope to influence the thinking and actions of their local, national, and even international communities.

We are living in a time of great pain and tragedy. Mass shootings, natural disasters, hate speech, discrimination, harassment, personal heartache: every day brings new awareness that our world is consumed by violence and chaos. Rabbis and ministers are essential in helping instill hope and inspiration in moments of hopelessness and loss, and to add wisdom gleaned through millennia of experience and reflection as we adapt and move forward. A burning desire to be prepared to meet all diverse individual and societal needs is what inspires many to pursue a theological education. The magnitude and uniqueness of contemporary challenges is also a reason to think anew about theological education.

For more than twenty years, I have served as associate dean of the Ziegler School of Rabbinic Studies in Los Angeles. During that time, one of the most common reflections I have heard both from those studying to be ordained as rabbis and from ordained graduates concerns the challenge of integrating academic learn

Cheryl Peretz is the associate dean of the Ziegler School of Rabbinic Studies in Los Angeles, where she also received her ordination. She also holds an MBA in marketing management from Baruch College and helps bring those skills and expertise into the operational practices of rabbis and congregations throughout North America.

ing and professional skills training with their own and others’ journeys of spiritual meaning, ecstatic religious expression of prayer and ritual, and personal experience of God.

When seminary students complete their studies and move into employment, the communal positions for which they are hired demand that they be prepared to run organizations, plan programs, administer, fund raise, and manage. All this in addition to pastoral counseling, teaching, leading prayer, and facilitating births, bar and bat mitzvahs, weddings, funerals, and the like. These are all deeply meaningful activities, yet too often we hear of clergy experiencing burnout, loneliness, addiction, doubt, and pain so severe that many feel driven away from God. In some cases the very life of the individual minister has been at stake. When clergy suffer in this fashion, we are deeply concerned not only for those clergy, but for a general loss of confidence in religious leadership and faith communities.

People of faith at all seminaries must think about theological education that goes beyond academic courses in Bible, history, doctrine, and language. We must teach students how to engage others in healthy, life-sustaining ways in their faith journeys, and we must teach them how to maintain and nurture their own faith in the face of adversity and pressure. In some ways, this is no different than what we teach our clergy to do for members of their communities. And yet, even as ministers serve as vessels for others’ spiritual growth, it is crucial that they continue to cultivate their own spiritual lives. Seeking to address all these concerns, theological education at the Ziegler School includes two new components that have had a tremendous impact on the experience of students and their long-term success as clergy: Hevruta (paired) learning and spiritual practice.

Hevruta (paired) Learning Each day at the Ziegler School, students are engaged in hevruta learning, a method of learning that is as old as study of our most ancient Jewish texts. In hevruta, the pair struggles to understand the language and meaning of each passage. They discuss how to apply it to the larger issues in their communities as well as to their own lives. On one level, hevruta learning is about the technical work of reading, translating, and decoding Hebrew text in order to be prepared for class. This type of learning, however, is not limited to technical study of sacred text, doctrines, or languages—as important as all that is—for in stepping beyond the technical, hevruta learning invokes and strives to instill other principles that are essential to resilient theological formation and religious life:

We are each responsible for one another. Each member of the pair is responsible for his or her own learning and is also responsible for the learning of the other. If one is not finished with the work, then neither is finished. Through disciplined practice of this principle, students learn they are connected to one another, dependent on each other, and can rely on one another for support and nurturing. I don’t have to agree with you to hear/value your opinion. In talking about the text, each member of the pair is encouraged to share language, literary, and/or theological questions and challenges, even when the two disagree. Rabbinic writ

ings on hevruta encourage disagreement, even amongst those who love and respect one another, for it is through dialogue and openness that we can ultimately understand our own positions and challenge ourselves to new understanding. Putting this principle into practice gives students concrete experience of valuing and respecting one another amidst disagreements, an experience of growing and learning through disagreement. These are vital skills, because in every faith community in which they minister they will need to navigate disagreement and model concern and enduring community (within limits) with those with whom they disagree. So important is this type of learning that the Talmud proclaims: “o havruta o mituta” translated provocatively by Jacob Neusner as, “Give me hevruta or give me death.” Some scholars understand the phrase to mean that the individual needs society and the respect of others, and without them life is not worth living. At the same time, many scholars cite this phrase to illustrate the centrality of study in hevruta. Without others to share our learning and to challenge us, we cannot survive. When hevruta works best, pairs of learners continue to learn together on a regular basis even after graduating and moving on into diverse ministries. Where that is not possible, the experience of hevruta has inspired other graduates to set up new hevruta pairings with clergy in their local area (often in interfaith settings).

Cultivating Spiritual Practice Historically, rabbinic and other seminaries have been very good at making sure that future clergy know how to conduct prayer services—even when that meant memorizing words and participating in rote recitation of blessing and prayer. Daily Jewish prayer is a compilation of fixed liturgy using psalms, scriptural passages, and rabbinic words of communal request and expression. There is a tension in Jewish prayer between fixed prayer and spontaneous prayer, which many would say is brought together through recognition that we bring our own individual intention to the fixed words. For others, however, the difficulty in finding the self in the ancient words can be an impediment. In any case, while there may be variety in the particulars, spirituality is the deliberate cultivation of gratitude and steady joy. Ideally, daily prayer—the practice of addressing the universe in the second person as an object of marvel, wonder, and delight—can help us to cultivate this gratitude and joy. Spiritual disciplines are ways of cultivating tranquility and mindfulness and greater access to peace. Spiritual disciplines also address a yearning for intimacy with God, a hunger to remake oneself as a living exemplar of God’s wisdom, and a desire to wrap ourselves in a life made holy through service to God.

Jewish daily practice involves prayer, ritual, and practices that cultivate spiritual development. Still, theological education cannot assume that people (even clergy) will be successful in pursuing these vital daily practices on their own. So, there is a need to integrate into theological training practice in the discipline of taking time for quiet meditation, taking time to sit in God’s presence, to reflect on who I am and how I am doing (the Hebrew word for prayer is l’hitpalel, a reflexive verb that means “to judge oneself”). For the contemporary religious person, this could take the form of prayer, silence, meditation, or song.

Here at the Ziegler School of Rabbinic Studies, we have created a cohort-based program addressing the existential realities of each student’s life. We strive together to name struggles and hopes, opportunities and disappointments, and then, using theological resources and trained leaders, we work together to bring spiritual strength and wisdom to those living challenges. For instance, led by a spiritual guide from within the community and accompanied by song, text, group discussion, and reflection, students may be invited to identify and reflect over a period of weeks or months upon an area of spiritual growth.

All this helps future ministers viscerally understand that their spirit matters, that faith is dynamic and changing, and that we are best equipped to do this spiritual work on disciplined journeys undertaken with others. The individual and group work both model what can be done with future congregants and gives explicit permission for and affirmation of the need to make time to attend to spiritual practices that are sustaining and nourishing for one’s own journey of faith in this beautiful and horror-filled world.

Of course, traditional academic study remains essential. Judaism is primarily understood through the lens of the ancient rabbis, whose understanding of civil and ceremonial law and legend is recorded in the Talmud. In order for our spirituality, our daily prayer, meditation, reflections, and contemporary teaching to carry the substance of millenia of accumulated wisdom, it must be anchored in learned study of the Talmud. Still, the Talmud invites open conversation and innovation, and we have found hevruta learning and also practice in engaging in spiritual disciplines to be essential supplements to traditional academic theological education.v