5 minute read
Running in Place
The Art of Running in Place
the treadmill of stability
by Br. Simon Baker
a monk or nun professes three vows. That’s it; only three vows (and contrary to popular opinion silence is not one of the three!) So whatever be the content of those three vows, it stands to reason that the monastic charism lives or dies by them.
Our first vow, obedience, in an Apostolic Church makes good sense. To give God everything, even our own wills, it is necessary to consecrate them to his legitimate representatives. After all, “none of us lives as his own master” (Romans 14:7). Vow two, fidelity to the monastic way of life, is even less controversial than obedience. This vow raises as many eyebrows as would a zoo keeper who promises to care for animals for a living. It is the final vow, stability, that is easily the oddest of them all. We live in a world that values frenetic activity and constant change so as to stave off boredom and safeguard what it calls “freedom.” In a world such as this, what sense does it make for a man or woman to promise to stay in one place for the rest of his or her life?
First of all, let us bear in mind that while stability is staying put, it is not staying still, not remaining idle waiting for something to happen. That is the heresy of Quietism. That kind of stability leads to stagnation and decay. Water that does not flow freely quickly turns sour and unfit for drinking. Stability, therefore, needs movement to be life-giving. St. Benedict, the very man who so strongly demands that his monks live stably, tells those same monks that “we must run and do now what will profit us forever” (RB Prologue: 44). Abbot James, too, understands this imperative as is seen in his choice of abbatial motto, Currite Vitae Lumine (“Run with the Light of Life”).
At this point you are not to be blamed if you find yourself asking, “So which is it, stay put or run?” Well, like most things Catholic, the answer is the paradoxical both/ and. Think of it this way. It is difficult to imagine a form of exercise more boring than the treadmill, yet we are told 50 million Americans use one! The treadmill’s design is such
rule of st. benedict, prologue:49
that its occupant exerts a tremendous amount of energy without ever getting anywhere. You step off the machine exhausted but in the very same location where you stepped on. Monastic stability is something like this. Remaining permanently committed to this place and these people we run to obtain the imperishable crown promised to those who believe and live the Gospel of Jesus Christ (1 Corinthians 9:24). This pursuit of God, like the lover in the Song of Songs, is often exhausting and requires a great deal of effort. But as the gym-rats are fond of saying, “No pain, no gain.”
While monks and nuns may indeed be the only ones who vow stability, all Christians are called to live it as a virtue. Observing literal stability - physical geographic rootedness - does not make sense for everyone. In fact, for some this is contrary to their vocation. But living its spiritual meaning, as a stable attitude of mind and disposition of heart grounded in God, that’s universal. So how does one attain to this virtue of stability? The answer is deceptively simple: prayer and perseverance.
Whether vow or virtue (and these are not mutually exclusive), true stability is always founded upon the unchanging, steadfast love of God. So stability requires that we be rooted in God, who is for us a firm and unchanging center in a constantly changing world. We must touch him daily in prayer and in the Sacraments. But let’s get practical. Because many of those 50 million faithful treadmill users cannot always find time to go to the gym, a good number bring the gym home to them and have their own treadmill. So why not have a spiritual treadmill in your home? Make your bedroom your cloister, and devote a corner of it to spiritual exercise by creating a prayer station – maybe have a prayer rug, Bible, crucifix, candle, rosary, or some images of favorite saints. And if you own an actual treadmill, learn from the horse and carrot trick and hang a reminder of your heavenly homeland on the wall in front of you! Like the monastic cloister, designating a physical place for prayer somewhere in your house is a great way to live the spiritual journey without ever leaving home. And another advantage of having a spiritual treadmill in your home is, like with an actual treadmill, the very sight of the often neglected equipment is a gentle, prodding reminder of the need to “get back in shape.”
For anyone who has ever tried regular, daily prayer, perseverance means to obtain the inner virtue of stability. As has already been said, running the spiritual journey is often exhausting. This fatigue is compounded when little to no fruits of your labor are apparent. Keep going. Walk or even crawl, if you must, but keep going. God who inspires all good desires and brings them to fulfillment will not leave your sincere labors fruitless for long. “The road that leads to salvation…is bound to be narrow at the outset. But as we progress in this way of life and in faith, we shall run on the path of God’s commandments, our hearts overflowing with the inexpressible delight of love” (RB Prologue:48–49). This perseverance and patient endurance required by the virtue of stability is what makes martyrs (Luke 21:19).
Stability is not immobility. Although we stay put, we do not stay still. Like a treadmill, stability should change us. Living it daily and faithfully will make us more fit evangelists, and stronger, more enduring disciples. It requires a constant movement towards God and commitment to him in this way and in these circumstances in which he has placed us. Stability grounds the person in God and makes him or her, like leaven in the dough, a stabilizing influence in a fickle and fleeting world.
Br. Simon Baker has been a Benedictine monks since 2009. On June 5 Br. Simon was ordained to the temporary Diaconate after studying at St. Meinrad seminary in Indiana. He will spend the next year working in various ministries preparing to be ordained to the Priesthood in April 2015.
