Mutual Service in Manual Labor |
Shared Liturgical Prayer |
Meditational Scripture |
Prayer in the Heart |
It is a pernicious mistake to think that our spiritual life does not include work. Some people think they have to be done with work as soon as possible in order to get back all the more quickly to their "spiritual life." All wrong! We are not more spiritual at prayer or in receiving the sacraments than we are when we are digging potatoes or washing windows. The most intimate essence of our spiritual life is this: to be moved into action by the Holy Spirit. When this Spirit of God is the ultimate source of our actions, then all we do is done by God and our actions are divine. Through our Spirit-inspired actions, God's love produces its fruit in the world. There is a time when the Spirit leads us to pray in silence and solitude.
There is a time when the Spirit calls us into loving service of our fellow monks. The service may be considered important or unimportant in human judgment. But, it is all the same thing whether the Spirit is leading us to sweep floors or preach a sermon. All Spirit-inspired actions have the same equal value: they express the perfect will of God; all of them equally are the realization of unity between the human person and the Divine Spirit. The Holy Spirit gives the word of Wisdom to the inspired preacher. The same Holy Spirit moves the contracting muscles and the bending limbs of the individuals who work in loving service of their fellows. This kind of manual labor is not an obstacle to contemplative prayer. It is the path to contemplative prayer and the result thereof. Every bodily effort, every physical movement, performed in love at the time of work will bear its fruit in increased capacity to perceive God at the time of prayer.
This is all that needs to be said about work in this short statement of basic principles. Now let us consider another essential activity in the monastic day: the Liturgy.