Chapter 2: Gifts needed by an abbot or abbess (paragraph 5-6)
They should make their own the different ways of teaching which the Apostle Paul recommended to Timothy when he told him to make use of criticism, of entreaty and of rebuke. (From para. 5 of Ch. 2 of Saint Benedict's Rule, trans. by Patrick Barry, OSB, 1997.)
If I'm to know how to guide someone most appropriately, I must first put my habitual thoughts aside, and listen to them with the ear of my heart.
If I'm to know how to guide someone most appropriately, I must first put my habitual thoughts aside, and listen to them with the ear of my heart.
Chittister ends her commentary for paragraphs 16-22 of Chapter 2, the May 13 reading of the Rule with this powerful sentence. “He(Benedict) wants holy listeners who care about the effect of what they do on everybody else.” Being a “holy listener” points back to the very first word of the Prologue, “Listen, carefully”(Prologue.1). What does this have to do with the prioress or abbott not showing favoritism in the monastery? A lot because “they are to show equal love to everyone”(RB 2. 22). And this is what I very much forget, to listen with the ears of my heart to what another person is saying. I start to formulate what I think is wrong and the steps the other needs to take to correct the problem. My response is not “equal love”. The equality is in the deep listening and if I do not have a response then just an affirmation of what was said by another shows that I have listened. Let me be silent so that the Spirit who dwells in our hearts can take over and I and my ego can move out of the way in a true spirit of humility.
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