Saturday, June 3, 2017

Chapter 7: The value of humility (paragraph 12)

The fifth step of humility is that we should not cover up but humbly confess to our superior or spiritual guide whatever evil thoughts come into our minds and the evil deeds we have done in secret.  (From para. 12 of Ch. 7 of Saint Benedict's Rule, trans. by Patrick Barry, OSB, 1997.)

St. Benedict challenges me to see that to deny aspects of myself that I don't like is sin, is separation from my true self rooted in God.  He challenges me to self-acceptance, to honesty with myself and others. Self-acceptance and honesty break down the barriers to transformation.

1 comment:

  1. Reading St. Augustine’s “Confessions” was a revelation to me. He did not write it as a navel-gazing, ego-centric exercise as our modern psychoanalytically-influenced autobiographies tend to do. Augustine wrote it as a prayer to you, Abba. It is one long prayer, a model for what I can hope that my life and self-disclosure may become.

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