The Feast of Saint Benedict

I earned my first Master’s Degree at Saint John’s University in Collegeville, Minnesota. The year was 2001.

Collegeville is the home of Saint John’s Abbey, named for John the Baptist, and it is the largest Benedictine congregation in the world. I studied Church History and Systematics at the School of Theology there.

Saint John’s Abbey was home to Godfrey Dieckmann, the monk who headed a liturgical reform movement that in the early to mid-twentieth century had significant influence on the Second Vatican Council and the future history of the entire Church. It changed the way Catholics celebrate the mass, the language it is conducted in, the music we sing, and in some cases even the bread we share at the eucharistic feast. These reforms were guided by the study of patristics, they represented a return to the practices of the earliest Christians, going all the way back to the Ante-Nicene and apostolic era.

While I was at Saint John’s I taught world religions at the preparatory school, I wrote my master’s thesis on the topic of universal salvation, its reasonableness and historical authenticity[1]. My work was also rooted in the Ante-Nicene world, in the theology of St. Irenaeus of Lyons, it challenged the theology of the Imperial Church and found support in other theologians from the early to mid-twentieth century, who like Dieckmann were interested in returning the church to its foundations in the way, that was taught by Jesus Christ.

My work was well received by my students, my peers and professors.

While at the School of Theology I took courses on medieval and monastic history, on monastic spirituality and one course specifically related to the Rule of Saint Benedict, from which I have taken a phrase that I use most often in my ongoing theological work.

Obsculta!

 It is the first word in Benedict’s Rule, written in Latin…it means, It is in the imperative mood, it is the command to listen.

 I use this word interchangeably with: be mindful, know this, understand and remember.

 Today we celebrate the feast of Saint Benedict, who purportedly lived between the late fifth-century and the mid sixth-century CE.

 Be mindful.

 What we know of the life of Saint Benedict comes mostly from the writing of Saint Pope Gregory the First, otherwise known as Gregory the Great. What Gregory wrote is not exactly a biography but rather a reflection on the idealized life of an abbot, most of which is a fiction written c. 593 CE.

 Benedict, whether real or imagined, produced a Rule (a guide for community living) that became the foundation of western monasticism. His rule enjoins the monk to a life of poverty, chastity and obedience, a commitment to work and to a studious-meditative reflection on the psalms…among other things.

 The life of Benedict, and the writing attributed to him has influenced the lives of thousands upon millions of people. Monks under his rule built the university where I earned the title of theologian, where I honed my skills as a historian and philosopher, where I proved my thesis that we may have faith in the salvation of all people, simply on the basis that God desires all people to be saved, it where I became a member of the magisterium of the Catholic Church and I am grateful for that.

[1] RHADUS: the Reasonableness and Historical Authenticity of the Doctrine of Universal Salvation