Works by St. Benedict

Spiritual disciplines help Christians in their desire to know God. We learn about God through reading his word. We speak to our Lord in prayer. We listen for the voice of God in solitude and silence. We fast to gain control over our desires and to have empathy with those who involuntarily go without food. The spiritual disciplines have been practiced throughout history. Jesus practiced the spiritual disciplines and his practice was documented in scripture. He practiced solitude and prayer on the Mount of Olives (Luke 22), and fasted in the desert for 40 days in preparation for his encounter with Satan (Mark 1). Given the historical and scriptural evidence of the usefulness of the spiritual disciplines, all Christians should be interested in knowing how to integrate these behaviors into everyday life. So, how do we go about engaging in the disciplines?

St. Benedict established a rule of life for the monastic life in The Rule of St. Benedict, which provides a blueprint for the complete integration of the spiritual disciplines in the life of the monk who has fully devoted himself to the worship of God away from the rest of society. Benedict's rule has been a reference for aesthetics for fifteen hundred years. St. Benedict's emphasis is on cultivating the obedience of the believer, prayer and worship via the recitation of the Psalms and strictly frugal living.

Obedience is the glue that held Benedict's communities together, and it is the glue which holds the believer close to God. A book full of rules and regulations is meaningless without submission to those rules. Benedict's rule provided those who felt a desire to grow in communion with God a well-regulated path to achieve that communion.