Benedictine Oblates

St. Benedict detail in fresco, St. Benedict's Abbey, Atchison, Kansas

Becoming a modern monk

Thanks to Kathleen Norris, being a Benedictine oblate is almost hip these days. Norris is the author of the critically received books Dakota: A Spiritual Geography and The Cloister Walk. Both tell the story of a literary New Yorker who moved to the Great Plains and found a spiritual life at—of all places—a Benedictine monastery. More than any other person since Thomas Merton, Norris has helped rekindle interest in monastic spirituality among the “thinking crowd.”

While I’d like to think that I became a Benedictine oblate before reading Norris (somehow I think it is morally superior to choose a path before it becomes popular), the truth is that her ruminations on the relevancy of Benedictine spirituality for contemporary life were formative in my own choice. I became an oblate of a small Benedictine community in Oakland, California, in 1999.

The Life of a Saint

So what is a Benedictine oblate? “Benedictine” does not, in this case, refer to the liqueur of the same name (although that liqueur is made by Benedictine monks in France). Rather, Benedictine means an association with the monastic order based on the teachings of St. Benedict, himself worthy of a separate column on this website. St. Benedict was born in 480 CE, 70 years after the fall of Rome. He came from an educated, wealthy family but eventually left that life behind to pursue the spiritual life. Over time, his reputation as a holy man spread, disciples flocked to him, and he eventually established 12 small monasteries.

All monastic communities require some kind of “rule of life” that orders their common spiritual life together. In Benedict’s time, there were several monastic rules in circulation. The most popular one seems to have been a document called The Rule of the Master. Benedict drew from this rule, but with significant changes—mainly in spirit and tone. The Rule of the Master saw monastic communities as a group of individuals gathering around the feet of a sage (usually the abbot), to whom was given enormous power. Benedict, instead, emphasized the relationship of the monks to each other. He saw the monastery as a community of love and the abbot’s main job as tending to the well-being of this community. In addition, The Rule of the Master was harsh and unrelenting in its demands on the monks. Benedict’s rule was known for its moderation, its humanity.

Benedictines R Us

Benedict’s rule ended up having an enormous influence on Western civilization. At the time of Benedict’s death, his rule was one among many. However, within a century or two, the Rule of St. Benedict had become the norm for Western monasticism. And monasticism had, by this time, become the norm for what was left of Western civilization. Monasteries were, by the sixth century, the one vital institution left in the societal breakdown precipitated by the fall of Rome and the waves of “barbarian” invasions. Benedictine monasteries accumulated illuminated manuscripts and works of art, kept the light of learning and scholarship alive, and generally provided order and stability in a chaotic world. As the Benedictine scholar Esther de Waal writes, “To sketch the history of the Benedictines in the Middle Ages would be not only to write a history of the church, it would be to write a history of medieval society as well.” (From Seeking God: The Way of St. Benedict, pg. 21.)

Although not as numerous as in their heyday, there are still today hundreds (if not thousands—I couldn’t find an exact number) of Benedictine monasteries around the world. What’s most interesting to me about contemporary Benedictine life, however, is the number of lay men and women who have found spiritual sustenance in the Benedictine rule and in the spirituality it expresses. The test of its popularity? Go to Amazon.com and type in “Benedictine spirituality.” You’ll get hundreds of titles, most published quite recently.

Becoming an Oblate

Which brings me to the second word in the phrase “Benedictine oblate.” In the most general sense, an oblate is someone who makes an act of oblation. (That explains everything, right?) An oblation literally means “an offering.” So an oblate is someone who makes an offering of themselves—that is, someone who dedicates themselves to a spiritual life. More specifically, oblates are lay people who take an abbreviated form of monastic vows (called “promises”) and become associate members of a particular monastic community. The promises are considered to be for life and are not tied to that particular monastic community—so if you move, you are still an oblate, even if you have no regular contact with the monastic community in which you made your promises. No getting out of them that easily!

Oblate promises differ from community to community, but most of them (and this was certainly true of my own) will be based on the three vows taken by all Benedictine monks:

  • Obedience. While obedience for monks certainly includes the idea of following the will of an abbot or one’s monastic community, it also means more generally attuning one’s spiritual ear to the voice of God in all people and situations and responding to that call. (In fact, the word obedience comes from the Latin root oboedire, which shares its roots with audire, to hear.)
  • Stability. Stability refers to physical stability, meaning that a monk commits to life in a particular community and to not leaving when the going gets tough. However, for the oblate, stability is interpreted more generally as not only keeping one’s commitments in life but also committing to the deeper stability of one’s inner being, to a calmness and peace of mind.
  • Conversatio Morum (or, in English, roughly “ongoing conversion”). Finally, the truly fun and scary promise of conversatio morum simply means that one (whether monk or oblate) commits to always being a pilgrim, to remaining ever open to change and transformation.

In addition to the above three ideas, oblate promises would also tend to include some language that says the oblate will follow the Rule of St. Benedict insofar as one’s station in life allows. Now, I confess that to simply sit down and read the Rule of St. Benedict leaves me a little cold. As with the Bible, I need modern scholars to help interpret the relevancy of this book for my life. Thankfully, there are many such books available. My favorite authors are the already-named Norris and de Waal, and also Joan Chittister, a Benedictine nun and rabble-rouser. I’d recommend any of their books on the subject.

An Ancient Rule for Postmodern People

One of the things I appreciate most about Benedictine spirituality is its emphasis on moderation and balance. Nothing is to be taken to the extreme. For instance, it recognizes the need both for community and for solitude. As a person brought up in a relentlessly community-minded Anabaptist tradition, I have found this an important balance. I love my community; I also need holy solitude on a regular basis. And while Benedictine life is centered around prayer, it’s understood that this must be balanced by work (with a historic emphasis on manual work) and scholarship. Although this insight may seem rather self-evident, I have found it quite helpful in practice. When I feel out of balance, I ask myself, “What do you need, Soul? Do you need to go out in the garden and pull weeds; do you need to read a challenging book; or do you need to sit down and meditate?” The question is always helpful, and usually yields the answer I need.

It’s fascinating to me that contemporary men and women have a common bond with those first small monastic communities founded 1,500 years ago. Our lives couldn’t be more different, and yet both I (a married, Mennonite woman) and a celibate, Catholic monk of 600 CE have found a foundation for a vital spiritual life in the writings of St. Benedict. In a time when new spiritual fads abound, I find this kind of continuity and stability comforting…and possibly even hip.

Guest author Sheri Hostetler is the pastor of First Mennonite Church of San Francisco. The Benedictine community to which she belongs is called Hesed. It is a non-resident community made up of laypeople from a variety of Christian denominations who are committed to the practice and teaching of Christian meditation..

Note: This is an updated version of an article that originally appeared on Interesting Thing of the Day on September 1, 2003, and again in a slightly revised form on August 12, 2004.

Image credit: Randy OHC [CC BY 2.0], via Flickr


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Author: Sheri Hostetler

Genealogy Day

Family tree graphic

One observation I’ve made in my years living on Earth is that nearly all humans have (or had) parents. Those parents also had parents. Indeed, for the entire history of humanity, it’s pretty much been a long series of parents and offspring. What a curious way to run a species, right? And yet many humans have only a passing awareness of their genetic lineage (and the many other people to whom they are related). One would think that is significant information. If you’re a human with insufficient knowledge of your ancestry, today’s a great day to start fixing that, whether through conventional genealogical research or by spitting into a tube, which is apparently what the cool human kids do these days.

Image credit: Pixabay


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Author: Joe Kissell

A week in family law: Domestic abuse, court modernisation, and more

As I explained here, the Ministry of Justice (‘MoJ’) has announced that it has awarded a grant of just under £900,000 to two organisations to provide in-court support to domestic abuse victims: the Personal Support Unit (‘PSU’) and the Citizens Advice Witness Service. As the MoJ explain, the PSU has been supporting litigants in person in family courts since 2001, and Citizens Advice has been supporting witnesses in criminal court proceedings since 2015. Both have “extensive front-line experience of helping victims and witnesses navigate court processes and feel safe at court.” We are told that Citizens Advice will be using the funding to extend their current Witness Service to selected family courts to provide information and practical and emotional support to victims before, during and after the day of the hearing, and that the PSU will be using the funding to invest in further training of their staff and volunteers and to share learnings on best practice with a range of family justice stakeholders. The funding runs from January 2019 through to 31 March 2020, and will allow Citizens Advice to provide these services in up to 12 family courts across England and the PSU in 24 courts across England and Wales.

An application by James Bulger’s father and uncle to vary the anonymity injunction in relation to the person formally known as Jon Venables has been refused by the High Court. Venables and Robert Thompson, who were both 10 at the time, killed James in 1993, and were subsequently convicted of his murder. The application was made after Venables was jailed in 2017 for possessing child abuse images. It sought the removal of certain categories of information that are subject to the injunction, including any names used by Venables, and information relating to his whereabouts and activities, prior to his being jailed. James’ father and uncle claimed, amongst other things, that the safety of the public dictated that people have a right to know that an individual such as Venables, who presents a risk to safety, has been living in a particular locality. However, President of the Family Division Sir Andrew McFarlane refused to change the terms of the injunction, which he said was designed to protect the “uniquely notorious” Venables from “being put to death”. He said: “There is a strong possibility, if not a probability, that if his identity were known he would be pursued resulting in grave and possibly fatal consequences.” You can read the President’s full judgment here.

The Home Office has published a ‘position statement’ on male victims of crimes considered in its ending violence against women and girls (‘VAWG’) strategy. The statement sets out twelve commitments to assist victims and survivors to receive support, encourage more people to come forward and seek help, and bring perpetrators to justice. The measures include giving £500,000 to specialist organisations that support male victims and survivors of domestic abuse, and awarding £500,000 to specialist LGBT domestic abuse organisations to improve inter-agency support for LGBT victims and survivors; raise awareness within LGBT communities to increase reporting; and improve monitoring and recording practices. Victoria Atkins, Parliamentary Under Secretary of State for Crime, Safeguarding and Vulnerability, said: “Men can, and do, suffer from crimes such as domestic and sexual abuse. It is a horrendous experience that often goes unrecognised and it is heart-breaking that some men feel they cannot report their experiences because of societal views around masculinity. As a government we are determined to bring these horrific crimes to light and support victims and survivors, regardless of gender.” You can read the position statement here.

And finally, in a piece of completely unsurprising news HM Courts and Tribunals Service (‘HMCTS’) has announced that it is extending its court modernisation programme by a year. The programme will not now be completed until 2023. The programme has been beset by difficulties and criticisms, and has already been extended once before, from four to six years. Last July the House of Commons Public Accounts Committee published a damning report on the programme. The Chair of the Committee, Meg Hillier MP, commented: “Government has cut corners in its rush to push through these reforms. The timetable was unrealistic, consultation has been inadequate and, even now, HMCTS has not clearly explained what the changes will mean in practice.” Sighs…

Have a good weekend.

The post A week in family law: Domestic abuse, court modernisation, and more appeared first on Stowe Family Law.


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Author: John Bolch

Sutro Baths

The ruins of Sutro Baths

Diving into the past

At the intersection of the Boulevard St. Michel and the Boulevard St. Germain, in the heart of Paris’s Latin Quarter, stands a ruin of brick and stone walls, vaguely recognizable as rooms or chambers. This spot was once the site of Roman public baths, a place of leisure for local residents in the first to third century CE. These baths were destroyed in the third century, and the property was later bought in 1330 by the Abbot of Cluny, who built a new structure alongside the ruins. During the French Revolution, the property passed out of the church’s hands, and had various owners (one of whom covered the bath ruins in six feet of soil) before being bought by Alexandre du Sommerard, a collector of medieval antiquities. Today, both of these sites are part of the Musée National du Moyen Age, a museum dedicated to the arts and history of the Middle Ages.

Besides the relative novelty of visiting ancient (and surprisingly intact) Roman ruins amidst the hubbub of a 21st-century city, the baths give a fascinating insight into Roman culture. These baths consisted of a series of pools: the tepidarium (lukewarm), caldarium (hot), and frigidarium (cold). Guests normally moved from the lukewarm pool to the hot pool, then to the cold before retiring to rooms designed for socializing with other guests. Roman baths of this type were open to everyone, and were an important part of life in ancient Roman towns.

Water, Water Everywhere

Almost two thousand years later, in 1896, San Francisco entrepreneur and mayor Adolph Sutro opened his own public baths, albeit on a much grander scale. At the time, Sutro owned almost 1/12 of the land in San Francisco, and he decided to build his baths on part of that property, near his own home on Sutro Heights. Built to house 25,000 bathers, the three-acre complex included three restaurants, an amphitheater, an outdoor tide pool, and five saltwater pools of various temperatures—a design similar to the Roman baths. These pools were filled and emptied by the movement of the tide, the sea water moving into and out of the pools through a large tunnel.

Sutro conceived of the baths as a benefit to the public, much as the Roman baths were intended for everyone. In fact, when he learned that train operators were charging seaside visitors two fares to reach the baths, he built his own rail line to bring people there for the price of one 5-cent fare. This was in keeping with Sutro’s general concern for the public welfare; in 1869 he successfully agitated for the construction of a tunnel linking various Comstock Lode mines in Nevada to ensure better working conditions for miners (although he did also benefit financially from the completion of the project).

Road to Ruins

After its heyday in the first half of the 20th century, the baths fell into disuse, and in fact were in the process of being demolished when a fire gutted the property in the 1960s. This left a sprawling mess of concrete foundations and melted metal. These ruins became part of the Golden Gate National Recreation Area in 1973. By the time I first visited the site, in the 1990s, it looked incredibly aged, its former bathing pools choked with algae, and its metal pilings eaten away by the tide. But despite this decay, or maybe because of it, the scene was incredibly picturesque, with a gorgeous view opening out onto the ocean, and white calla lilies dotting the upper slopes of the property. At the time I didn’t know the history of the place, but was fascinated by its glorious state of decay.

After visiting the Cluny baths in Paris, I immediately thought of the Sutro ruins, and was surprised to realize that the Sutro Baths appealed to me on the same level as the Roman baths, despite having been built almost two thousand years later. There is something mysterious and melancholy about any place that has outlived its use, and a modern visitor is similarly drawn to imagine what it once was like, whether it has been abandoned for a hundred or a thousand years. On the one hand, this shows the limits of human memory, that anything that occurs before our lifetimes seems foreign and unknowable, but on the other, it highlights our own sense of mortality, and the hope that our works will be remembered and wondered over when we are gone.

Note: This is an updated version of an article that originally appeared on Interesting Thing of the Day on September 5, 2003, and again in a slightly revised form on January 16, 2005.


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Author: Morgen Jahnke

International Women’s Day

International Women's Day poster

International Women’s Day is a storied holiday, observed each year on March 8. It both celebrates women’s countless achievements and draws public attention to the continuing quest for equal rights, pay, and opportunities. It’s kind of shocking to me that even now, in 2019, we as a society haven’t figured out how to treat women with dignity and respect. Let’s see what we can do to fix that today.

Image credit: Public Domain Files


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Author: Joe Kissell