10/17/2021

The collection caught up some with our budget since my last column. Thank you for the response and support – please keep up the good work! We are still coming out of our COVID crisis, so encourage those you meet to return as they feel comfortable. We are doing well; we can do better.
Over the next few weeks as the space presents itself, I would like to discuss the Capital or “deadly” sins. When Constantine legalized Christianity in the Roman Empire in 317 A.D., martyrdom of Christians stopped. The zeal that had gone into martyrdom seems to have been channeled into monastic life who were called “white martyrs”. Certain Christians fled the world into the desert to do battle with the devil and to devote themselves to prayer, fasting, and work, dedicating themselves totally to Christ. We call these people monks. One of the things the monks did was to organize the types of thoughts which hindered them from growing into greater union with God. There were eight categories of thoughts. They were not themselves terrible sins, but they were the seeds which, if left to grow, would develop into great vices. So these were the kinds of thoughts to avoid if one wanted to allow the Gospel to take root and flourish in one’s life. It was important to confront these as thoughts, and not wait until they developed fully into vices. These eight types of thoughts are the following: acedia, gluttony, lust, greed/avarice, anger/wrath, sadness, vanity, and pride. The eight were whittled down to seven about the time of St. Gregory the Great, omitting acedia. Three are thoughts about the body (gluttony, lust, greed), three are thoughts about the heart and mind (anger, sadness, and acedia), and the last two are about the soul (vanity and pride).
Why did monks do this? Monks, like all humans, want to be happy. Happiness comes when we are in union with Christ. So the attempt to systematize these eight types of thoughts is an attempt to eliminate those categories of thoughts which can disrupt our union with Christ, which leads to unhappiness. These thoughts are like thorns which can grow and choke off the Word of God which leads to happiness. Avoiding these thoughts in itself will not make us happy - it is union with Christ and that alone which can truly make us happy. These kinds of thoughts are problematic because they are detrimental to achieving that union.
The first thought is gluttony, which involves excess in eating. Gluttony results from an inordinate amount of attention given to thinking about eating. As usual, there is a happy medium between eating too much and too little. Eating is necessary to live, but it also symbolizes the sharing of our lives and the bounty of the Lord, as when a family sits down at table to eat together. It also is a way of celebrating birthdays, anniversaries, feasts and the like, which will have special foods to indicate special significance (e.g. turkey on Thanksgiving). As the movie “Babbet’s Feast” indicates, there can be both a cultural and spiritual dimension to a meal which unites us as we share the same food. Gluttony detracts from those higher dimensions. It is promoted commercially, e.g. through sugar addiction, or impulse eating (fast food). We are meant to be fed on multiple levels, not just to gorge ourselves on food. One of the traits of centenarians is that they leave the table 80% full. Moderation is the rule, which allows us to experience sharing on other levels as we eat together. The Eucharist is the best example of truly sublime use of food as a sign to share a much greater spiritual reality.
It is always a joy to celebrate Eucharist with you.

Father Albert, O.S.B.