Anyone who overdoes something physical soon learns the pain caused by lack of moderation. We say such a person is ‘wiser’. Knowledge plus experience equals wisdom.

One pearl of wisdom from the knowledge of St. Benedict is: ‘All things are to be done with moderation’ (RB 48:9). As an oblate, I thought it would be interesting to research secular and sacred wisdom on moderation and see what our wise holy father Benedict tells us about this Benedictine value.

In secular tradition, wisdom and moderation are frequently linked. Seneca, the mid-first century philosopher, was an advocate of moderation. He said, ‘It is the sign of a great mind to dislike greatness, and prefer things in measure to things in excess.’ His contemporary, the poet Ovid, noted, ‘You will go most safely in the middle.’ In the seventeenth century, French philosopher Blaise Pascal posed: ‘To go beyond the bounds of moderation is to outrage humanity.’ Thomas Fuller, seventeenth century English clergyman, called moderation ‘the silken string running through the pearl-chain of all virtues.’ Nineteenth century American author Elbert Hubbard notes, ‘Ninety-nine people out of a hundred who go to a physician have no organic disease, but are merely suffering from some symptom of their own indiscretion.’

Moving from the secular to the sacred, Scripture goes further, noting that Wisdom is not only moderate, but that moderation is gentle, tolerant, and discerning. ‘It is not good to eat much honey’, Prov.25:7 cautions gently. In Phil.4:5, St. Paul says, ‘Let your moderation be known among all men’. Some Bible translations use ‘gentleness’ for moderation and some use ‘tolerance’ for the same. St. Peter cautions, ‘Add to your knowledge, temperance’ 2 Pet.1:6. Another Bible citation says to add ‘discernment’ to your ‘self-control.’ These different translations give us some sense of the range of what moderation covers, not just eating or drinking too much or too little.

In drawing up his Rule, Benedict says he hoped ‘to set down nothing harsh, nothing burdensome’ RB Prologue: 46. Benedict wanted to provide a model of Christian living, ‘a school for the Lord's service’ RB Prologue:45. He desired the Abbot to ‘so arrange everything that the strong have something to strive for and the weak nothing to run from’ RB 64:19. He balanced the day between prayer, work, study and sleep, following the natural rhythms of the day. A characteristic of wisdom is that it endures. This balanced and moderate Rule has endured for centuries and wisely has been adopted as the norm for Western monasticism.

In the Holy Rule, St. Benedict works to establish everything in harmony and peace ‘so that in all things God may be glorified’ RB 57:9, 1 Pet.4:11. In monastic life, the responsibility for moderation is placed on all the brothers or sisters, but particularly the Abbot. Benedict calls for great discretion on the part of the Abbot to discern, to temper and to measure regarding food, clothing, discipline and Lenten resolutions. Nowhere is this balance more noticeable than when the Abbot is cautioned to be a ‘worthy steward in charge of God's house’ RB 64:5.

He is instructed: to ‘be profit for the monks, not pre-eminence for himself’ so he can rule in a spirit of service RB 64:8, to ‘bring out what is new and what is old,’ lest he fall into conservatism or modernism RB 64:9, Matt 13:52, to ‘always let mercy triumph over judgment’ RB 64:10, James 2:13, to ‘hate faults but love the brothers’ RB 64:11, to ‘strive to be loved rather than feared’ RB 64:15, to ‘prune them (faults) with prudence and love ... prudent and considerate in his orders ... always discerning and moderate’ RB 64:14-17. St. Benedict concludes his instruction to the Abbot: ‘Therefore, drawing on this and other examples of discretion, the mother of virtues, he must so arrange everything so that the strong have something to yearn for and the weak nothing to run from’ RB 64:19.

What does moderation and a Rule 1500 years old from rural Europe have to do with me? I used to think that being an all or nothing person was the way to be. Growing up, I believed that if one was good, two was better. I could ‘fast,’ but I couldn't ‘slow.’ I eventually succumbed to addiction, the disease of ‘more.’ What happened? ‘Therefore I prayed, and understanding was given me, I called on God and the spirit of wisdom came to me’ Wis.7:7. As Augustine said: ‘To many, total abstinence is easier than perfect moderation.’ And so it is for me. I have been in recovery for 21 years. I am blessed with a healthier and happier outlook on life. Aside from abstinence from the addictive substance or behaviour, recovery does not imply perfection, but rather balance. Ernest Kurtz, in Spirituality of Imperfection, refers to recovery as a balanced spirituality of ‘both/and,’ rather than ‘either/or.’

Twelve-Step Spirituality says one is to practice such principles in all one's affairs. Similarly, Benedict says we are to keep this present Rule in all things RB 64:20. My own call is to continually strive for balance in all areas of my life (work, prayer, family, school, health, play). Just as the Ante-Nicene Fathers wrote about the power of harmony in prayer, so too, without the harmony of moderation, my prayer will suffer. With a discerning spiritual director I can be more objective and better live the balance of the Benedictine motto: ‘Ora et Labora.’ Thomas Fuller said: ‘Always remember that the greatest word in the English language is Sufficiency. The wisdom of Prov.30:8 says: ‘Give me just enough to satisfy my needs’. So be it!

One of our novices said to me: ‘When I became an oblate, I was delighted and then I went home and thought, now what do I do? So maybe I could get some thoughts from the group? Now what do I do? What is an oblate, anyway?’

I felt that I should make a reply to this query.

An oblate is a Benedictine, as much or as little as one wants to be. You will meet, as I have, much to my chagrin, some professed who will make it less, take a reductionist approach or stress its lay character so heavily that its monastic character is lost. Do not listen to them. You are not a wannabe, you are a Benedictine, and all Benedictines, from our holy Father Benedict himself to the Abbot Primate down to us, are seekers, or they are nothing at all.

To search for the God we have found is the Benedictine vocation. It is a never-ending search, life-long. Our Holy Rule encompasses all people at all points on the road of that search, since it requires only that we seek God for entrance. We are, by definition, seekers. Any who fail to seek have left without knowing it. That seeking however, is incapable of insisting on a certain entry level minimum of holiness, or mysticism, or anything. We seek - Period. Where that takes us and how fast, is up to God and God alone. St. Benedict merely asks that we seek God. That is the sole criterion for entry or membership in our Benedictine family.

It's OK to be proud of a distinguished family and ours is a very distinguished family! Never worry about whether you measure up to it or not, none of us do, anymore than we measure up to Christ Himself. Any who think they have measured up, or are more than you, have missed the boat entirely, so ignore them! Be calm and serene in the fact that our family embraces you. Our family is so great that one candidate wept at the prospect of joining it.

One hesitates to compare us to the Kennedys - perhaps not at all apt for our Republican members - but they say a lot of people get away with a lot because they are Kennedys. Well, so do we. The goodness and holiness of the whole family accrues to us strays and losers. I would much rather face God someday as a Benedictine than just as myself, heaven knows what would befall me on my own merits, but I stand in lofty company!

As to what you do, be sure you will do a lot of it alone. Ask us for guidance anytime, as most of us have had to do it alone too. Many abbeys and priories have not tapped into the fact that their Oblates really want more. They have given, in many places, a very superficial blancmange. You have to supply that lack, but many others here who know that hunger will help you. Just let us know! Because we have been there ourselves, we will be most eager to help you.

Read the Holy Rule and say the psalms or the Office as best and as often as you can. Nothing, nothing, so forms a Benedictine as the psalms. Get familiar with them, let them breathe into your heart and soul, sneak into the marrow of your bones. The ancient monastics, long before our holy Father Benedict esteemed the psalms, prayed them constantly because they thought that that book was a synopsis of all of Scripture and in many senses, they were right on the money. Illiterate, the earliest monastics learned all 150 by heart!

That's quite a stretch, but start trying to memorize a few. Then they can be with you anytime, on the subway, on a plane, in the car. Try some of the Compline psalms first. When you can learn to say Compline entirely from memory - and that's not a stretch if you do it every day or even several times a week- you will have gained an inestimable gift. It's always there, no book, no light needed. I often say it while driving to the city and back.

Get a copy of the "Sayings of the Desert Fathers" and read it every day. As soon as you finish, start over again. Do this for about a year and you'll find that they, too, are becoming bone of your bone and flesh of your flesh. It was these Fathers (and Mothers!) of the Desert who formed St. Benedict. After the Holy Rule and the Gospel itself, nothing will make you more Benedictine than this!

There, this was just a beginning and already too long. I surprise myself! But I know that this verbosity came from love. You asked me about the dearest thing to my heart, being an Oblate, the very thing that connects me to this great Order!

Having picked up some more supplies, Salvado drove his bullock team and wagon back to the mission in the bush and rejoined Serra. They later found that the land they had been occupying was part of another settlers land and they were forced to move further on and were directed by the natives to a place where the Moore River widened into a pool that they called Mourin. Here they marked out twenty acres and were granted the land on 1 March 1847, just one year after their arrival in the Plains. They called it after the old Roman city Norcia, the birthplace of St. Benedict and so New Norcia was born.

Salvado went to Perth to recruit labour for the construction of a monastery. He returned with some twenty men including several French and Irishmen, none of whom had ventured into the Victoria Plains before. In fifty days they completed a substantial building, fourteen feet long and ten feet wide, within which they made a small chapel. The next essential was a farm to support the fledgling mission. A further trip to Perth secured a plough, a harrow, an iron mill to grind the grain, a few oxen and cows, a bull and an old horse. The two missionaries and a number of aborigines worked together and in a short time they had cleared thirty four acres and put in a crop of grain which produced well. Salvado applied for and received a grant of a one thousand acre pastoral lease. He walked to Northam, a distance of fifty miles and purchased 710 sheep, plus he hired a shepherd and drove the lot back to New Norcia ‘without the loss of a single one’. The care of the animals was to be entrusted to the aborigines. By the end of 1847 the two missionaries had made a start. The foundation of the mission had been laid. Already, although Serra was Superior, New Norcia was being identified with Salvado.

Salvado became a master interpreter of land regulations, keeping precise dates of lease expiry dates and was always on the look out for suitable additional land. He carried pegs to mark out areas and made careful notes and accurate sketch maps to support his claims. Many have claimed that Salvado was the best surveyor and cartographer in the colony in his day. As time passed, more and more settlers began arriving in the Victoria Plains area and setting up their own landholdings. It was inevitable that disputes would break out over land ownership. However it was rare for Salvado to be on the losing end of a dispute, even though several actions were mounted against him. By the end of 1848, the lease of a further 18,000 acres was acquired.

Over the next five years both Serra and Salvado made trips to Europe. Whilst in Rome, Serra was consecrated Bishop of Port Victoria (Darwin), which when Salvado heard, caused him fresh fears for the future of New Norcia. Meanwhile Brady’s debts continued to escalate, forcing the trend towards New Norcia providing for the running of the Perth diocese. ‘I was fully aware’ wrote Salvado ‘that the mission to the aborigines was no more than a name. De facto it was Dr. Brady’s farm’. Salvado was ordered to Europe to seek funds and took with him two aboriginal boys who were pupils from the mission school. The two young men created a great stir in Europe wherever they went and both received the honour of being clothed in the black Benedictine habit by Pius IX himself. Salvado was proud of them and they in turn were devoted to him. He then delivered them to Cava monastery where they were to begin their novitiate. However events were such that both died of poor health within the next six years. Had Salvado acted too quickly with these aboriginal boys? It cannot be said that he did. They would probably have died young had they remained at the mission as others had done. The very presence of the white man amongst them was to do this. Salvado and his helpers merely softened the harshness of the contact with white civilisation, so destructive of the aboriginal. Meanwhile further confusion occurred with Serra being transferred to Perth as co-adjutor, with Salvado nominated as Bishop elect for Port Victoria. He tried in vain to sway Propaganda from his Episcopal appointment, so that he could return immediately to New Norcia. He was consecrated on 15 August 1849, meaning that the small church of Western Australia would now have three Catholic Bishops. Finally news arrived that the settlement at Port Victoria had been abandoned and Salvado’s appointment there was cancelled. Salvado received 28 novices and Serra a further eleven, who all embarked with Serra on the Spanish ship Ferrolana, for Western Australia. Prior to his own departure Salvado spent time with Abbot Casaretto at Subiaco, Italy and obtained six places for novices to be trained for New Norcia from the monastic college which had been set up there.

In the meantime Brady’s financial position had reached a hopeless state. After much acrimony, events finally led to Pope Pius IX’s decree expelling Brady from office. Brady then left the colony and died in France in 1871. Salvado returning back, found Serra in full charge of the Perth diocese. He had also diverted all the Spanish missionaries to his own foundation at Subiaco in Perth. Serra had much antagonised just about everybody he had come into contact with. In particular Mother Ursula Frayne, Superioress of the Sisters of Mercy, based at Guildford, was harassed severely by him together with her charges. In addition he lost the patronage of much of the ruling officialdom by his high handed behaviour. A major split developed between Salvado and Serra with approaches made by both of them to Rome complaining of each other’s conduct. Eventually Serra found himself unable to go on with his duties and resigned and returned to Spain in 1861.

By this time Salvado had been given the approval by Propaganda to return to New Norcia and from 1857 he spent another 40 plus years in the place where he had always wanted to be. Three things stood out clearly in his mind, dominating all his thinking and policies:

1.Complete independence for the mission in relation to the diocese of Perth.

2.The building at New Norcia of a wholly self supporting mission-village after the model of early monastic towns of Europe.

3.Implementation of his plan for the welfare of the aborigines.

After a long campaign with Rome, a decree arrived on 1 April 1859 granting his long cherished independence from Perth and appointing him its sole Superior. Rome also gave to the numerous candidates for the monastic life already in the colony, their choice of staying at Subiaco or moving to New Norcia. Thirty one moved to New Norcia and shortly after the number grew to forty seven. Up until this time he had been intent on establishing a mission. He now deliberately set out to set up a monastery and that same year opened a novitiate with eight Spaniards, who had been postulants for ten years at Subiaco. The time was now ripe for Salvado to achieve the second of his objectives, namely to build up New Norcia into a self supporting mission-village.

In 1865 a new church was built and two large houses, one for native boys, the other for girls. Also a school was commenced with tuition given by Judith Butler, the daughter of an Irish Catholic settler.

After another visit to Rome in March 1867, the Pope decreed that New Norcia should become a Prefecture Apostolic and Abbey Nullius with its own territory independent of the diocese of Perth and that Salvado should be its Abbot for life.

Salvado’s work with the aborigines continued unabated as he handed over land to various reliable natives who were to work it under supervision. A sort of association of aboriginal farmers was formed. He taught them the value of money and paid them a weekly wage for all work done on the mission. He kept their earnings in deposit boxes held at the mission, from which they could withdraw and purchase stock and seed etc., just as the white settlers did. He noticed that as a result they gained a desire to settle down, with some constructing huts for themselves and their families. Salvado not only tolerated, but appreciated many of the aborigines beliefs and customs and he realised how they could be adapted to Christianity. It was a rare tribute to the success of his approach that they were prepared to disclose to him many of their most sacred beliefs and ceremonies. Numbers varied at the mission throughout the nineties but the average during this period would have been about 130.

Salvado made it his constant aim to always maintain good working relations with the succession of Governors who ruled the colony. He kept up a continuing fight throughout his tenure at New Norcia for Government support both monetarily and the enactment of just Acts of Parliament. However the Federal Conferences and Conventions of 1890, 1891, 1897-98, completely overlooked the aborigines in their efforts to determine future Australian citizens. They were simply not mentioned by the delegates of the Colonial Assemblies who drafted the Federal Constitution. It struck the old Bishop that the aborigines had no one to speak up for them at the Conventions and no one who cared about their ‘humanity’. He was led to ask by what Christian principle these representatives of the Colonies could totally omit to take into ‘calculation the aboriginal inhabitants who had been around for centuries’. To the end, Salvado himself fought ceaselessly against greed and scepticism on the one hand, inconsistency and indifference on the other, but he never gave up in defeat.

Salvado was to take his last trip to Europe in 1899 at the age of 85. As he knew he was coming to the end of his time, he was keen to appoint a successor. His choice fell upon Dom Fulgentius Torres. Torres came from the Spanish monastery of Montserrat. Salvado invited Torres to Rome to prepare himself for the role of Abbot.

Salvado lodged at the monastery of St. Paul’s-Outside-the-Walls but was confined to bed by an undefined illness. The last entry in his faithfully kept diary was that Torres had seen him and was going to Subiaco for a retreat prior to leaving for New Norcia. On 29 December 1900, Salvado received the last sacraments of the Church he had served so well.

During the last few years of Salvado’s life, the Forrest Government appointed Henry Prinsep as the Chief Protector of the aborigines. He was to say on hearing of Salvado’s death that ‘all members of his community looked to him as their father and leader, but none more so than the aborigines, who had lost the best friend they ever had’

THE EIGHT THOUGHTS - VICES
by Abba Evagrius taken from Inner Light Productions.com - extracts from The Desert Fathers

Abba Evagrius is well known to students of the Philokalia. He was a monk of Sketis, born around the middle of the fourth century. He was known to such contemporary teachers as St. Basil the Great, St. Gregory of Nyssa, and St. Gregory the Theologian. He attended the Second Ecumenical Council in Constantinople, but he left there after a short while for Jerusalem. There he became a monk and returned to Egypt a short while later. He lived in Nitria for two years, then in the area known as ‘the Cells,’ and finally in Sketis. He was a student of St. Macarius of Egypt and St. Macarius of Alexandria. Abba Evagrius wrote many texts that were translated and read widely in both the Greek-speaking and Latin-speaking Churches. His works were translated and carried to the West by his disciple, Rufinus. This teaching from Abba Evagrius is written in the form of a letter to Anatolius and is about the eight vices from which all other thoughts stem.

To Anatolius: On the eight thoughts

There are eight principal thoughts, from which all other thoughts stem. The first thought is of gluttony; the second, of fornication; the third, of love of money; the fourth, of discontent; the fifth, of anger; the sixth, of despondency; the seventh, of vainglory; the eighth, of pride. Whether these thoughts disturb the soul or not does not depend on us, but whether they linger in us or not and set passions in motion or not -- does depend on us.

The thought of gluttony suggests to a monk that he make haste to give up his ascetic life, depicting to him diseases of the stomach, liver or bile, dropsy or some other long illness, the lack of medical remedies and the absence of doctors. Moreover, it brings to his memory brethren who actually contracted such diseases. At times the enemy urges brethren who have suffered such diseases, to visit monks who are fasting and to relate what has happened to them, adding that this was due to too strict an abstinence.

The demon of fornication excites carnal lust and insidiously attacks abstainers, striving to make them abandon their abstinence, thinking that it brings them no profit. Polluting the soul, it urges it also towards such actions and makes them say and hear certain words, as though the act itself were before their eyes.

Love of money conjectures a long old age, inability to work with one's hands, hunger, illness, the hardships of want and the grievousness of accepting from others the necessities for bodily needs. Discontent is sometimes caused by the loss of what is desirable and sometimes accompanies anger. When caused by the loss of what is desirable it happens thus - certain thoughts come first and bring to the soul memories of home, relatives and the old way of life. When they see the soul does not oppose them but goes with them and mentally spreads itself in enjoying them, they seize it and immerse it in discontent, both because the objects of their thoughts are absent and because by the statutes of a monk's life, he cannot have them. So the more eagerly the poor soul spreads itself in the initial thoughts, the more it is stricken and grieved by the sequel.

Anger is the quickest passion of all. It is aroused and inflamed against a man who has done, or seems to have done one an injury. It hardens the soul ever more and more, it particularly captures the mind during prayer, vividly bringing up the face of an offender. At times, lingering in the soul and passing into enmity, it causes nightmares, depicting physical tortures, the horrors of death, attacks of poisonous snakes and beasts. These four phenomena accompanying the birth of enmity, bring with them many thoughts, as every observer will find for himself.

The demon of despondency (acedia), which is also called the noonday demon (Psalm 90:6), is more grievous than all the others. It attacks a monk in about the fourth hour (about ten in the morning) and whirls the soul round and round till about the eighth hour (two o'clock in the afternoon). It begins by making a man notice dejectedly how slowly the sun moves, or does not move at all and that the day seems to have become fifty hours long. Then it urges the man to look frequently out of the window or even to go out of his cell to look at the sun and see how long it is till the ninth hour, at the same time making him glance hither and thither to see if some of the brethren are about. Then it arouses in him vexation against the place and his mode of life itself and his work, adding that there is no more love among the brethren and no one to comfort him. If in these days someone has offended him, the demon reminds him of it to increase his vexation. Then it provokes in him a longing for other places where it would be easier to find the necessities to satisfy his needs, by adopting some craft, which is less strenuous and more profitable. He adds that to please God, does not depend on the place, God can be worshipped everywhere. He connects with this thought memories of relatives and former well-being and prophesies here a long life with the hardships of asceticism and uses every wile to make the monk end by leaving his cell and taking flight from his career. This demon is followed by another, but not at once. However if a monk fights and conquers, this struggle is followed by a peaceful state and the soul becomes filled with ineffable joy.

The thought of vainglory is the most subtle of all. It comes to those who lead a righteous life, and begins to extol their efforts and collect praise from men, making them imagine the cries of demons being cast out, the healing of women, crowds pressing round a man to touch his garments. Finally it predicts his consecration into priesthood, brings to his doors men to seek him who, on his refusal, bind him and lead him forcibly away against his will. Having thus kindled idle hopes in him, the demon withdraws, leaving the field for further temptations either by the demon of pride or the demon of discontent, who at once suggests to him thoughts opposed to these hopes. At times he even surrenders to the demon of fornication, this man who, only a short time before, saw himself as a holy and venerable priest.

The demon of pride is the cause of the most grievous fall of the soul. It counsels the soul not to profess God as its helper, but to ascribe to itself its righteousness and to puff itself up before its brethren, considering them to be ignorant because not all of them think so highly of it. Pride is followed by anger and discontent and by the final evil -- going out of one's mind, frenzy and visions of many demons in the air.

PRAYER LIST

ITEMS OF INTEREST

Back Row – Dom Chris Power, Peter Driver, Frank Woods, Fr. Seraphim Sanz, Nick Agocs, Fr. Anthony Lovis, Paul Vinci, Abbot Bernard Rooney, Kelvin Devine, Abbot Placid Spearrit, Fr. David Barry, Dom John Herbert, Dom Michael Tunney, Brian Low, Rhod Metcalf, Kevin Thompson.

Moderation by Peg Gawne-Mark OblSB, taken from the St. John’s Newsletter

SALVADO & THE FOUNDING OF NEW NORCIA

THE EIGHT THOUGHTS - VICES
by Abba Evagrius taken from Inner Light Productions.com - extracts from The Desert Fathers

PRAYER LIST

ITEMS OF INTEREST

Back Row – Dom Chris Power, Peter Driver, Frank Woods, Fr. Seraphim Sanz, Nick Agocs, Fr. Anthony Lovis, Paul Vinci, Abbot Bernard Rooney, Kelvin Devine, Abbot Placid Spearrit, Fr. David Barry, Dom John Herbert, Dom Michael Tunney, Brian Low, Rhod Metcalf, Kevin Thompson.

Moderation by Peg Gawne-Mark OblSB, taken from the St. John’s Newsletter

SALVADO & THE FOUNDING OF NEW NORCIA

THE EIGHT THOUGHTS - VICES by Abba Evagrius taken from Inner Light Productions.com - extracts from The Desert Fathers

THE EIGHT THOUGHTS - VICES
by Abba Evagrius taken from Inner Light Productions.com - extracts from The Desert Fathers