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Tools of Good Works
18/January/2008 Filed in: Jottings
We begin today St Benedict's list of tools for doing good. This began life as a guide for adult candidates for baptism, but it is salutary to find a monastic rule accepting what is rather than what ought to be: there are no illusions about what human nature is capable of. I am surely not alone in having experienced murderous thoughts about the brethren (and they about me), so here is Benedict calmly restating that murder in the monastery is not a good idea and ought to be avoided. On the whole, I agree; as one must with the other points he makes, though some are more difficult than others. The real inspiration comes with the final thought for today about preferring nothing to the love of Christ. Tonight at Compline we shall all examine our conduct in the light of that ideal, and there will be none who does not recognize that she has fallen short of it.