Monastic Library by Reinhard Sebastian Zimmermann, 1893. Public Domain. In the beginning was the Word,
and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things came to be through him, and without him nothing came to be. - The Holy Gospel according to John, Prologue "To be learning something is the greatest of pleasures." - Aristotle "Because," I said, "the free man ought not to learn any study slavishly. Forced labors performed by the body don't make the body any worse, but no forced study abides in a soul." - Plato, The Republic "Nine years", I said to the astonishment of my students, "it has been nine years or more, since I have been bored." It is hard for me to describe precisely the moment, but I place it about eight or nine years ago. Something changed in my life while I was studying philosophy in minor seminary. While reading through the major monuments of philosophical works from Plato to Augustine to Nietzsche, I was beginning an interior and intellectual odyssey, a wandering and searching journey for the resting place for my mind. Something changed in those years. What changed was the discovery of the meaning of human existence. When I relate to my students the fact that I can honestly say that I have not been bored for so many years, and that I know why I have not been bored, most respond with simple disbelief. Boredom, they think, is an inescapable reality for a human person. After all, we live in an age of distraction and information overload. We live in an age in which information is ubiquitous, but wisdom is scarce. Boredom is like getting tired, or getting hungry, they assume, quite a natural thing that is probably caused by not being entertained. If we just had more interesting video games or better technology nobody would be bored... Most students today do not understand that the distaste for life that is experienced as boredom is a deeply spiritual malady. The spiritual apathy that is boredom is truth-sickness above all else. Either the bored person has not discovered the basic truth that their is such a thing as truth, or they have failed to become deeply enamored with it upon discovery. The reason I have not been bored for around a decade is because the wisdom culled from ages gone by and certain guiding lights of our own day made me realize that truth is the most wonderful of all things, and the love of it the greatest of human endeavors. People like Fr. James Schall, SJ, Fr. Benedict Ashley, OP, Bishop Robert Barron, Pope Benedict XVI, from our day, and past figures like Aristotle, St. Thomas Aquinas, Josef Pieper, and G.K. Chesterton all played the role of teacher to me in the pursuit of knowledge about the most important of things. Their writings served as a remedy to my mind suffering asphyxiation from a lack truth about things that really matter. The gospel of St. John begins with its famous prologue about the Word. Interestingly, it echoes the creation story in the book of Genesis, but with the full light of revelation that places the creative act of God within the context of the Holy Trinity. Jesus is the eternal Word of God, through whom all things exist and by whom all things were created. God "spoke" and "it was made". What did he speak? He spoke the Word. It is quite fitting for us to say that God has "spoken" creation into existence. Everything that exists is communication. Everything bears the intelligibility proper to words. Everything can lead one to God. In a very real way creation is a book, and we are characters in it. It is the first book we learn to read, and by reading it carefully we are able to discern in vague contours the nature of our Author and discover for ourselves the purpose and meaning of it all. It turns out that everything is interesting because everything is able to lead you to God. Words, books, and libraries are the laboratory where the Word of God searched out, whether in creation or divine revelation. The Word became flesh and dwelt among us. The picture Monastic Library captures well the happy fruits that come from a mind wrapped in wonder and dedicated to the pursuit of truth. The monks in their library exude joviality and delight in the prospect of learning because Aristotle was correct: to be learning something is the greatest of pleasures. There is no boredom when there are libraries. Or better yet, there is no boredom for those who are able to wonder, and you will probably find these people in libraries, or at least they will have libraries in their homes. This, in the end, is what a good educator and parent will pass on to his pupils, the love of learning and the desire for truth. Parents, as the first educators, should not entrust this task entirely to school teachers. It is a task too important and too joyful not to partake in. A love of learning can be passed on just as family recipes or carpentry skills, but it requires some good books. Perhaps, this portrait of the monks will prompt you to inspire your children to pick up good books freely, and not slavishly, as though the discovery of truth was a burden or boring, but rather from the perspective of friars convinced, as I am, that all things are interesting and learning a most jovial of all activities. Sincerely in Christ, Fr. Nelson
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Zacchaeus - by Tissot (Public Domain)“He was the most generous man I ever met.” - James Cardinal Harvey about St. John Paul II
“For God loves a cheerful giver.” - 2 Corinthians 9:7 He entered Jericho and was passing through. And there was a man named Zacchae′us; he was a chief tax collector, and rich. And he sought to see who Jesus was, but could not, on account of the crowd, because he was small of stature. So he ran on ahead and climbed up into a sycamore tree to see him, for he was to pass that way. And when Jesus came to the place, he looked up and said to him, “Zacchae′us, make haste and come down; for I must stay at your house today.” So he made haste and came down, and received him joyfully. And when they saw it they all murmured, “He has gone in to be the guest of a man who is a sinner.” And Zacchae′us stood and said to the Lord, “Behold, Lord, the half of my goods I give to the poor; and if I have defrauded any one of anything, I restore it fourfold.” And Jesus said to him, “Today salvation has come to this house, since he also is a son of Abraham. For the Son of man came to seek and to save the lost.” The virtues are the path to happiness. It should be no surprise then that St. Gregory Nazianzen said that the goal of the virtuous life is to become like God. Godliness and happiness are identical. At the same time, very often when we think of another word for moral perfection, holiness, generosity doesn’t seem to immediately come to mind as a defining characteristic of one who is holy; or for that matter happy. We tend to think of holiness dealing with penitence, faith, love, prayer, chastity, serving the poor, or any other number of virtues. I do not think, however, that generosity gets its due as an important virtue of the happy and holy person. This summer while on the Rome Pilgrimage with many of our students, we had the incredible opportunity to receive a tour of the basilica of St. Paul’s outside the walls from the American James Cardinal Harvey, a friend of our good bishop David Kagan, and the archpriest of that basilica. Cardinal Harvey spent many years as the Prefect of the Papal Household for St. John Paul II. In other words, every day he was with the one of the most beloved and venerated saints in the modern era. He knew the saint as well as anyone in the world. Fr. Josh Waltz convinced the Cardinal to say a word to our students about St. John Paul II. His words have stuck with me. They have changed the very way that I understand the meaning of my life, and what it means to be holy, happy, and virtuous. Cardinal Harvey said simply about the saint: “He was the most generous man I ever met.” I believe that as parents and teachers we must strive to inculcate into the children of our school the absolute importance of striving every day to be generous. Generosity is one of the virtues that most makes us like God “who makes the sun to rise on the evil and the good” (Mt. 5:45) and is the source of “every good endowment and perfect gift” (Jm 1:17). Everything good in our lives comes from God, even when we don’t acknowledge him for it. God’s goodness is supremely manifest in his acts of mercy and generosity, by which he freely bestows good on those who have no claim to it. Similarly, the generous person strives to give good things to others, simply out of the goodness of their heart. In the gospel story about Jesus and the tax collector Zacchaeus, the unmerited generosity of Jesus inspired generosity in Zacchaeus, a notably greedy man. Generosity begets generosity. This principle holds for both the ability of generous people to inspire others to be generous, and the fact that our own acts of generosity tend to make us more generous in the future. Even more interestingly the fact that the more generous we are with others, the more we receive from God. As the saying goes, God will not be outdone in generosity. Perhaps, this Advent can be a time of intentional generosity in our homes and school. I encourage you to foster practices within your own family that foster generosity of time, talent, and treasure. The corporal and spiritual works of mercy would be a great place to start for ideas about how to become more generous. Pick a work of mercy that each member of the family strives to practice for a week, or choose one to do together as a family. Encourage your children to be generous with the upcoming “No Room in the Inn” Homeless Coalition fundraiser beginning at the end of November. Increase your own charitable giving to a real ten percent tithe called for in the Bible. Since the season of Advent is primarily one of preparation to receive the ultimate gift, namely God himself, it is quite fitting that we prepare to receive by giving of ourselves in a new and intentional way. After all, “God loves a cheerful giver” (2 Cor. 9:7). In Christ, Fr. Nelson |