By David Warren
Among the emotions of being completely immobile, or nearly so, is the fact that it keeps one away from bookstores. Finally, one has the opportunity to read those things one was postponing «for when I retire.»
Irresponsible book buyers have invariably accumulated works to read then, «when I have a lot of time.» Unfortunately, with advancing age comes the revelation that one doesn’t have as much time.
In fact, as I begin this column, I learn that a close old friend, whom I had known since he was twenty-five, has died at what I once considered the venerable age of eighty. We were just starting to talk about certain things, and I reflect: «If Julian could die, anyone can die.»
And believe me, the Canadian winter is a mortification. It is one of the many advantages of living in this place.
Reading up here in my cell (I call it the High Doganate), like the author of the book I’m reading, «I spend as much time nodding over my books as in my bed.» But, unlike him, when sleep is more pleasant and I feel I could stay in bed for hours, the bell for Matins rings.
It is St. Aelred of Rievaulx whom I am reading, and I imagine that in northern Yorkshire, nine hundred years ago, it could be as cold as in Toronto. The only difference is that not all of us have to go out into the open air, like the poor garbage collectors whose noisy truck suddenly wakes me before seven in the morning.
There is also work to be done out there, but unlike in a monastery, not everyone has to do it. We don’t have «from each according to his ability, to each according to his need,» as in theoretical Marxism, or as it really happened in the abbey of Rievaulx. It was a worker’s paradise: everyone worked.
In the Speculum Caritatis, or Mirror of Charity, which I try to read amid the clamor of the garbage trucks, Aelred addresses directly or indirectly the novices, or possible novices.
He dealt with many of them and, as one who was once sent by King David I from Scotland to Rievaulx when it was still huts under construction, he had a lot of experience in the art of recruitment. He became the most illustrious abbot of that enclosure in northern Yorkshire, while continuing in the same old task: saving souls wherever possible.
And here he is, explaining to a novice who may be settling in, the difference between life inside and outside the monastery. If you flinch at the workload that may be necessary to save your soul, well, the Matins bell will ring around three in the morning.
But remember that those were medieval times—not yet fully the «High Middle Ages»—and that most of Europe was then quite Christian, unlike today.
The splendid Romanesque and Gothic buildings, which our tourists like to contemplate when they are still standing, were not only being built (with higher artisanal standards than we can imagine), but they were not yet fully inhabited.
Our civilization was still, for the most part, on the «to-do list.» Instructions on how to live and what to do were still being compiled. St. Aelred was contributing to that «medieval work.»
In contrast, look at Rievaulx today. It is a beautiful ruin in its valley, much reduced from what it was, since the stones with which it was built were reused to construct the secular structures that now dot that concrete landscape.
They were recycled when Henry VIII was ravaging the place to make room for Protestantism, except for the choicest pieces, which were privatized in the real estate market.
No one really lives in the ruin, for it has no central heating. One would freeze. There is no water either. And the «National Trust» doesn’t even allow camping.
It follows from this that a guide to becoming a novice, or continuing to be one, is no longer necessary, except for academics and experts. The rest can comfortably waste their lives. There will be no «exam» in an earthly sense. Your only instruction as a Christian is to get up, unless that now seems impossible. Gravity would be offended.
But according to Aelred, there will be no difference. The many things that worried and afflicted you in secular life will follow you more or less to the convent, and you don’t become holier by crossing the door.
Did they feel, for example, the love of God more or less? Did they think they obtained more spiritual consolation? Were their old secular friends less attentive to their needs and desires than their new friends in the monastery?
Et cetera. It was a comparison that would quickly convince the novice that he had taken a wrong step, if he wasn’t already finding his place in the new life. And at least it would shake him up a bit if he thought he knew what he was doing.
Later, when he has been locked in the monastic regime for a while, Aelred might ask him if he was suffering more for the love of Christ than right after arriving. And the novice would probably reply that he couldn’t have endured even one hour of what he now does all day.
In particular, no one imagines how difficult it is to maintain absolute silence, from dawn to dusk, and then afterward.
And even if we shed true tears thinking how much we love Christ, that won’t stop us from returning to the usual with friends and relatives if we pause; to overeating and drinking, sleeping late, and yielding to discontent, quarrels, and coveting others’ property.
St. Aelred is surprisingly modern.
About the author
David Warren is former editor of the magazine Idler and columnist in Canadian newspapers. He has extensive experience in the Near and Far East. His blog, Essays in Idleness*, can now be found at: davidwarrenonline.com.