<\/a>Title:\u00a0 Holy Work: Toward a Benedictine Theology of Manual Labor<\/p>\nAuthor:\u00a0 Dom Rembert Sorg<\/p>\n
Publisher:\u00a0 Santa Ana, CA: Source Books, 2003<\/p>\n
Reviewer:\u00a0 Josh Sweeden, Ph.D. student in Practical Theology<\/p>\n
Originally published in 1951, Dom Rembert Sorg\u2019s theological engagement of the Benedictine understanding of manual labor remains a classic text today. The latest edition, published in 2003, contains a preface written by Brian Terrell, O.S.B., and member of the Strangers and Guests Catholic Worker Farm in Maloy, Iowa. This new edition, with a preface by Terrell, displays the profound influence Sorg\u2019s text has had not only for Benedictine monasteries but also for contemporary movements like the Catholic Worker which draws heavily from the Benedictine tradition. Indeed, after examining the correlations between the Catholic Worker Movement and Sorg\u2019s text, Brian Terrell exclaims, \u201cI am anxious to get it [Sorg\u2019s text] into the hands of Benedictine and Catholic Worker friends and look forward to the discussions it will spark\u201d (xvi). Concurrent with Terrell, it should also be said that many today, particularly various expressions of intentional communities, will greatly benefit from Sorg\u2019s text and discover a new (or possibly renewed) discussion partner in St. Benedict, the Benedictine Rule, and Sorg\u2019s analysis.<\/p>\n
According to Sorg, manual labor follows a monk\u2019s \u201cprofession to follow the way of perfection in Christian poverty and charity\u201d (4). The terms poverty and charity shape Sorg\u2019s analysis of manual labor and the monastic tradition throughout the text. While Sorg argues for the centrality of manual labor in the contemplative life, which is, \u201conly the life of faith, sincerely and honestly lived,\u201d he also recognizes that manual labor is not embraced within all monastic tradition(s) and not even in the entirety of the Benedictine tradition. Sorg\u2019s task, therefore, is to raise again the centrality of manual labor for the contemplative Christian life. His text addresses more than monastic communities\u2014though he argues neither poverty nor charity are possible without some form of community\u2014but also the \u201claity,\u201d who Sorg hopes to show the applicability of his theology of manual labor toward the development of an \u201cideal social order\u201d (75). It is important to note that Sorg\u2019s \u201cideal social order\u201d is neither an attempt at, nor an assumption of Christendom.\u00a0\u00a0 Sorg\u2019s ideal is a form of \u201cChristian Communism\u201d found in \u201ceconomically independent communities which renounce the system that is run by the spirit of the world\u201d (81). Not suprisingly, Sorg\u2019s two primary elements of \u201cChristian Communism\u201d are poverty and charity.<\/p>\n
Other elements do help compose Sorg\u2019s vision of the Christian community, but poverty and charity are distinctive in light of capitalism and modern constructions of work. Sorg states that Liberalism, which readily expresses itself economically in capitalism, \u201clogically and inevitably makes a king of avarice because it excludes God and gives free play to human nature\u2019s inherited concupiscence\u201d (xviii). As follows, \u201clabor, which is supposed to be a glorious expression of God\u2019s own image and likeness and of love, has become a marketable commodity, valued in dollars and cents, and bought and sold like hogs and potatoes\u201d (xix). Monks, writes Sorg, were pledged to a life of poverty and charity, and because of this \u201ccharacter of their profession\u2026monks had to work\u201d (12). So manual Labor is not only connected ontologically with humanity and our image and likeness of God, argues Sorg, but is instrumental for the embodiment of two fundamental characteristics of \u201cChrist\u2019s work\u201d: poverty and charity.<\/p>\n
Jesus\u2019 poverty \u201crepudiated any ownership\u201d of things and thus, a pledge to voluntary poverty would mean that \u201clabor is not to be done for money or any private ownership.\u201d Sorg goes on to say that this \u201cideal can be realized only in the Christian community\u201d (25). Community members must labor together to be self-supported. This was a central theme of the ancient monastic theology of manual labor prescribed by St. Antony based on his understandings of Paul (5).\u00a0\u00a0 Because poverty, expressed primarily in non-ownership, is a Benedictine pledge, manual labor is a necessity. In the history of Benedictine practice, manual labor has not always been prescribed as it had by St. Benedict. The \u201cclericalising\u201d of the monks, the overburdening of monasteries with \u201ctoo much liturgy,\u201d the \u201csecularization\u201d of monasteries, and \u201cthe Intellectual movement\u201d all encouraged the detriment of manual labor in Benedictine monasteries. Clericalization and liturgy placed significant time demands on monks, replacing the central role of daily labor, while intellectualism \u201csubstituted\u201d manual labor for study and education. But it was under secularization that \u201cwealth abounded so that there was no economic necessity to work for a living\u201d (55). The centrality of manual labor in Benedictine monasticism is directly tied to the voluntary poverty of monks seeking to live into the characteristics of Christ\u2019s work.<\/p>\n
Christ\u2019s \u201cwhole spirit proclaims charity\u201d (25).\u00a0\u00a0 As a central characteristic of the work of Christ it is a pledge of monks to live charitable lives.\u00a0\u00a0 Christian manual labor \u201cfinds its ideal and perfection when it is wrought entirely for Christ in the person of the hungry and naked, and not at all for self\u201d (24). Like poverty, charity and almsgiving \u201cnecessarily requires community; in the individual members it excludes the motive of self-support. Thus, ideally, the community supports itself while the individual member works entirely for others and never for himself\u201d (12). Manual labor allows for charitable living as the entirety of monastic life is lived for the sake of others. Monastic self-supporting communities ensure that through their manual labor their needs are met, freeing the community from dependence on others from and the burden of seeking support. Also, for the monks, all life was a form of almsgiving. Everything done was for the sake of another\u2014never to build private wealth\u2014which meant that hospitality became a natural outflow of the monastery (101).<\/p>\n
Despite the instrumental function of manual labor in sustaining poverty and charity within the community, all work \u201cbelongs to the pristine condition of human nature and there is an ontological desire in man [sic] to do it\u201d (17). Sorg understands manual labor to be a \u201cfundamental trait of Christ\u2019s revolution\u201d and therefore dignified in the new creation. He states that the \u201cwhole dignifying of manual labor is distinctively Christian\u201d by which he means that the humble are exalted, the proud are disposed, and the distinction between slave and free is erased (79). Manual labor is not, at least within the \u201cideal social order\u201d to be the work of the marginalized and oppressed\u2014there is no degradation in manual labor or stratification of labor at all.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Title:\u00a0 Holy Work: Toward a Benedictine Theology of Manual Labor Author:\u00a0 Dom Rembert Sorg Publisher:\u00a0 Santa Ana, CA: Source Books, 2003 Reviewer:\u00a0 Josh Sweeden, Ph.D. student in Practical Theology Originally published in 1951, Dom Rembert Sorg\u2019s theological engagement of the Benedictine understanding of manual labor remains a classic text today. The latest edition, published in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7324,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[2105],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/cpt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1847"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/cpt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/cpt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/cpt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7324"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/cpt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1847"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/cpt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1847\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1946,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/cpt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1847\/revisions\/1946"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/cpt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1847"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/cpt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1847"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/cpt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1847"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
![<\/a>Title:\u00a0 Holy Work: Toward a Benedictine Theology of Manual Labor<\/p>\nAuthor:\u00a0 Dom Rembert Sorg<\/p>\nPublisher:\u00a0 Santa Ana, CA: Source Books, 2003<\/p>\nReviewer:\u00a0 Josh Sweeden, Ph.D. student in Practical Theology<\/p>\nOriginally published in 1951, Dom Rembert Sorg\u2019s theological engagement of the Benedictine understanding of manual labor remains a classic text today. The latest edition, published in 2003, contains a preface written by Brian Terrell, O.S.B., and member of the Strangers and Guests Catholic Worker Farm in Maloy, Iowa. This new edition, with a preface by Terrell, displays the profound influence Sorg\u2019s text has had not only for Benedictine monasteries but also for contemporary movements like the Catholic Worker which draws heavily from the Benedictine tradition. Indeed, after examining the correlations between the Catholic Worker Movement and Sorg\u2019s text, Brian Terrell exclaims, \u201cI am anxious to get it [Sorg\u2019s text] into the hands of Benedictine and Catholic Worker friends and look forward to the discussions it will spark\u201d (xvi). Concurrent with Terrell, it should also be said that many today, particularly various expressions of intentional communities, will greatly benefit from Sorg\u2019s text and discover a new (or possibly renewed) discussion partner in St. Benedict, the Benedictine Rule, and Sorg\u2019s analysis.<\/p>\nAccording to Sorg, manual labor follows a monk\u2019s \u201cprofession to follow the way of perfection in Christian poverty and charity\u201d (4). The terms poverty and charity shape Sorg\u2019s analysis of manual labor and the monastic tradition throughout the text. While Sorg argues for the centrality of manual labor in the contemplative life, which is, \u201conly the life of faith, sincerely and honestly lived,\u201d he also recognizes that manual labor is not embraced within all monastic tradition(s) and not even in the entirety of the Benedictine tradition. Sorg\u2019s task, therefore, is to raise again the centrality of manual labor for the contemplative Christian life. His text addresses more than monastic communities\u2014though he argues neither poverty nor charity are possible without some form of community\u2014but also the \u201claity,\u201d who Sorg hopes to show the applicability of his theology of manual labor toward the development of an \u201cideal social order\u201d (75). It is important to note that Sorg\u2019s \u201cideal social order\u201d is neither an attempt at, nor an assumption of Christendom.\u00a0\u00a0 Sorg\u2019s ideal is a form of \u201cChristian Communism\u201d found in \u201ceconomically independent communities which renounce the system that is run by the spirit of the world\u201d (81). Not suprisingly, Sorg\u2019s two primary elements of \u201cChristian Communism\u201d are poverty and charity.<\/p>\nOther elements do help compose Sorg\u2019s vision of the Christian community, but poverty and charity are distinctive in light of capitalism and modern constructions of work. Sorg states that Liberalism, which readily expresses itself economically in capitalism, \u201clogically and inevitably makes a king of avarice because it excludes God and gives free play to human nature\u2019s inherited concupiscence\u201d (xviii). As follows, \u201clabor, which is supposed to be a glorious expression of God\u2019s own image and likeness and of love, has become a marketable commodity, valued in dollars and cents, and bought and sold like hogs and potatoes\u201d (xix). Monks, writes Sorg, were pledged to a life of poverty and charity, and because of this \u201ccharacter of their profession\u2026monks had to work\u201d (12). So manual Labor is not only connected ontologically with humanity and our image and likeness of God, argues Sorg, but is instrumental for the embodiment of two fundamental characteristics of \u201cChrist\u2019s work\u201d: poverty and charity.<\/p>\nJesus\u2019 poverty \u201crepudiated any ownership\u201d of things and thus, a pledge to voluntary poverty would mean that \u201clabor is not to be done for money or any private ownership.\u201d Sorg goes on to say that this \u201cideal can be realized only in the Christian community\u201d (25). Community members must labor together to be self-supported. This was a central theme of the ancient monastic theology of manual labor prescribed by St. Antony based on his understandings of Paul (5).\u00a0\u00a0 Because poverty, expressed primarily in non-ownership, is a Benedictine pledge, manual labor is a necessity. In the history of Benedictine practice, manual labor has not always been prescribed as it had by St. Benedict. The \u201cclericalising\u201d of the monks, the overburdening of monasteries with \u201ctoo much liturgy,\u201d the \u201csecularization\u201d of monasteries, and \u201cthe Intellectual movement\u201d all encouraged the detriment of manual labor in Benedictine monasteries. Clericalization and liturgy placed significant time demands on monks, replacing the central role of daily labor, while intellectualism \u201csubstituted\u201d manual labor for study and education. But it was under secularization that \u201cwealth abounded so that there was no economic necessity to work for a living\u201d (55). The centrality of manual labor in Benedictine monasticism is directly tied to the voluntary poverty of monks seeking to live into the characteristics of Christ\u2019s work.<\/p>\nChrist\u2019s \u201cwhole spirit proclaims charity\u201d (25).\u00a0\u00a0 As a central characteristic of the work of Christ it is a pledge of monks to live charitable lives.\u00a0\u00a0 Christian manual labor \u201cfinds its ideal and perfection when it is wrought entirely for Christ in the person of the hungry and naked, and not at all for self\u201d (24). Like poverty, charity and almsgiving \u201cnecessarily requires community; in the individual members it excludes the motive of self-support. Thus, ideally, the community supports itself while the individual member works entirely for others and never for himself\u201d (12). Manual labor allows for charitable living as the entirety of monastic life is lived for the sake of others. Monastic self-supporting communities ensure that through their manual labor their needs are met, freeing the community from dependence on others from and the burden of seeking support. Also, for the monks, all life was a form of almsgiving. Everything done was for the sake of another\u2014never to build private wealth\u2014which meant that hospitality became a natural outflow of the monastery (101).<\/p>\nDespite the instrumental function of manual labor in sustaining poverty and charity within the community, all work \u201cbelongs to the pristine condition of human nature and there is an ontological desire in man [sic] to do it\u201d (17). Sorg understands manual labor to be a \u201cfundamental trait of Christ\u2019s revolution\u201d and therefore dignified in the new creation. He states that the \u201cwhole dignifying of manual labor is distinctively Christian\u201d by which he means that the humble are exalted, the proud are disposed, and the distinction between slave and free is erased (79). Manual labor is not, at least within the \u201cideal social order\u201d to be the work of the marginalized and oppressed\u2014there is no degradation in manual labor or stratification of labor at all.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Title:\u00a0 Holy Work: Toward a Benedictine Theology of Manual Labor Author:\u00a0 Dom Rembert Sorg Publisher:\u00a0 Santa Ana, CA: Source Books, 2003 Reviewer:\u00a0 Josh Sweeden, Ph.D. student in Practical Theology Originally published in 1951, Dom Rembert Sorg\u2019s theological engagement of the Benedictine understanding of manual labor remains a classic text today. The latest edition, published in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7324,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[2105],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/cpt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1847"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/cpt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/cpt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/cpt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7324"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/cpt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1847"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/cpt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1847\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1946,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/cpt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1847\/revisions\/1946"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/cpt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1847"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/cpt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1847"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/cpt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1847"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}](\"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/cpt\/files\/2009\/07\/holyworksmall.jpg\"){kind=link}