Dear Benedict<\/p>\n\n\n\n
A large chunk of\nyour Rule is about what action the community should take towards\nthose members who go wrong (chapter 23-30). It\u2019s a tricky section\nto interpret nearly 20 centuries after you wrote it. Social attitudes\nand culture have changed a great deal, as I\u2019ve mentioned before.\nThere are quite diverse views about punishment, and a move away from,\nfor example, physical punishment especially for young people, should\nbe noted. You use words infrequently used today outside church\ncircles (and even in them) like excommunicate.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
It\u2019s a serious and\nstrong word for you to use as we see from the examples you give. A\nperson who has done wrong is removed from community in steps: at\nmealtimes, at prayer times and eventually those unable to amend their\nfaults have to leave. Such steps are common in most communities\nbecause a community cannot be a community if there are disruptive\nrule-breakers inside. Our criminal justice system is supposed to work\non similar lines. We may seek to guide and change such individuals\nbut what if we can\u2019t?<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The issue has become\na very challenging one in our time. The central notion of confession\nand forgiveness means we like to think anyone can be a better person.\nYet we also see damage caused by those who cross the lines as far as\nacceptable behaviour is concerned. Yet looking back, we can also see\nwhere, historically, lines were crossed and nothing happened, lines\nwere crossed and there was no transparency of action, or lines\nweren\u2019t crossed but someone was blamed or disciplined falsely,\nperhaps due to inherent prejudices and bias. So even the community\ncan get doing wrong, wrong, or even not get doing right, right.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
When a community\nmakes a mistake against another person and punishes them in whatever\nway for not doing wrong but other wrong doers get away without\npunishment, then a bad situation has been made worse. It is charges\nof this sort against the Church in its various forms, and covered up\nor defended by some insiders, that has contributed to a widespread\nlack of trust amongst some outsiders. If, for example, a regulation\nsays, a rule breaker must appear before a regulating body within 3\nmonths and this doesn\u2019t happen for 9 months, there should be a good\nreason. If one person seems to have been given exemption from a\nspecific rule that others have to obey, again it needs to be clear\nwhy. \n<\/p>\n\n\n\n
But most of us\nprefer to keep our wrongs to ourselves, and at least out of the\npublic space (harder today than you might imagine). We also prefer to\nselect which rules we need to keep and which don\u2019t need to apply to\nus. All of which is in the forefront of my mind as we approach a 2nd\n(predictable) COVID19 national lock down in England (other parts of\nthe UK may follow different lock down rules). We will have different\nideas of what communal priorities should be.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Having had several\ndecades of emphasis on extending life expectancy across the\npopulation with various health campaigns, screening and so on, we\u2019ve\nnow appear to have hit a wall. First some people now think that some\nhealth conditions are not worth surviving with and others think some\nforms of older age are worthless. Both of these are very serious\ncommunal wrongs. But if they become widespread views how will we deal\nwith them?<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Economic stability\nhas been pushed above personal vulnerability, mostly by fear. We have\nseen, in previous situations, how the poor are badly served. Their\nlife expectancy, quality of life and health are all likely to suffer\nmore than other sections of the population. None of us wants to be in\nthis group so we grope towards economic stability and leave the poor\nto fend for themselves. The MPs voting against the extension of free\nschool meals in the holidays recently had all got good reasons for\ndoing so, and none of them was hungry. They played on the fear of\nmany who had been hungry in the past saying we can\u2019t make the money\nstretch for ever. As a result even some people who have been hungry\nbacked the decision hoping they\u2019d not be on the hungry list this\ntime.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In Britain today, no one needs to be hungry. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
A community is a\nchallenging place to live. It\u2019s not just about being nice to the\npeople next door or picking up your dog waste. Sometimes we learn the\nmost about community when we do get things wrong. Putting things\nright is often much more difficult. \n<\/p>\n\n\n\n
From the remembered\ngospel: Forgive us the wrongs we do as we forgive those who wrong us.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Help me to get things right!<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n From a Friend of\nScholastica and a Member of the Lay Community of St Benedict.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Dear Benedict A large chunk of your Rule is about what action the community should take towards those members who go wrong (chapter 23-30). It\u2019s a tricky section to interpret nearly 20 centuries after you wrote it. Social attitudes and culture have changed a great deal, as I\u2019ve mentioned before. There are quite diverse views … Continue reading “Right or wrong?”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[55,25],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-250","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-covid19","category-forgiveness"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/foowr.org.uk\/notesfrombambi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/250","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/foowr.org.uk\/notesfrombambi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/foowr.org.uk\/notesfrombambi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/foowr.org.uk\/notesfrombambi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/foowr.org.uk\/notesfrombambi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=250"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/foowr.org.uk\/notesfrombambi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/250\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":252,"href":"https:\/\/foowr.org.uk\/notesfrombambi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/250\/revisions\/252"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/foowr.org.uk\/notesfrombambi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=250"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/foowr.org.uk\/notesfrombambi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=250"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/foowr.org.uk\/notesfrombambi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=250"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}