The Rule of Benedict: A Spirituality for the 21st Century (Spiritual Legacy Series)

those who hold authority in a community are not to be above the group, they are to be the centers of it, the norm of it, the movers of it. They themselves are to mirror its values. Their job is not simply to give orders. Their job is to live out the ideals.

true humility is simply a measure of the self that is taken without exaggerated approval or exaggerated guilt.

prayer is warfare to the last breath.’”

They are to be directors of souls who serve the group by “coaxing, reproving, and encouraging” it—by prodding and pressing and persuading it—to struggle as they have struggled to grow in depth, in sincerity, and in holiness, to grow despite weaknesses, to grow beyond weaknesses.

there is no escape from life, only a chance to confront it, day after day in all its sanctifying tedium and blessed boredom and glorious agitation in the communities of which we are a part at any given moment of our lives.

Do your work, then step back. The only path to serenity.

The question in the Rule is not who is right and who is wrong. The question in the Rule is who is offended and who is sorry, who is to apologize and who is to forgive. Quickly. Immediately. Now.

whatever authority we hold, we hold it for the good of the entire group, not for our own sense of self.

the function of leadership is to call us beyond ourselves, to stretch us to our limits, to turn the clay into breathless beauty. But first, of course, we have to allow it to happen.