Cultivating the Gift of Patience: March 28, 2020

Saturday, March 28, 2020 (9:00 am-12:15 pm, doors open at 8:45 am)
Leader: Br. David Vryhof, SSJE

According to Trappist monk and author Michael Casey, in Western Monasticism patience is seen as the “principal battleground” where we work out our salvation.  It is “the practical expression of faith and hope and an important indication of the genuineness of the interior life.”  Gregory the Great calls it “the root and guardian of all the virtues.” Impatience, on the other hand, is also taken seriously; it is, in the words of Bernard of Clairvaux, “nothing less than the soul’s perdition” (i.e. the soul’s utter destruction).  In this workshop, we’ll try to understand why monastics valued the virtue of patience so highly and how they encouraged us to attain it.