Living for Others: What Monasticism Can Tell Us About Ourselves

This May I did something uncommon. I spent five days at the Abbey of Gethsemani, a Trappist monastery near Louisville, Kentucky. On my fourth day at the Abbey, I woke up early to hear the monks pray the Vigils, the first prayers of the day, at 3:15 am. I had listened to the monks chant the Psalms earlier in the week, but Vigils are different. They are spoken not sung. In the dim light of the high ceilinged chapel, the dark morning still and quiet as night, the only sound was these men chanting praises for their God. It was beautiful. I thought, why do so few people choose this kind of life?

Two days after leaving the Abbey, I found myself in a shopping mall on a Sunday afternoon. Bright lights, reflective white walls, pop music, and hundreds of people chatting. Why do more people choose to live this way? This is not to condemn either form of life. The people at the mall clearly enjoyed themselves. They smiled and laughed and moved briskly to the next store with excitement, while the old men of the monastery preferred the rapt awe of communal prayer. Why do so few people choose the latter? I don’t want to shrug them off with the cliche, “different strokes for different folks.” The people at the monastery are monks, but still human beings. It was this commitment that yielded an insight, not only into why the monks choose to live as they do, but the rest of us outside the cloister. By looking at those who live such a unique life, we are able to more easily see the values that motivate their choices. This new perspective shines light on our own surprisingly similar values, and how both the monks and the rest of us both succeed and fail to live up to our values.

To see this we must refute a common criticism of the monastic life: the commonly-held belief that it is selfish. The monk runs away from the problems of the world and becomes a recluse; however, this is a misunderstanding. A monastery is a community. To call it a community of hermits would be contradictory. The monk does not leave the world to sing the Psalms as a soloist; he joins a choir. Much can be learned from monks in this regard. Their entire life is designed to enable their practice of prayer. They live in a community of people oriented towards the same goal, and each of them performs tasks for the welfare of the community. The Abbey of Gethsemani is self-sufficient. The monks cook their own food and support themselves entirely on the goods they make and sell. These include bread, pastries, honey, pottery, and artwork. It is a community of about forty men who each contribute to the welfare of all the others in the community. Everyone is clothed, fed, has a place to sleep, and access to medical care. The monk is a part of a community that enables himself, along with the other members, to live out their lives for a higher purpose. They dedicate their lives to glorifying God, whom they believe gives them purpose for existence, and petitioning Him to intercede in the world for the good of all humanity.

One might protest that plenty of people outside the cloister do much philanthropic work, and (prayer notwithstanding) help many more people than the monks ever will. This is true, but often this charity comes after the downpayment on the beach house in Malibu. While we may be happy to help others, we are also reluctant to give up the time and money dedicated to our preferred video-streaming services. But the monk has little; nevertheless, after satisfying only his basic needs, he sacrifices everything for, as he sees it, the wellbeing of others.

Individual satisfaction is essential to a life well-lived, but when a life contributes little-to-nothing to the welfare of others, to some salient degree it has been wasted (especially if a comfortable quality of life is achieved at the expense of others). The same criticism commonly aimed at monasticism is more appropriately applied to many other pursuits as well. A talented artist refuses to share her work with others; a rich man lives in opulence due to the constant struggle of his employees; people neglect any moral duties to others for selfish goals. This isn’t to say we should all flock to monasteries and nunneries. Even the monks have personal pursuits. Thomas Merton, the most famous resident to ever live at Gethsemani, was a very successful spiritual writer. The hobbies of the monks today range from baking, to painting, to even beekeeping. But these pursuits have an aim in addition to personal satisfaction: The welfare of others. The monks teach us that we can achieve individual fulfillment while promoting the common good. Helping others may even be the best (or the only way) to achieve individual fulfillment.

Yet we must not believe that the monastery is the ideal way of life. It is not a paradise. It is also a small, celibate, men-only community. It is a community that provides for the needs of all of its members, but membership is restricted to a select few. But contemporary culture and monasticism reflect similar values, and can see themselves in the other, if only through a funhouse mirror. Both, to varying degrees, aspire to lives concerned with a higher good while also enabling others to achieve this end. But the monks seek a small, close-knit community, while those at the shopping mall seek maximum sociability. Monks support themselves by the work of their hands, and most others work a day job. Perhaps the lesson to be learned from the monks is the simplicity in their lives. They live with just enough to provide for their community and pursue a life of prayer. Contemporary culture, on the other hand, can be one of excess. One can wear oneself thin maintaining the material comforts everyone is encouraged–and even coaxed–to possess. Worst of all, competition for basic necessities will leave many people without access to them. These problems will not be solved by monasticism, but it is important to see how others have pursued familiar goals in ways entirely different from a more common approach that takes market forces as an inevitable solution to any problem. The contrast can remind us what our own values are; what they should be; how we can fail to live up to them; and how we can (if we wish to do so, and have the opportunity) change our lives for the betterment of others.

John Garrett

John Garrett is a freelance writer and videographer. In May 2018, he graduated from Belmont University in Nashville, TN, where he studied both filmmaking and philosophy. He blogs at johnmgarrett.com.