By Rev . Ron Rolheiser , OMI

Theologian , teacher , award-winning author , and president of the Oblate

School of Theology in San Antonio , TX

Early Christian monks believed in something they called , Acedia . More colloquially , they called it , the Noonday Devil , a name that essentially describes the concept . Acedia , for them , was different from ordinary depression in that it didn ’ t draw you into the dark , chaotic areas of your mind and heart , to have you diseased before your own complex and infinite depth ; it was more of a flattening out , a dearth of energy , that put you into a semi-vegetative state that simply deadened all deep feeling and thoughts .

The early church considered it one of the seven capital sins . Later it was renamed as Sloth . There ’ s an abundance of good spiritual literature on the concept of acedia , not least Kathleen Norris ’ rather definitive work on how acedia was understood by the early church .

But until recently , acedia hadn ’ t been studied in depth as a psychological concept . Happily that ’ s changing , with important implications for spirituality . To offer just one example : I recently attended a lecture on acedia given by a Jungian specialist , Lauren Morgan Wuest . I cannot do justice to her full thesis here , but let me risk an over-simplified synopsis .

Having read the literature of the Desert Fathers and the various commentaries on the idea of acedia , she attempted to interface that spiritual literature with the insights of contemporary psychology , particularly those from the Jungian school of thought . What were her conclusions ?

In brief , her view is that acedia is not a clinical diagnosis , meaning that it isn ’ t a pathology requiring treatment , nor is it an ordinary depression . Rather the symptoms of acedia are the result of a healthy instinctual reflex of our bodies and minds which , when they not given something they need , sometimes forcefully shut us down , much like an ordinary depression shuts someone down ; except that in the case of acedia , the shutdown of energy is for the purpose of health . Simplistically put , because we won ’ t sit down on our own and give our bodies and minds the rest , nourishment , and space they need , our bodies and minds conspire together to sit us down , forcibly . In essence , that ’ s acedia , and , in essence , it ’ s for our own health .

It ’ s no secret that today the practice of Sabbath is more and more disappearing within our culture . Indeed , our culture constitutes a virtual conspiracy against the practice of Sabbath .

As a psychologist , she didn ’ t go on to draw out the potential ramifications of this for spirituality , particularly how this might relate to the practice of Sabbath in our lives , but all the implications are there .

When you read the Judeo-Christian scriptures , particularly the early sections in Genesis which chronicle the creation of the world and how God “ rested ” on the Sabbath , you see that there ’ s a divinely-ordered rhythm to how work and rest are supposed to unfold in our lives . Briefly stated , there ’ s to be pattern , a rhythm , to our lives which works this way : You work for six days , and then have a one day sabbatical ; you work for seven years , and then have a one-year sabbatical ; you work for seven times seven years , and then have a Jubilee year , a sabbatical for the whole planet ; and then you work for a lifetime , and go on an eternity of sabbatical .

In essence , our lives of work , our everyday agenda , and our normal anxieties , are to be regularly punctuated by a time in which we lay down the hammer , lay down our agenda , lay down our worka-day worries and simply sit , rest , vegetate , enjoy , soak-in , luxuriate , contemplate , pray , and let things take care of themselves for a while . That ’ s the biblical formula for health , spiritual , human , psychic , and bodily . And whenever we don ’ t do this voluntarily , in effect , whenever we neglect to do Sabbath in our lives , our bodies and minds are likely to do it for us by shutting down our energies . Acedia is our friend here : We will do Sabbath , one-way or the other .

It ’ s no secret that today the practice of Sabbath is more and more disappearing within our culture . Indeed , our culture constitutes a virtual conspiracy against the practice of Sabbath . Among the many culprits responsible for this , I highlight our addiction to information technology , our current inability to go for any stretch of time without being connected to others and the world through a phone , a computer pad , or a computer screen . We are finding ourselves less and less able to step away from all that we are connected to through information technology , and consequently we are finding ourselves less and less able to simply rest , to let go of things , to be in Sabbath-mode . Perhaps the most important ascetical practice for us today would be the practice of Cyber- Sabbaths .

Already seven hundred years ago , the Sufi poet , Rumi , lamented : I have lived too long where I can be reached ! That ’ s a cry for Sabbath time that went up long before today ’ s information technology placed us where we can always be reached , and that cry is going up everywhere today as our addiction to information technology increases . One worries that we will not find the asceticism needed to curb our addiction , but then acedia may well do for us what we cannot do for ourselves .

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