Advice from 3 monks for overcoming acedia

aleteia.org/2021/09/26/advice-from-3-monks-for-overcoming-acedia

September 26, 2021

Lifestyle

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Marzena Devoud - Matthew Green - published on 09/26/21

If you're struggling with the "demon" of acedia, take to heart the

words of these saints who overcame it.
Acedia is a sort of listlessness, a strange state of mind of sadness and melancholy. It was
a problem faced by the first Christian monks, those who chose to take refuge in the
desert to live more intensely their ideal of spiritual perfection in solitude or in small
communities.

These men sometimes suffered from discouragement that left them troubled, dissatisfied,
sad, and tired. Those are feelings we can surely identify with today, whether or
not we’ve chosen to dedicate our life to God in religious life.

The “demon” of acedia

For the monks, this evil could assume different forms, such as irritation with the other
members of their community and with monastic life, a lack of concentration in reading
and prayer, great tiredness, sudden hunger and sleepiness, desire for novelty, or a strong
desire to be somewhere else. Substitute “family” for “community” and it sounds
all too familiar, especially during times when a public health crisis is disrupting our
daily life.

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The “demon of acedia, also called the noonday demon, is the most burdensome of all the
demons,” warned Evagrius Ponticus, a 4th century monk who lived in the Egyptian
desert. He explained:

It besets the monk at about the fourth hour (10 a.m.) of the morning, encircling his soul until
about the eighth hour (2 p.m.). First it makes the sun seem to slow down or stop moving, so
that the day appears to be fifty hours long. Then it makes the monk keep looking out of his
window and forces him to go bounding out of his cell to examine the sun to see how much
longer it is to 3 o’clock, and to look round in all directions in case any of the brethren is
there. Then it makes him hate the place and his way of life and his manual work. It makes
him think that there is no charity left among the brethren; no one is going to come and visit
him …

Anyone who has been working from home during the pandemic, or who has simply had to
spend a lot of time social distancing, will likely recognize these feelings—as will students
trying to study for exams, for example. Who of us has not felt discouraged,
distracted, and at least a bit frustrated?

Here are some ideas from three great monks who fought against acedia. While these
saints all dealt with acedia in the context of monastic life, their observations can apply in
varying degrees to all of us.

1St. Anthony the Great

An ascetic intoxicated with God, like many anchorites of the first centuries of Christianity,
St. Anthony the Great withdrew to the desert to find the ideal conditions for union with
God in silence and solitude. Like Christ, in the desert his faith was put to the test.
Despite his feeling of psychological exhaustion, he decided to resist the visions sent him
by Satan: “I saw all the devil’s traps set up on earth.”

The devil strove to distract him from his prayers, urging him to renounce in spirit the fast
to which he was obliged and, in a dream, to wallow in gluttony. He then understood
that asceticism should never be considered an end in itself. Salvation comes
from God. He explains, giving this valuable advice:

Keep what I command you: wherever you go, always keep God before your eyes; whatever
you do, consider the testimony of the Holy Scriptures; and wherever you are, do not be
moved easily. Keep these three things and you will be safe.

Those of us who are not monks also need to remember that always, although perhaps in a
special way during the pandemic, we have to accept limitations, make sacrifices,
and carry out work under conditions that won’t always be enjoyable or
comfortable. However, the reason for doing all of this is transcendent: to love and serve
God, by working to support ourselves and our family and by doing our best to promote the
good of all, especially the most vulnerable.

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We can’t let boredom and frustration separate us from what must be done.
When we want to give up and do whatever we want without regard for anyone or anything
else, we have to look to God and to Christ on the Cross.

2St. Peter Damian

The hermit monk Peter Damian dedicated himself from a very young age to prayer,
asceticism and the study of the Holy Scriptures, as well as to contemplation and
preaching.

In his numerous works that made him a doctor of the Church, St. Peter Damian focuses
on certain manifestations of evil. Struck by drowsiness during reading, he describes this
“inevitable heaviness of the eyelids which not even a saint of great temperament can
resist.” For him, the remedy is found in charity which leads to true joy:

May hope lead you to joy! May charity awaken your enthusiasm! And in this intoxication
may your soul forget that it is suffering, so as to blossom.

Again, we need to remember why we do what we do, and we can infuse all our actions
with charity, at least indirectly—working to support ourselves and those we love,
educating ourselves to be better people and thus love God and our neighbor, seeking to
live with virtue and reach heaven… It’s easier to do something with joy if we’re
doing it with hope and purpose. If what we’re doing cannot even remotely be
connected to love, maybe we need to reevaluate our choices.

3St. Romuald
St. Romuald of Ravenna admitted to suffering from acedia. The evil manifested itself in
him particularly during the mechanical learning of the Psalms. Faced with the rebellion of
the body because of the limitations of the monastic life to which he was subjected, he
insisted that it was necessary not to give in, but, on the contrary, to increase vigils, prayers
and fasts.

For him, a working monk must remember that there is no rest but eternal
rest. Since the morning hours are when listlessness most often occurs, they should be
occupied with prayer.

Prayer can certainly be useful for all of us when we’re feeling tired or bored
and are struggling to carry out our duties. Standing up or kneeling and praying an
Our Father or a Hail Mary, for example, can help us break out of the stupor we’re in and
reorient our hearts and minds. We can pray to renew our motivation, offer up our activity,
etc., and thus take up our activities again with new purpose and energy.

Read more:You may be suffering from acedia — and it’s deadly

Read more:3 Common difficulties in prayer and how to overcome them, according to
Pope Francis
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