by: Eric
Ariel L. Salas
There was
a presentation I attended before which accentuates the ancient monastic values of Ora et Labora. It means Prayer and Work. The values got wedged at the back of my mind as I dearly contemplated
how my busy schedules have sporadically affected my time of silence and prayer.
For many
of us, labour has become our existence. People see us on our feet frequently moving, or more appropriately running, like there
is someone catching us up from behind. We become more of pursuers than just plain
dreamers. More often than not, we were reminded by friends to take an hour off on a Sunday afternoon to chill out from a tough
week of pure working.
Nonetheless
we never learn. We often do this and that, this and that again and juggle time
like the world would end any moment. From the Mystery of the Ordinary, the writer wits: "To stop and rest is to trust that the world will go on in an
orderly fashion without my help for a few minutes or a few hours." In the defence of the workaholics, we just cannot tolerate
chances. Tragedies happen when we
begin to take chances. To us it seems the world would come to a halt if we do
not make our moves count. Work shapes us.
We love work and we abhor the idea of stopping.
"Pray and work" is
the summation of the Benedictine Rule. If someone wishes to attain a dwelling place in His kingdom, he shall not reach it unless he does his
share of good deeds. Prayer and work must go together. Somehow the same meaning is conveyed by the words preachers often quip: "Do your best and God will do the
rest". Time and again, we are reminded of the reality that working too much is
never enough, prayer must have its share for God to emancipate His power of fulfilling the rest of the tasks.
Yet why have we in
one way or another lost the grace to rest and just be still? How heavy-loaded are we exactly to hardly find a way for God
to tune in perfectly the stations of our Christian lives? Not long before, observing
holy days set a variety of picks: go to this prayer meeting, attend this Pastor's
talk, be on this healing mass, enjoy the worship concerts (or we even picked all) – lately, too busy we are.
Recently, a close friend
of mine gave me a book The Purpose Driven Life. It is a book so many
are slowly being touched I think. Students read it on jeepney rides and businessmen
browse the pages inside café houses. I turned to the page that carries the question
"What makes God smile?" The author enumerates few things. I want to focus on the last two.
First: God smiles when we praise and thank him personally. God loves it
when praises and adoration are expressed for Him. We know very well that prayer
is a way of praising and adoring God. Prayer is the way to His heart. Prayer,
spoken or unspoken, brings miracles. Second:
God smiles when we use our abilities. God
wants us all to be the designed humans He made us to be – make love with your husbands and wives, plant crops and eat,
watch this TV program, read books, go for a walk, play basketball. As the author
puts it, "God said that it is time to get on with life". Stated differently,
do what is humane and wholesome.
Now we pondered how
God has viewed our being individuals whose moment of stillness has not been so apparently fulfilled. The line "Be still, and
know that I am God" really means, in its complete contemporary biblical setting, "Cease, relax, Shut Up! Spare time for me
and know that I am God". To bring this moment to perfection is in fact Saint Benedict's perpetual prayer.
We characterize our
lives with the words: doctor, computer programmer, professor, engineer, manager, designer, architect, accountant – all
presuppose that accomplishment means doing. God smiles when we work. God smiles when we use the gifts of talents He conferred to us. As
much as He wants us to laugh, to be ourselves and benefit from all His other creations, to enjoy every fraction of our existence
in a sacramental manner, He also wants us to rest and pray.
Then we laze around
in joy at what we have done, how we have prayed. This, we know, we believe, would
make Him smile even more.
***