Anglican Community Project

From Rod Dreher: A Secularist Sees The Benedict Option : I haven’t mentioned it in a while, but a few years ago, in my book “Crunchy Cons,” I suggested that traditionalists should consider what I called “the Benedict Option” — living in variations of monastic communities for the sake of preserving certain countercultural values in an increasingly dark age. The name comes from the Benedictine monks of Western Europe, whose monasteries were oases of faith, order, and light during the Dark Ages, and eventually helped midwife the rebirth of civilization. Cultural historian Morris Berman thinks this might be necessary. From a review of his new book “Why America Failed” ; the reviewer is George Scialabba: As a former medievalist, Berman finds contemporary parallels to the fall of Rome compelling. By the end of the empire, he points out, economic inequality was drastic and increasing, the legitimacy and efficacy of the state was waning, popular culture was debased, civic virtue among eli

Rod Dreher has published several posts on the Benedict Option lately, which I will link here for future reference: Tomorrow’s Christianity Today : Jonathan Wilson-Hartgrove gets all Benedict Option-y: By the end of the fifth century, when a middle-class, young Italian named Benedict left his home in Nursia to go to school in Rome, the Empire that had been centered there was in total disarray. The church whose faith had become the official religion of that Empire was in turmoil. It was in every way a time of transition. In short, it was a moment not unlike our own. Everyone knew that a new future was being born, but no one was sure just what it would look like. In a moment of clarity, Benedict saw that the system of education that had been designed to prepare him for a world that was passing away could only lead to a dead end. While it could teach him what had worked in the past, the system did not have the resources to present a way forward. A different kind of school was needed.

This interview has a lot of affinities with a Benedict Option future for the Church. A sample: In your book, you not only provide a biblical and theological discussion of the concept of place, but do so in a way that addresses the crisis of place in contemporary culture. What's the nature of the crisis ? What we are experiencing in our world is a wide sense of displacement, which does not lead to human flourishing. Outside Christian circles, the literature on the crisis of place is huge, but within Christianity, it's only starting to get attention. Contemporary life roots against this deep implacement through the speed of culture, technology, the automobile, and the state of economics. The middle class is always on the go  through  places and are not generally deeply rooted in a particular place. When I travel I have opportunities to see new places, but many are all the same corporate chain stores that we have here in Hamilton. Everything is monochrome. All the houses lo