R.V. Young on the Benedict Option

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My friend Scott passed along this article to me. The conclusion of the article says:
At the end of After Virtue, Alasdair MacIntyre remarks that the world is waiting not for Godot but for a new St. Benedict. When Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger took the name Benedict upon his election to the papacy, an important motive may well have been to inspire a renewal of the civilizing work of Benedictine monasteries amidst societies in cultural decline during the anarchy of the Dark Ages of the first millennium. Perhaps a new “Benedictine moment” is already at work during our current era of cultural decline, carried out quietly and modestly by dozens of small liberal arts colleges, many of them Catholic or Protestant, by private preparatory schools and high schools, by institutes and foundations dedicated to nurturing the Western tradition, and by home-schooling parents and associations. The monks inspired by St. Benedict withdrew from a corrupt, chaotic world to do their work of restoration; the small traditional centers of liberal learning in our time are regarded with disdain—if noticed at all—by the progressive elites who dominate the decadence and disorder that we observe all around us. Nevertheless, the seeds planted in obscure corners may one day flourish, and the meek may indeed inherit the earth, as modernity at length completes its slow disintegration, displaced by a renewal of tradition.
This fits in well with a lot of our thinking on this blog. In other words, small pockets of people preserve the classical Christian heritage through dark times. I must confess however, that my own thoughts on the Benedict Option and the way I envisioned it (moving to one location and 'taking over' a town culturally) have moved into a bit of despair.

I would like to believe that a move towards an intentional parish with a vision of the Benedict Option is possible, but it runs into the realities of everyday life that frustrate it. Jobs, family, commutes, and so on militate against establishing a new community like this. What is ultimately required is a critical mass of people with the same vision who are willing to make big sacrifices to make something happen, and I don't know that such a vision is necessary. Perhaps we do better to flourish where we are and attempt to build institutions that will last.

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