President Obama’s moniker for success has been his desire for ‘change.’ Whether or not he pulls it off is another matter. I get burned out by the polarization of the political landscape. I tire of hearing about the ‘good old days’ of the right and the lack of moral center that seems to characterize the left.
The desert fathers and mothers were faced with a society and a church that needed change. Only their approach and strategy did not have anything to do with societial structures. While we can ‘do something’ about who or who is not in power, we really need change of a different sort. What if God’s people everywhere committed to something simple but difficult? Calling on the name of the Lord? Here’s a comment about the fathers and mothers of the desert:
“It is a picture familiar enough in the Middle Ages; the three parts of society, those who fight, those who labour and those who pray, all working in their different ways for the life of the kingdom. Prayer was a great action to be fulfilled in the body politic; the monks were like trees, purifying the atmosphere by their presence” (The Lives of the Desert Fathers, 12).