Today’s feast, St Hildegarde of Bingen, is giving me a helpful perspective on a challenging gospel. Jesus, perhaps fed up with a barrage of complaints, says to the people:
“‘What description can I find for this generation? What are they like? They are like children shouting to one another while they sit in the market-place: ‘We played the pipes for you, and you wouldn’t dance; we sang dirges, and you wouldn’t cry.’”
His words challenge me to reflect on a very human tendency which we all recognize and fall into all to easily, grumbling. It can sometimes seem that whatever we have, even if we get exactly what we say we want, we are never content. We always hanker after something else.
His words take me back to the Rule of St Benedict. They almost perfectly illustrate one of the things he warns against at every opportunity. He repeatedly warns his community against “murmuring”, that low level discontent that can bubble destructively under the surface of our lives, sapping our appetite for real and constructive change.
St Hildegarde, a Benedictine nun, would have been familiar with the concept both from the Rule and from her own challenging experience of monastic life.
It’s easy to grumble in these challenging times when so much that we relied on seems to be broken or untrustworthy. This distracts us, helping us to avoid taking responsibility and appropriate action where we can. That’s never the call of the gospel.
Instead, Jesus’ words are a call to discernment. He calls us to look at where we fall into the temptation of grumbling instead of using our discontent to seek constructive solutions to our challenges.
Where is Christ challenging you to avoid grumbling today?
