The Blessings of Leisure and Wonder

These comments come out of my meditation upon the events of Transfiguration Sunday and the 40 days of Lent before us. As the days begin to lengthen (hence the name Lent), we urge one another to claim extra time to ponder the meaning of Christ's sacrifice in our lives. These hours are times to retire from the frenetic pace of our 21st century lives and come away to some 'mountain' be with Jesus in prayer (Luke 9:28-36).

It also strikes me that I, who am retired from the busy-ness of overseeing a parish congregation, can give thanks, not only for Lenten times, but for the nearly ten years I've had to be at leisure to study, write and share whatever the Lord Jesus puts into my heart and mind, be it in this blog or in other creative writing.

I love the following quote from a blog by Father James, a young Orthodox pastor. It is from a commencement address by James Carrey. I was not able to find a direct link to Carrey's address. He is not the actor. Nevertheless, here's the quote, based upon Josef Pieper's Leisure: The Basis of Culture. I've ordered Pieper's book for myself. 

“Joseph Pieper shows that the contemporary tendency to identify leisure with idleness, or sloth, is a perversion of an earlier way of looking at things. Leisure is the free time, literally the free time, in which we are not enslaved by practical concerns that keep us from cultivating our higher powers of discernment. Leisure is the condition under which intellectual virtues can be acquired. 

Sloth, on the other hand, is a vice. It is the vice that abuses leisure by filling up the precious free time we have with entertainments and trivialities that make time fly and keep us from reflecting in any kind of sustained fashion on the really important questions human beings can raise. Sloth distracts from the passage of time by making it pass more quickly. Sloth forestalls wonder, which the ancients thought was the beginning of philosophy, and in place of wonder it substitutes curiosity, two more concepts that should be carefully distinguished, but in our times are typically used as synonyms. 

Wonder and curiosity are similar in that both are states of mind characterized by interest and inquisitiveness. But they differ regarding the character of their objects.”

I can only say thanks to our Lord for the past nearly ten years of my 'retirement' from the life of overseeing a growing suburban congregation. These have been precious years years indeed, filled with time to pray, meditate, study, write and share. I've had time to write six books, both published and unpublished, attend lectures and seminars, write in my blogs, correspond and be with friends and family and travel. What a joy and what a privilege, especially to learn that my leisure activities are blessing many and will continue to do so, even when I move on to heaven.