That a Religious Should Stand Particularly on His Guard against Occupying Himself with the Business Affairs of His Relations

ABOVE all a religious should be very careful not to charge and occupy himself with the business affairs of his relations, for the many very awkward consequences and dangers which that involves. St. Gregory says: “There are many who, after having given up their properties and all that they had in the world, and what is more, themselves, putting down and making small account of themselves and trampling with equal constancy on prosperity and adversity, have let themselves be fettered with the ties of flesh and blood. Unwisely desirous of complying with this obligation and prompted by affection for flesh and kindred, they return to things that they had left and forgotten. Forgetful of their profession and making more of what they owe to their families, they occupy themselves with family business and external affairs. They go into audience chambers and before tribunals, entangle themselves in the meshes of the law and earthly things, give up their interior peace and quiet, and plunge anew into worldly concerns to the imminent risk of their souls.” St. Isidore says the same: “Many religious for love of their relations plunge not only into earthly concerns, but into lawsuits and litigations, and for the temporalities of their kindred forfeit the eternal salvation of their own souls.”

This is one of the greatest bottoms and bogs that there are on this ground, when fleshly affection comes to overmaster a religious so far as to make him take over the care of the business affairs of his kindred and charge himself therewith, as we see and experience more than we could wish, for our sins. St. Basil says that this comes because the devil, envious at seeing a religious lead a heavenly life on earth, living in the body as though he lived without it and steadily gaining what he has lost, strives under pretext of piety and even of duty to hamper religious with these cares, that so they may lose the peace and quiet of their souls, and go lukewarm in the love they had for God and the fervor with which they were traveling to perfection. It is quite a sight to see the vigorous effort that the devil makes here, making a tool of these same kinsfolk till it looks as though they had no resource in all their businesses, suits, and differences, and in all their marriages and embarrassments, but to have immediate recourse to their relation in religion. He has to be like the contractor who is responsible for the meat supply to the town; they take it for granted that he is the man readiest to hand, the man who has most free time, the man who has nothing else to think of but to attend to their business. The Carthusian, Louis of Saxony, says very well, speaking of prelates and secular clerics: “God has taken sons away from the clergy, and the devil has given them nephews.” And he quotes the same in verse:

Cum Factor rerum privaret semine clerum, Ad Satanae votum successit turba nepotum.

For this end Satan contrives to bring up your cousin’s affairs in the courts, and your female relative’s settlement in marriage, to get you on the dance and withdraw you from your post and profession. That is his object—not the good of your relations, but your hurt and loss. Unhappy religious! Did he leave his property and his rank and his conveniences and comfortable estate, all to rid himself of these cares and embarrassments, and is he here to burden himself with other people’s worries and be as one under contract to manage all the affairs of his kith and kin, and lose thereby the fruit of his vocation? That was a good answer of the Abbot Apollo, as related by Cassian. One night when he was in his cell, a brother of his came to him to ask him to come out and help to draw out an ox that had fallen into a pool or morass, since he could not draw it out by himself. Abbot Apollo asked him: “Why did you not call upon that other brother of yours who was there?” He answered: ‘Why, he has been dead now fifteen years.” Then said Apollo: “Know, my brother, that I have been dead now twenty years, and buried in this cell; so I cannot come out of it to help you.” ‘This is how a religious ought to behave in like occasions; and if he does not know how to shake off the cares and businesses of his relations, let him hold it for certain that he will receive great injury to his soul, even though it be under pretext of piety and however much he may seek to justify it.

“How many religious,” says St. Jerome, “under pretext of piety and a false compassion for their kindred have lost their souls and come to a bad end!” Daily experience shows it us, and many examples. How many have lost their vocation and ceased to be religious from meddling with the cares of their kinsmen’s estate and trying to advance their rank! How many apostates from their order do we see in these ways, who have gone off to comfort their parents, and afterwards serve for nothing but to devour their substance and bring their old age to sorrow by their evil life!’ So St. Basil calls this an arm or arrow of the devil, which we ought greatly to eschew, since he takes it for an instrument and means to do us vast mischief.

And let no one assure himself in this matter, or think that the whole proceeding is sanctified, purified, and passed by obedience. As we said of visits to relations and journeys to one’s native place, so it is here. In many cases superiors had rather you did not mix yourself up with the business of your kinsfolk, thinking such avoidance the better course, but they allow it because they do not see in you virtue enough for anything else. That is not obedience, but simple permission; the superior comes down to your weakness, and he rather does your will than you do his. If that monk we spoke of would not visit his mother because the superior would not take it on his conscience, how much more reasonable will it be for you not to plunge into or meddle with the business affairs of your relations, except it be purely out of obedience, your superior saying that he takes it upon his conscience, seeing the danger there is in them.