Welcome to Human as a Verb, an audio newsletter this week about practicing the sacred work of being human.
Today, we'll explore the Benedictine rhythm of prayer and work and how contemplative Praxis invites us to view our inner life and social action as an integrated whole, shaping our engagement with the world.
And to bring this to life, I wanted to share a story about someone who listened to me, not only with their words, but with their whole life. Through simple acts of hospitality and welcome, it takes me back to when I lived in South Korea from 2004 to 2008, which seems like ages ago now.
During those years, I worked at Korea Nazarene University. I was an English professor and helped lead an English chapel, much like I shared last week. This story is another reminder that our inner lives are always tied to the way that we live and move in the world.
So I hope you enjoy.
The Bell That Interrupted
I was deep in a book one afternoon at the Mother House in Korea when it happened again.
The bell rang.
And everything stopped.
Sisters set down their tools mid-task. Conversations ended mid-sentence. Even I felt the pull to close my book, though I did not want to. I wanted to keep reading. I wanted to finish the thought I was chasing. But I knew Sr. Anna Marie would notice if I did not show up. So, a little annoyed, I went.
When I stepped into the chapel, I could not understand the words because everything was in Korean. So I watched. I listened. The sisters stood and bowed, their voices rising in song. They sang like angels. And as I stood there, still carrying my resistance, something shifted.
Beyond the Stereotype of Monastic Life
When most of us think of monks or nuns, we imagine endless hours of peaceful prayer, untouched by the demands of ordinary life. But what I found with the Benedictine sisters was the opposite.
Their lives were full, often stressful, demanding. And yet there was a rhythm that held it all together. A rhythm of prayer and work, what Benedictines call ora et labora.
That is what this episode is about: how prayer and work are not separate things but one life. And why that matters for those of us who want to live as people of prayer and justice in the world.
Learning to Live with Interruptions
When I first met the sisters, I romanticized their lives. I thought they were like retreatants, free to set their own prayer schedules, to move at their own pace. I quickly learned I was wrong.
Their days were ordered by the bell. And when the bell rang, it did not matter what they were doing, everything stopped.
At first, I resented it. It felt like living with chronic interruptions. Imagine sending an email or writing a letter, and suddenly the bell calls you away. Or tending to a task that you know will now be left unfinished until later. At first, that felt frustrating.
But over time, I noticed something. The interruptions did not diminish their lives. They shaped them. The sisters began to measure their work by the pauses, not the other way around.
And this began to form me too. Even when I did not want to stop, choosing to pause created space for something deeper to emerge.
Benedictine Sister Embodied Witness
No one embodied this rhythm better than Sr. Anna Marie, who ran the retreat center at the Mother House. She walked fast, always had a lot going on, but she was unfailingly hospitable.
“Julene, come,” she would say. It was always an invitation, to join her, to participate, to share in her life. Her office was buzzing: the phone ringing, her calendar crammed with retreat groups. And yet she made space. She invited me to meals. Once, she even made a special kalbi barbecue just for me.
After decades of Benedictine life, she did not balance prayer and work. She embodied them as one.
A Theology of Human Goodness and Possibility
At the heart of the contemplative life is a belief about what it means to be human. We are created in goodness. Marked by possibility. Invited into transformation.
Christian practices, the means of grace, grow our capacity to hear God and to be open to what God might do in us. But those practices are not enough if they do not change the way we live. How we treat one another. How we lead. How we follow.
This is the work of spiritual formation: not only shaping private prayer lives but transforming the ways we live and lead in community.
Prayer as a Way of Life
And this is what I realized with the sisters: prayer is not something you escape into. Prayer is how you live your life.
The active life, emails, caregiving, cooking, advocacy, is not separate from contemplation. It is contemplation embodied.
The Challenge of Ora et Labora
That is the real challenge of ora et labora.
The contemplative life is not only what happens in silence or song. It is how we show up in conflicts. It is how we handle interruptions. It is how we resist the compulsion to be in control.
Our active life, our justice work, our relationships, even the ordinary chores of human-ing, is as much prayer as anything that happens in a chapel. This is also what contemplative leadership requires: a willingness to let prayer shape how we act, decide, and engage with the world.
Can Life Itself Become Prayer?
The Benedictines remind us that prayer and work, contemplation and justice, mysticism and prophecy, are not two separate paths. They are one integrated life lived in God.
So for us, the question is not, “How do I fit prayer into my busy life?” The real question is, “Can I let my busy life itself become prayer?”
And in a world fractured by division, maybe this is the invitation of ora et labora for us today: to let prayer and presence flow into the way we live, love, and even practice conflict transformation in our daily lives.
This is the heart of everyday peacemaking: learning to live with a receptive posture toward God, toward ourselves, and toward others.
That is also why I am offering a course called Pathways to Peace, designed to help resource the inner life so you can step into difficult conversations with grace and greater connection to God, self, and others.
Ora et labora. Prayer and work.
Everyday Peacemaking
More and more, this newsletter will be connected to the work of Everyday Peacemaking, a ministry my husband and I are starting together.
Pathways to Peace
We’d love for you to join us in November for a learning journey called Pathways to Peace. You can think of it like a retreat for your soul, a way to strengthen your relational capacities for having difficult conversations. And Thanksgiving itself will be a practicum, where you’ll practice what you’re learning around the table with a friend or relative who may see things differently from you on political or social issues.
The Invitation of Ora et Labora
This is the invitation of ora et labora for us today: to let prayer and presence flow into the way we live, love, and even practice conflict transformation in our daily lives. This is the heart of everyday peacemaking—learning to live with a receptive posture toward God, ourselves, and others.
Going Into Your Week
Thanks for listening, everybody. As you go into your week, I encourage you to notice the “bells” in your own life—the interruptions or pauses you may not be looking for but that arrive anyway. Try receiving them as invitations to prayer. This is the essence of the contemplative life: letting our inner life shape our outer life so that we live more grounded, attentive, and connected with God, with ourselves, and, of course, with others.
Have a great week.
Julene Tegerstrand, Ph.D.
