By Deacon Gary Keepes
Catholic Healthcare Column
A patient comes into the office, we will call him Mike. I glance at the reason for his visit and see that he is here to discuss symptoms of possible depression. Mike tells me that over the past several months he has felt depressed. He feels well physically but has no motivation and does not feel any happiness or joy in his life. He is finding it harder and harder to interact meaningfully with his wife and kids. He has been able to go to work and do his job, but he finds no meaning or purpose in it. He finds himself mindlessly scrolling through social media or binging a Netflix series. Mike considers himself a spiritual man but quit going to church and no longer prays. He tells me that he would like to try a medicine to see if that would help with his symptoms.
What do we do? Do we prescribe Mike an antidepressant and send him out the door? He very well could need medication and a referral for counseling. However, we should not neglect a possible spiritual component to his symptoms. Could the vice of acedia (spiritual sloth) be contributing to the way he is feeling?
How do we distinguish between acedia and depression? Major depression disorder (MDD) is a serious illness and does need to be treated with medications as well as intensive psychological counseling. MDD symptoms include persistent hopelessness, sleeping too much or too little, fatigue, difficulty concentrating, changes in appetite, physical complaints, and, in more severe cases, thoughts of self-harm or suicide. Acedia is more of a spiritual sadness. In his book, “The Noonday Devil: Acedia, the Unnamed Evil of our Times,” Dom Jean-Charles Nault says, “On the one hand, acedia is a sin against the joy that springs from charity; it is sadness about what ought to gladden us most: participation in the very life of God.” It should be mentioned that acedia and depression can be present in a person at the same time.
How do we address the symptoms of acedia? Evagrius of Pontus, a 3rd century Desert Father, tells us, “Perseverance is the cure for acedia, along with the execution of all tasks with great attention.” The Benedictine rule of Ora et Labora (prayer and work) helps us to persevere. We must persist in our daily work and pray even when we receive no consolation from it. Just as the early monks were told to stay in their cell and persist in prayer, so should we get up every morning and go to work; doing our work to the best of our ability. We must set aside time for prayer every day regardless of the emotion we are feeling at the time. Think of Mother Theresa caring for the poor of Calcutta day in and day out for more than 45 years. We know that Mother Theresa suffered from a spiritual dryness for a good part of her life. Could this have been her battle with acedia? Yet she persisted in her work and prayer.
Another way to overcome acedia is through wonder and gratitude. The great early 20th century English author GK Chesterton can help us to understand this antidote. Chesterton’s writings are filled with wild adventures experienced in the normal everyday life of his characters. Chesterton sees the world as a “wild and startling place” if only we have the eyes to see. It is magical and enchanted. In his book Orthodoxy, he says, “I came to feel as if magic must have a meaning, and meaning must have someone to mean it. There was something personal in the world, as in a work of art; whatever it meant, it meant violently.”
Gratitude is Chesterton’s other antidote for acedia. He says, “You say grace before meals. All right. But I say grace before the concert and the opera, and grace before the play and the pantomime, and grace before I open a book, and grace before sketching, painting, swimming, fencing, boxing, walking, playing, dancing, and grace before I dip the pen in the ink.” His point is to always be thankful to God for everything.
Acedia is a very common vice in our world today. Combat it by persevering in work and prayer. View the world with wonder and gratitude. And read more Chesterton.
Dr. Keepes serves as a permanent deacon for the Diocese of Evansville. He is assigned to Sts. Peter and Paul Parish in Petersburg and Blessed Sacrament Parish in Oakland City. He also is a member of the Southwestern Indiana Guild of the Catholic Medical Association.