Walking with the Saints Podcast | Feast of St. Pachomius the Great, The Founder of Christian Cenobitic Life l May 9
According to the Pontifical Yearbook, the annual
directory of the Catholic Church, there are now a million priests, brothers and nuns living in communities in various religious institutes. This is excluding the diocesan priests who serve in parishes. How religious life began to be
lived in communities is what we shall discover in the biography of our saint today, St. Pachomius the Great. St. Pachomius was born in 292 A.D. in Thebes, now Luxor, Egypt. His parents were pagan but they gave him an excellent secular education. At twenty years old, he was conscripted in the army of Roman Emperor Constantine, where the new recruits were placed in a prison guarded by soldiers. Local Christians came to give them food and took care of their other needs. Pachomius was surprised and asked why those Christians were serving them. He learned that they were fulfilling the Commandment of God to love their neighbor. Impressed, he soon vowed to become a Christian himself. When he returned from the army, he asked to be baptized and went to a lonely place to lead an ascetic life. Then he sought the help of a desert-dweller Palaemon for spiritual guidance, and followed his instructions about monastic life.
After a few years following this kind of life, he went to a desert and there he heard a voice ordering him
to start a monastery. He and Palaemon believed that this voice came from God. They went to a certain spot and built a small monastic cell, but soon Palaemon
died. Yet God did not abandon him. An angel came to Pachomius, disguised as a monk, and gave him a Rule of monastic life. It is this rule that both St. Benedict and St. Basil based and developed their Rules. Pachomius’ brother came to join him. Gradually, other men began to follow him because of his love for prayer, love for work, his task of giving guidance and counselling and service to others, especially the sick. He introduced a cenobitic monasticism. Cenobitic life is life lived in common, with strict discipline, regular daily worship and manual work. The monks fulfilled the work assigned to them through
obedience, they were not allowed to possess their own money and those who disobeyed were punished. Pachomius’ sister Maria came for a visit, but
observing the strict Rule, he did not see her. He only blessed her and asked her to enter monastic life, promising to help her. The monks built her a hut on the opposite side of the Nile River. Other women began to join Maria and soon a women’s monastery was formed with strict monastic Rule furnished by Pachomius.
Pachomius was not a priest. When he was to be ordained by St. Athanasius, he fled. But he was severe and strict upon himself, kind condescending to the other monks. He taught them monastic obedience, chastity, humility, fasting, austerity, prudence, to avoid judging others, to fulfill their assigned tasks and to treat the sick
with special care. He instructed them to rely more on the mercy and help of God. The Lord granted Pachomius the gift of miracles, yet he suffered much from the wickedness of the devil. When he died in 348, there were eight monasteries and several hundred monks living cenobitic life. They spread from Egypt to Palestine, North Africa and Europe. He is remembered as the founder of Christian cenobitic life. His feast is celebrated on May
Virtue: piety, humility, austerity, prudence, chastity, obedience, fidelity, kindness and austerity.
Prayer: St. Pachomius, we pray that all who live monastic cenobitic life may be faithful to the vows they profess.
