A Saeculi Actibus Se Facere Alienum - RB 4.20

There is no question as to whether genuine contemplative life is alien to the ways of the world. Your way of acting should be different from the world's ways - Rule of St. Benedict 4.20.

In the case of an traditional approach, renunciation and obedience to enculturated, accepted practises applied in great detail can have positive effect in building an awareness of and intimacy with God inasmuch as these are called out of a world with which they have nothing to do. Modern society is viewed as wholly irrelevant precisely because it is irrelevant. There is truth to this.

But throughout Judea-Christian history there have always been people who have circumvented the institutions and ended up with direct experience of God with great insight and humility anyway. These have recognized that there is no time other than the present; that people can find themselves and God right where they are. After all, there is a proper time and historical place to which each person belongs. Redemption and direction may leap at us even out of our responses concerning society's most common insincerities. And considering that the contemplative life must-needs end in compassion for the world is it not more clearly and genuinely monastic that this approach shows itself to be more effectively liberated from the servitudes of the world and can therefore be more truly present to the world and one's time through love and compassion and understanding and tolerance and of course, hope?