The Abbey of the Hills Retreat Center, Marvin, South Dakota. Photo courtesy of Abbey of the Hills Retreat Center.
By Katie Eskro
Most people enjoy taking a break from work, whether that’s a job or the work of everyday living. Scroll any social media platform and you will see friends posting about vacation time spent at a beautiful destination or out on a walk or bike ride. From the large to the small, these are only a few examples of breaks from work and, often, these moments offer opportunities to impact our joy for living.
“For some people, leisure is what you do when you’re not working,” says Dr. Jason Heron, assistant professor of theology and philosophy at Mount Marty University in Yankton. “This is a very modern way to think of leisure. It ends up being a thing you do with your time so that you can re-energize yourself for all the hard work you have to do.”
The modern world might call these breaks from work a time to recharge, self-care or leisure, and these times are important. However, to a Catholic, Dr. Heron says we should view our leisure time a little differently than the secular world, though we likely will find that we are immensely affected by how the secular world, and particularly the U.S., sees leisure.
As Catholics, Dr. Heron says that leisure is a way of life, rather than a part of life. “Catholics can practice leisure as a way of encountering the beautiful gift of life,” he says. “Instead of a break from the serious world of work, we can practice leisure as an ongoing lifestyle of gratitude, receptivity, festivity and worship.”
This awareness and style of living does not need to change whether we are at home, at work, on vacation, by ourselves, with others, etc.
A way of life, not a part of life
Picture in your mind your calendar, whether it be on your phone, hung on a wall of your home, or just in your head. What is your calendar revolving around? Likely, the answer is work and activities. And likely, you may be reading this article and thinking, “Great, I’m supposed to fit more leisure into my schedule somehow?” And the answer to that is, probably, yes and no.
Dr. Heron stresses that leisure is not simply another slice of the pie to squeeze in. Of course, we should not spend all of our time working, nor should we spend all of our time doing nothing. But if we are thinking of leisure as simply an activity or a lack of action, then we are understanding leisure incorrectly.
“Leisure is not a commodity,”
Dr. Heron says. “It’s a way of life. So, consider it in terms of analogy with friendship or breathing or health. If you ask whether you have too much friendship or breathing or health in your life, you’re actually demonstrating that you misunderstand friendship, breathing and health.”
The real challenge of living a life of leisure then is how to allow it to be integrated with your whole life. This is a practice that takes self-awareness and time to develop. “To live a life characterized by gratitude, receptivity, festivity and worship is to live a life that is attentive and contemplative,” says Dr. Heron.
If you’re looking to start on a healthier path of leisure or want to try a new leisurely practice, Dr. Heron recommends starting with practicing a restful Sabbath. From Saturday evening to Sunday evening, the Heron family intentionally slows down, has family and friend time, and goes to Mass together.
“The Sabbath is given to us to enable us to pay attention to the goodness of our lives,” he says. “I think a healthy Sabbath practice will trickle out into the rest of the Christian’s use of time and space and help the Christian become a properly leisurely person.”
Work to rest or rest to work?
Whether we want it to be the way we live and think or not, American ideas of wealth, materialism, consumerism and work impact all of us—and in a particular way our views of leisure.
“I have been taught by our American way of life to measure my life by my work, by my usefulness and by my efficiency,” Dr. Heron says. “It just sort of happened as we were all trying to earn enough money to buy big houses and fill them with nice things.”
We are all familiar with the competition it takes to be successful, and as soon as we’ve hit a financial or work related goal, we make a new one and move our goal post. This way of living puts work in a place of importance because it’s the mode through which we can meet those goals. In this mindset, leisure can be likened to a reward for all of our hard work.
“A modern view of leisure makes leisure a servant of work,” Dr. Heron says. “By imagining leisure as a break from the real, serious world of work, leisure becomes something you try to squeeze into what’s really going on.”
This way of working and living doesn’t bring happiness or fulfillment. Rather, work becomes a drag and simply a means to an end.
“The fact that we limit the work week, that we have holidays, and that we require people to take vacations are all signs that we can recognize a truth about ourselves—the truth that we are made for more than simply being productive,” Dr. Heron says.
The Catholic view of work and leisure flips this idea on its head. “For the modern tradition, the point of leisure is to improve work,” Dr. Heron says. “We could say that the modern tradition says we live in order to work.” On the contrary: “For the Catholic tradition, the point of leisure is to become what you were created to be … [and proclaims] that we live in order to worship.”
Dr. Heron shared an example from his own life of a simple daily practice he and his wife do that serves to remind him of the right relationship between work and leisure. Every evening when Dr. Heron gets home from work, he shares a glass of wine with his wife and takes time to rest and relax.
From the outside looking in, this could be seen as Dr. Heron taking a break after an arduous work day and preparing to do it again the next day. However, the Herons are intentional about having the mindset that this time of leisure they share daily is a gift of their labors, not just to prepare for future labor.
“It’s a very simple gesture that reminds me that I work in order to have a life filled with such moments and habits,” Dr. Heron says. “I do not have that glass of wine in order to recharge my battery for another day at the office. The order of things matters. My work exists for the sake of my leisure.
I work so that I can have the space, time, and resources to be leisurely.”
Though our modern view of leisure is skewed, we can see in our culture a movement toward recognizing that, as humans, we are renewed by leisurely activities and at times need extra help to navigate the difficulties and stresses of life. As Catholics, we recognize that we are body and soul composites; we are tasked with caring for all the parts of us.
“We are incredibly vulnerable creatures, subject to forces that are far beyond our control. Taking self care and mental health more seriously is an opportunity to be honest about how much of our lives is out of our hands, how much help we need, and how dependent on others we actually are,” Dr. Heron says. “Since this is the sort of disposition Jesus encourages us to adopt, I see these current trends as great opportunities to embody the Gospel in our context.”
As Catholics, we can help these trends to grow by being aware of our own limits and asking for help when we need it and by encouraging others to find the help they might need.
A marathon, not a sprint
You may have heard the popular adage “Life is a marathon, not a sprint.” When it comes to leisure, this is a great analogy. We often stretch ourselves to the max and “sprint” to get things done as fast and efficiently as possible. And at the end of the day, we crash on the couch and reward ourselves by bingeing Netflix.
What if instead, we slowed down all parts of our life just a little, and lived leisurely in the midst of whatever we are doing? Bringing practices like gratitude and relational living into the workplace can help us to find meaning and fulfillment.
“If you accept the Catholic notion of leisure, you’re really making a choice for a healthier, happier, holier life,” Dr. Heron says. “It’s one thing to trudge through your work to get to the weekend. It’s quite another thing to do your work as an act of worship. It’s one thing to see your work as a means to a paycheck. It’s another thing to see your work as a way for you to fulfill your unique vocation in this world.”
Outside of the workplace, we can cultivate practices of joy and peace by nourishing our bodies and souls with leisure practices of our choice. These activities will vary from person to person and in different stages of life.
“St. Augustine says that our hearts are restless until they rest in communion with the Lord,” Dr. Heron says. When considering what leisure might look like in our own life “we ought to pay attention to that restless heart Augustine writes about. Where are those places, when are those times, what are those activities that help us quiet our restless hearts?”
“I find leisure by paying attention to the places, times and activities that make me feel the most human,” Dr. Heron says. Leisure for Dr. Heron brings feelings of belonging and being at home with himself and his surroundings. His anxiety and ego are quiet, and his body and mind are calm.
“I think what’s happening there is that I’m living in reality rather than in my head. I’m living in creation as one of its creatures,” Dr. Heron says. “In being leisurely this way, we are more at home with ourselves, with our neighbors, with creation and with the Creator.”
Finding those people, places and activities that bring a more healthy tempo and pace of life are important to seek out and spend time with and in. Dr. Heron says this process needs you to be “capable of listening to [your] heart. It’s sort of like an examination of conscience: look for those places, times and activities where you felt all your striving and inadequacy and anxiety and regret and anticipation quiet down. Pay attention.”
We were made for leisure, and until we allow God’s grace to open our eyes to embrace practicing leisure in every area of our life, we will always be striving for a fruitless goal. “I think people who have the privilege of living an integrated, holistic lifestyle are typically happier and healthier than people whose lives are divided into compartments they tolerate or even dread,” Dr. Heron says.
Essential to the spiritual life
“The highest act of leisure, according to the Catholic tradition, is worship,” Dr. Heron says. “It’s the highest act of leisure because it’s the type of act that combines our gratitude, our reception of the gift of life, and our festivity all in one.”
Leisure is how we discover more about who we are and how we can connect deeply with others. It helps to put us in greater connection with God and his creation. It reminds us of who we are and who God is.
“As leisure trains me to be a creature at home in this universe, I am slowly realizing that I am not the center of that universe,” Dr. Heron says.
Leisure is how we live a rightly ordered and fulfilling life, not by fitting in a little fun here and there or a vacation once or twice a year, but by viewing the whole of our life as an act of worship and slowing down to witness the quiet gifts of being human.
“Humans are spiritual animals,” Dr. Heron says. “The idea that you do spiritual things on Sunday and regular things the rest of the week is a distortion of the truth that our lives simply are our spiritual lives … The Catholic tradition of leisure encourages us to see life as a gift, [and] we are being asked to gratefully receive the entirety of that life. If you want a Catholic definition of leisure, you could call it a celebration of the gift of life.”
Katie Eskro is a member of Sacred Heart Catholic Church in Aberdeen, where she works as coordinator of Catechesis of the Good Shepherd. She has a degree in journalism and is pursuing a master’s degree in philosophy.
