Acedia and Its Discontents: Metaphysical Boredom in an Empire of Desire

by R.J. Snell

Sloth’s cure is staying in the cell, remaining yoked to the work God has given, including the universal vocation of the creation mandates, the task of our particular vocations as individuals, and the various disciplines of a life well-ordered. We stay in the cell in very concrete ways—keeping the prayers, finishing the report, paying our bills on time, wiping away childish tears, doing the dishes, cleaning the car, caring for our tools—through staying in the quotidian, the mundane ordinary work.25 While perhaps unromantic, this settling into our cell allows for virtue, since natural virtue requires habituation.

Like all the demonic thoughts, the vice of sloth promises life but brings death; the way of the Cross demands death but gives life.