"Woe to those who are at ease in Zion, those who feel secure on Mount Samaria" (Amos 6:1).

At one time the prophet Amos could not have seemed further off in his description, at least of my experience, in the land of Zion.  For those who internalize tension and conflict, like children hovering in a corner listening to parents grow farther from hearing each other, being at ease is not an option.  As one commentator describes the tension in Israel, "The clash between the cherished heritage of the majority and the hopes of the minority is more than friction."(1)  There is truly no place quite like this land.  But there is also no place on earth where I've found myself more disheartened.  In this tense and complicated place, the prophet's words, the words of a shepherd to a relaxed and comfortable people, seem directed at an entirely unfamiliar kind of sheep.  Or do they?

Twelve years ago, studying the storied dimensions of the Israeli/Palestinian conflict, I noted midway through the experience a weariness with everything.  My second encounter with Jerusalem was not far off.  Long after I had witnessed the hopeful work of a reconciliation ministry, the power of pain and forgiveness exuding from a bereavement support group, and the high of a few holy places, the lows of one particular city took over and evacuated everything but cynicism.  As I watched those from one side of the conflict prance down a divided walkway reminiscent of the divided South, only to be harassed by a group on the other side minutes later, the tide of emotions within me turned completely shallow.  The anger and tension of the city had cast a compelling shadow.  Though the gentle wisdom of a hopeful few was still reachable in my mind, I found myself not caring about any of it.  In that moment, all I could think was: Nothing is ever going to change.  Why bother?  I was weary in Zion, feeling everything and yet somehow nothing, lulled to an apathy that seemed justified—even as it caused me alarm. 

"Acedia" is a word I learned from Kathleen Norris not too long ago, and it came to mind in this instance as vividly as it has on less foreign soil.  It is a word that has fallen out of use in the last thousand years, written out of our minds and vocabularies, but not out of lives.  The Latin word refers to spiritual torpor or apathy.  It is the spiritual equivalent of sloth—inactivity or unconcern in the practice of virtue.  The term was most often used in monastic circles, considered an adversary that materialized in the drastic lives of the monks.  But the question at the heart of acedia—"Why bother?"—moves far beyond the walls of the monastery, and perhaps particularly in the hearts of those who find themselves weary of feeling, those who would sooner choose the ease of apathy than the work of relationship, the simplicity of self over the sacrifice of community. 

Like weariness or despair, acedia creeps into our lives and moves us to spiritual indifference.  It comes when we are tired of feeling, weary of living with care and attention, lulled to sleep by comfort or disinterest.  At this description, Amos's portrayal of Zion may not feel so far off after all.  In fact, at the time of Amos, the people of Israel were perhaps struggling with something quite like acedia.  Reeling in false security and erroneous confidence from their own economic affluence, the Israelites were living in a deplorable state of existence, warned Amos, blind and isolated by their focus on self, impervious to their own indifference at the situation around them.  It was in the midst of this, their most opulent and apathetic juncture, when the shepherd proclaimed: "Woe to those who are at ease in Zion, and to those who feel secure on the mountain of Samaria" (Amos 6:1). 

If we will hear it, the cry of Amos hits with a sting of accuracy in far more lands than one.  Whether we choose the ease of turning our heads to injustice out of weariness, the ease of hatred or alienation in lieu of the harder work of community, or the ease of apathy simply out of the lull of economic comfort, we are living with acedia—at ease in the land of Zion, or Zealand, or Atlanta.  Here, the hope of any city, where ease and apathy permit its members to tolerate things we should not, rests not in chariots or horses, but in our ability to battle the daily temptation to throw our hands up in the air and ask "Why bother?"  Kathleen Norris would remind us that the battle of acedia calls us to boldly live as those committed to the work of hope and attention, community and prayer—even when these things would seem most taxing.  For where we are tempted to despair, compelled to stop feeling or seeing, there Christ calls us to get up and follow, to go further into the life of a kingdom that does not promise ease, but assures of us rest.  Where acedia has so rooted itself in our spirits that our very bones are as dry and lifeless as the multitude in the valley with Ezekiel, even there the Spirit hovers over our darkness, bringing breath and new life, urging those at ease in Zion to wake up and stand again. 

Jill Carattini is managing editor of A Slice of Infinity at Ravi Zacharias International Ministries in Atlanta, Georgia.

(1) Ethan Bronner, "After 60 Years, Arabs in Israel Are Outsiders," The New York Times, May 7, 2008.