acedia

from Kathleen Norris, Acedia & Me: A Marriage, Monks, and a Writer's Life

"At its Greek root, the word acedia means the absence of care. The person afflicted by acedia refuses to care or is incapable of doing so. When life becomes too challenging and engagement with others too demanding, acedia offers a kind of spiritual morphine: you know the pain is there, yet can't rouse yourself to give a damn. That it hurts to care is borne out in etymology, for care derives from an Indo-European word meaning "to cry out," as in lament. Caring is not passive, but an assertion that no matter how strained and messy our relationships can be, it is worth something to be present, with others, doing our small part. Care is also required for the daily routines that acedia would have us suppress or deny as meaningless repetition or too much bother."

"It is evident that...disgust and dryness do not come from slackness and tepidity; {because} tepidity is characterized by not caring much or having an inner solicitude for the things of God...There is a great difference between dryness and tepidity...The state of tepidity implies great negligence and slackness in will and mind, without willingess to serve God; but purgative dryness is accompanied by...willingness, with concern and sorrow...that one does not serve God." (St. John of the Cross)

"The vice of noninvolvement is said to be endemic in the Western world. The acediac is a person without commitment, who lives in a world characterized by mobility, passive entertainment, self-indulgence, and the effective denial of the validity of any external claim... Sometimes [acedia] is identified with sloth or idleness, but that is only the external face of an attitude marked by chronic withdrawal from reality into the more comfortable zone of uncommitted and free-floating fantasy. The temptation to acedia is an invitation to abandon involvment and leave the pangs of creativity to others." (Michael Casey, OCSO)

"The tragedy of modern man is not that he knows less and less about the meaning of his own life, but that it bothers him less and less." (Vaclav Havel)