Even as early as AD 270 people saw a need for spiritual renewal. With the legalization of Christianity throughout the Roman Empire it became increasingly difficult to know the true believers from those who were simply Christians of convenience; a problem that seems to be persistent throughout history. St. Anthony responded by leaving the society of religious ease and lived alone in the mountains. He lived a simple life, prepared little food and had little company other than God and the reported demons that would tempt him. Being a hermit did not mean that he abandoned the world however, for he ended his seclusion during the reign of the pagan emperor Maximian to minister to the persecuted Christians forced to work in mines and again to combat the heresy of Arianism.

Even though Anthony’s motivation was for piety many followed his example for the exotic prestige that came with acts “devotion”. They would go without nourishment, would refrain from sleep or would otherwise physically perform acts of “self-denial”. St. Benedict did not desire theatrics but the committed life of community and service. He reformed the church with his Rule for monasteries and provided an expression of following Christ with a whole of a person’s life. The fact that there where monasteries showed the dissatisfaction of the Christian expression of the time and just like Luther, a turning point in Benedicts life was seeing the immorality and vanity of Rome itself. Monasticism flourished in Europe because of his writings.

Medieval Europe saw the rise of monasteries as “prayer factories” and the Church of Rome was intertwined in the power, influence and politics of the continent. St Francis was the son of a rich merchant, as well as a soldier, however when coming across a beggar on the street that he could not bring himself to ride past, he eventually turned his back on all the wealth that would be his. He devoted himself to helping the poor, living the life that he saw in Christ and shunning the attraction to power from the world. Many followed him, but he did not form a cloistered society. He instead established friars, who unlike monks primarily worked and lived in the world to minister to it. Francis could have bought his way into an ecclesiastical position, even buying a bishop’s chair was not unheard of. While he did not speak against the church, by not entering the Roman ranks his life spoke to his view of how close they resembled Christ. The Catholic clergy did not show Jesus as it should, so he did so himself.

The list could go on and on of the Carmelites, the Celtic monasteries in the British isles and countless saints. The point is that there were reformations before the reformation and that excesses of a stagnant church are only combated by those who are willing to mold themselves into Christ. I am not advocating everything that monasticism is, however, there are many lessons that we can learn from it. With monasticisms constant ideal of shunning the world and imitating your life to Christ, it is no wonder that the Protestant Reformation was started by an Augustinian Monk.