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School Culture Symposium: Top Presenters on Community and Virtue Formation - Charter School Course

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  1. Community and Virtue Formation

    Lesson 1: Plato and Classical Education (with Dr. Matthew Post)
    2 Topics
    |
    1 Quiz
  2. Lesson 2: Communal Education & Paideia (with Dr. Christopher Perrin)
    5 Topics
    |
    1 Quiz
  3. Lesson 3: Embodied & Liturgical Learning (with Dr. Christopher Perrin)
    3 Topics
    |
    1 Quiz
  4. Lesson 4: The Practice of Scholé, Part 1 (with Dr. Christopher Perrin)
    12 Topics
    |
    1 Quiz
  5. Lesson 5: The Practice of Scholé, Part 2 (with Dr. Christopher Perrin)
    3 Topics
    |
    1 Quiz
  6. Lesson 6: Meaningful and Effective Classrooms (with Robyn Burlew)
    4 Topics
    |
    1 Quiz
  7. Lesson 7: Setting Conditions in Culture (with Jerilyn Olson)
    4 Topics
    |
    1 Quiz
  8. Lesson 8: Growing Culture (with Jerilyn Olson)
    2 Topics
    |
    1 Quiz
  9. Lesson 9: Responding in Love (with Jerilyn Olson)
    2 Topics
    |
    1 Quiz
  10. Lesson 10: Partnerships with Parents: Communication and Peacetime Strengthening (with Robyn Burlew)
    2 Topics
    |
    1 Quiz
  11. Grammar School Community, Virtue & Education
    Lesson 11: The Moral Imagination and the Importance of Stories (with Dr. Vigen Guroian)
    3 Topics
    |
    1 Quiz
  12. Upper School Community, Virtue & Education
    Lesson 12: Who Do We Teach? (with Josh Gibbs)
    4 Topics
    |
    1 Quiz
  13. Lesson 13: Students Afflicted with Acedia & Ennui (with Josh Gibbs)
    2 Topics
    |
    1 Quiz
  14. Lesson 14: Helping Students Overcome Acedia or Ennui (with Josh Gibbs)
    2 Topics
    |
    1 Quiz
  15. Lesson 15: Leading Effective Discussions (with Dr. Christopher Schlect)
    3 Topics
    |
    1 Quiz
  16. Lesson 16: Socratic Teaching (with Andrew Kern)
    3 Topics
    |
    1 Quiz
  17. Lesson 17: Introduction to Socratic Education, Part 1 (with Dr. Christopher Perrin)
    3 Topics
    |
    1 Quiz
  18. Lesson 18: Introduction to Socratic Teaching, Part 2 (with Dr. Christopher Perrin)
    3 Topics
    |
    1 Quiz
  19. Lesson 19: An Example of Socratic Teaching (with Grant Horner)
    1 Topic
    |
    1 Quiz
  20. End of Course Test
    End of Course Test: School Culture Symposium: Top Presenters on Community and Virtue Formation - Charter School Course
    1 Quiz
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Acedia comes from a combination of the negative prefix a- and the Greek noun kēdos, meaning “care, concern, or grief.” (The Greek word akēdeia became acedia in Late Latin, and that spelling was retained in English.)
—Merriam-Webster Dictionary

What the desert fathers meant by acedia does imply a failure of effort, a failure linked to a lack of love—the Greek word they use (a-kedeia) literally means “lack of care.”

Acedia comes from a combination of the negative prefix a- and the Greek noun kēdos, meaning “care, concern, or grief.” (The Greek word akēdeia became acedia in Late Latin, and that spelling was retained in English.)
—Merriam-Webster Dictionary

What the desert fathers meant by acedia does imply a failure of effort, a failure linked to a lack of love—the Greek word they use (a-kedeia) literally means “lack of care.”

Icon of Saint John Cassian

“Our struggle is what the Greeks called ἀκηδια [acedia], which we can refer to as a wearied or anxious heart. It is [akin] to sadness and is the peculiar lot of solitaries and a particularly dangerous and frequent foe of those dwelling in the desert.… Once [acedia] has seized possession of a wrecked mind it makes a person horrified at where he is, disgusted with his cell.… He groans quite frequently that spending such time [in his cell] is of no profit to him.…”

Scenes from the Lives of the Desert Fathers by Fra Angelico
Dorothy Sayers
Dante and His Poem by Michelino

The sin which in English is commonly called Sloth, and in Latin, [acedia], is insidious, and assumes such Protean shapes that it is rather difficult to define. It is not merely idleness of mind and laziness of body: it is the whole poisoning of the will which, beginning with indifference and an attitude of “I couldn’t care less,” extends to deliberate refusal of joy culminates in morbid introspection and despair. One form of it which appeals very strongly to some modern minds is the acquiescence in evil and error which readily disguises itself as “Tolerance;” another is that refusal to be moved by the contemplation of the good and beautiful which is known as “Disillusionment,” and sometimes as “knowledge of the world;” yet another is that withdraw into an “ivory tower” of Isolation which is the peculiar temptation of the artist and the contemplative, and is popularly called “Escapism.” The penance assigned to it takes the form of the practice of the opposite virtue: an active Zeal.

—Dorothy Sayers’s commentary on (her translation of) Dante’s Purgatorio, canto XVIII