Maxim #20: Maintain Cleanliness and Order in your Home

We continue our reflections of Fr. Tom Hopko’s 55 Maxims for Christian Living with #20–Maintain cleanliness and order in your home. Our first reaction might be to say to ourselves “What does cleanliness have to do with Christian living?” The experience of the Church is that EVERYTHING in our lives impacts our Christian living. As the soap opera title used to remind us, we have “One Life to Live,” and that life is all-encompassing.

Monasteries and parishes are good examples for demonstrating that the setting and environment of our lives is either conducive to a healthy spirituality, or adverse to it.  Their order, beauty and cleanliness provide an impetus to spiritual effort. The reflection below gives us just a few of the many examples that could provide many of us with the inspiration we need to make a little more effort in this area.

Five Reasons why Cleanliness is Godliness

by Tony Wick 

There is no more profound truth to this idiom than the fact that cleaning or improving our environment promotes a positive mindset and sense of responsibility. When we clean something, we bring out its inner beauty, this is a good deed, and it benefits EVERYTHING. Following, we will dig deeper into this though with a few reasons why Cleanliness is like Godliness.

Promotes Positive Mindset

Cleaning helps encourage optimism. Keeping your house (place) clean and organized promotes a sense of achievement and relaxation. It brings you peace as you took a proper action to improve the environment. Taking positive action for yourself or someone else relieves stress. Doing good deed feels wonderful,and therefore cleanliness and godliness are very similar in how they affect our mind.

Improves Your Spiritual Health

Cleanliness is taking care of yourself and everything that supports you. Cleaning something promotes your spiritual advancement. It shows you care about your spiritual health and want to get rid of negativity. You stress yourself when you deal with clutter. Seeing a cluttered or poorly organized space releases cortisol, the stress-causing hormone. It leaves negative impacts on your well-being. Cleaning promotes your spiritual health and helps you fight against anxiety or stress. It promotes your will to contribute more. You take responsibility for improving yourself and the environment. Whether you clean yourself or hire cleaning services, it shows you are trying to improve your surroundings.

Physical Health

Hygiene has a vital role in our health. While it promotes spiritual health, it also improves our physical health. Staying clean helps your mind stay positive. Cleanliness is a sign we take care of ourselves,and it improves our health as we:

Kill Germs

Fights Food Contamination

Boosts Mental Health

Fights off the chances of getting sick or attracting any vermin

Promotes mental clarity as you get rid of foul odors

Promotes a positive perception

Cleanliness fosters a sense of beauty

Nothing is more beautiful than a clean house with a tidy garden. Everything we say is also true for the human body. We can only help our inner beauty shine through when we take care of our hygiene. Our sense of beauty helps us identify the negative and positive aspects of the life. It helps us draw the line between good and bad. Personal care (hygiene) is an essential agent of health. This agent improves the condition of your skin and hair. It gives you a more positive outlook.

Motivation

“Cleanliness is next to Godliness” is a metaphorical idiom. It means a clean body and home is a mind free of unfiltered thoughts. It brings joy to our life as we are taking a position action to get rid of something wrong. This deed helps make the world a better place for ourselves and others. Working to cleanliness brings a sense of satisfaction. It motivates us to take more decisive actions to improve our lives. Moreover, developing these habits improve our strength of mind, determination,and discipline. It also helps improve our morality.