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A significant part of Norris' agenda is to distinguish acedia from depression: two intersecting sets that have some features in common but differ in significant ways. Here, she suggests, "an informed understanding of sin" helps. Though I was never quite sure what Norris means by this, she is concerned that the church long ago began to define sin primarily in terms of acts rather than something like Evagrius' "thoughts," which are part of the human condition and which we must identify before they become harmful actions and stifle the work of grace in our lives. Put more simply, Norris' "most basic definition of sin" is "to comprehend that something is wrong, and choose to do it anyway." The danger of a sin like acedia is that it can become "mortal"—that is, it can prevent God's grace from transforming our lives: "When we are convinced that we are beyond the reach of grace, acedia has done its work." That is why Norris correctly places acedia in a category opposed to love, rather than under the heading of mere apathy.
Acedia works against the manifestation of the image of God in us. While Norris would probably not align herself with the Augustinian concept of original sin (the West charged Evagrius with semi-Pelagianism), she might agree with Augustine's sentiment (in his commentary on John) that God hates in us what we have made that he did not, while—at the same time and in a mysterious way—God loves in us that which he made that still remains.
So acedia has more to do with sin, God's grace, and the manifestation of God's image, while depression is often best understood as a treatable illness with an identifiable external cause that precipitates it. Depression may be addressed by the psychiatrist and the pharmacist, while the vice of acedia requires a gracious God, a discerning spiritual director for self-knowledge, repeated spiritual practices, and the discipline of prayer. Still, Norris is right to call the observations of early monastics an "urpsychology." There is a continuity between what Evagrius, Cassian, and other premoderns were doing when they assessed the etiology of acedia, warned of its devolution into anger and despair, and prescribed remedies, and what we suppose we have freshly discovered in modern psychology. We ignore the insights of those who have gone before us to our own detriment. The human condition that the ancients observed has not changed all that much—including the pride we take in our assumption that civilization has reached its zenith in us.
Norris artfully illustrates this ancient wisdom through the story of her life and her marriage, taking us back and forth from her adolescence to the present, when she must cope with the death of her husband David. (His life is similarly narrated, with all of his virtues and vices.) The autobiographical accounts are at times so compelling—particularly in chapter 5 and in the penultimate chapter's story of David's death, which is beautifully told without being morose—that I almost forgot the main topic of the book. But that's a tribute to Norris' power as a storyteller, not a complaint.
I did find myself experiencing symptoms of acedia in the middle portion of the book, but book reviews often tell us more about the reviewer than the book, and other readers might well respond differently. In any case, I took Norris' advice and pressed on, overcame my sloth, and found myself amply rewarded by persevering. Sticking with other work (like grading papers) wasn't so easy.
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