These days...

These days, we awaken each morning to discover that yet more beauty has spilled out of heaven and made a home on our lawn. Color has emerged from hibernation. Fragrance hovers companionably in the air. In daytime, light and shadow frolic playfully. At evening, the translucent beauty of a moonlit daffodil makes me want to weep with wonder.

Even as we rejoice in the exuberance of springtime, we are preparing to enter the sacred days of the Triduum. Here at the monastery, we will mark these days with silence and solemnity. We will chant the ancient Lamentations. We will walk the 'stations.' We will venerate the Cross. The air will be bathed in a reverent hush before the awesome mystery of the death and resurrection of our Lord.

On a recent springtime day I watched a child step carefully along the 'grounded' end of a see-saw. He then hovered in careful balance at the center point before making his way gently down the other side.

These past weeks, we have been walking the slope of Lent. We will soon hover at the center point, where all hangs in the balance and everything is possible, where laments are chanted as trees burst into bloom, where the 'stations' are walked amidst flowers and fragrance.

Let us hold one another in prayer as we, with all the Church, enter the poignant beauty of these most sacred of days.







Postscript: More of Sr. Therese's springtime photos can be found on our Facebook page. Also, a few photos from our Palm Sunday celebration are on our Community News web page.

Earthen Vessel Days

Did you read the previous post about our family treasures? And have you read the words of St. Paul about earthen vessels? And have you ever just had ‘one of those days?’

Yesterday I had one of those days – a genuine, bonafide ‘earthen vessel’ day. During Mass, as I prepared the altar for the Presider, I shuffled around in my squeakiest shoes ever, trying to minimize the noise by feebly attempting to move without actually walking, an awkward effort that likely drew even more attention to my noisily shod feet. In the process I unfolded the corporal upside down, clanged the chalices against one another, and none too soon shuffled meekly (and loudly) back to my seat.

That was just the beginning. In the afternoon I forgot an important meeting. Then I was nearly late to something else and arrived breathless and scattered. Like I said, it was a genuine, bonafide earthen vessel day. Not only did I feel my fragility, it was painfully apparent to everyone around me.

Probably every day contains some moment(s) like these, but most days don’t contain so many. A day like yesterday leaves me shaking my head with gratitude and wonder that God entrusts such treasures to us frail humans who so often shuffle around off kilter and out of balance and trampling on gems and jewels on every side. We say the wrong thing, we make the wrong move, we unknowingly injure despite good intentions, we turn things upside down, we make a big giant mess while wearing loud, squeaky shoes.

St. Benedict recognized our human frailty and our tendency to mess things up. He counsels us to “support with the greatest patience one another’s weaknesses of body or behavior.” Sometimes this support means to challenge a Sister to grow beyond her weakness. Sometimes it means to support with patient love a weakness that cannot be changed. At all times we are to remember both our need for mercy and our responsibility to be merciful.

Although we live amidst overflowing treasures, we are earthen vessels - quick to break things around us, and easily shattered ourselves. We are always in need of the love and support of community and the tender mercy of God, that in all things God may be glorified. Even - and especially - on an earthen vessel day.

We hold this treasure in earthen vessels, that the surpassing power may be of God and not from us. II Cor. 4:7


Postscript: As I was writing this post this morning I stopped to pray mid-morning prayer at my desk in the Retreat Center office. The scripture reading was from Isaiah 53: "He was...a man of suffering, accustomed to infirmity...yet it was our infirmaties thet he bore, our sufferings that he endured...." Our Lord knows our weakness. And may we bear up one another as He has borne us in His mercy.

The family treasures

Yesterday we celebrated the Passing of our Holy Father St. Benedict, a major feast day for us and for our entire Benedictine family around the world. It gave me pause to stop and think about this wonderful heritage, this Benedictine treasure box overflowing with riches and jewels.

Monasteries have long been centers of learning and art, and our love for God often expresses itself in works of beauty. Yet these are not the treasures to which I refer. Rather, our spiritual heritage is our true treasure. St. Benedict left us a spiritual legacy that has sustained centuries of monastic men and women who have gathered to seek God in communities large and small, urban and rural, in times of warfare and peace, in the extravagance of springtime and the barrenness of darkest winter.

Last night during Compline we listened yet again to a reading from the Rule of St. Benedict. Our daily reading from the Rule is like pulling a jewel from a treasure chest to examine, explore, and hopefully don as spiritual apparal. This morning, I had a similar sensation during Lauds as the words of the Psalms unfolded like sunlight on the morning horizon – each word and phrase a treasure to behold.

We are blessed with a rich and treasured heritage. Yet it is not merely heritage - a dusty box of heirlooms, if you will. It is a tradition that is alive and flourishing, borne along from generation to generation through the wisdom of our elders, on the wings of our desire for God, and in our day to day living of the tradition through daily work, prayer, and life within community.




“You are my inheritance,
O God."
(From Psalm 16, the responsorial Psalm for the Passing of our Holy Father Benedict.)


These two photos are from Vespers of All Souls in the monastery cemetery 2009.

A return home...

Yesterday, after our meetings, retreat time, and visits with long-time friends had concluded, Sisters Lynn Marie, Magdalena, and I departed from Mount St. Scholastica. The long drive back took us through parts of Kansas, Missouri, Illinois, Kentucky, Tennessee, and finally back home into Alabama.

Although long, it was a good drive. A cool, mostly-cloudy day…farmland that stretched from horizon to horizon…good traveling companions…a brief visit with family along the way… rivers that we crossed again and again – the Missouri, the Mississippi, the Ohio, the Tennessee….

Crossing and re-crossing rivers as we followed them southeastward reminded me a little bit of liturgy, of returning again and again to that great stream of prayer to God.

Yesterday morning, we prayed Lauds with the Atchison community. This morning we prayed Lauds in Cullman, with Sister Magdalena back at the organ and Sisters Lynn Marie and me back in our familiar choir stalls, entering once again that great river of prayer.


Postscript:
Sister Vicki Ix, OSB, of the Bristow, Virginina community has a great summary of our "55 and Under" meeting on her blog, "Monastics on a Journey." Also, a bit more about our trip is on our Community News web page. And here are a few photos from the Mount.

"My Old 'Kansas' Home"

There is something about visiting another Benedictine community that just feels like home. It's not because you know the people, although you might have gotten to know some of them in one way or another over the years. It's more about the way the Benedictine spirit has permeated the place. Everything feels so familiar, so right, even though it might be your first visit to that particular monastery.

Right now I am in Atchison, KS, attending a meeting at the monastery of Mount St. Scholastica. I only know a few people here, and I don't know them well, but this still feels like home in some inexplicable way. You know that feeling of walking into a relative's home and you recognize the people in the photographs, you know which cabinet likely holds the plates and bowls, and you know which magazines they probably subscribe to? It's that kind of recognition and sense of familial belonging, but on a spiritual level. It is truly "familiar."

Being Benedictine means, among other things, being part of a large, far-flung family. Every house has it's own unique character - and it's own unique cast of characters - yet the spirit of St. Benedict, a common liturgical tradition, and centuries of a shared spritual heritage create ties that bind us together in ways far beyond simply the shared label of "Benedictine" and the administrative/ecclesial ties of federations and congregations. Which means that here I am, a Southerner born and bred, visiting "my old Kansas home."


Postscript: I'm here in Atchison to help plan an upcoming gathering of younger Sisters of Benedictine women's communities. Also on our planning committee are Sisters from Benedictine communities in Virginia, Maryland, Oklahoma and from right here in Atchison. Sr. Lynn Marie from our Cullman community is also here for a meeting, and Sr. Magdalena is with us visiting old friends at "The Mount." My meeting ended today and I will now enjoy some retreat time while Sr. Lynn Marie's meetings continue for another couple of days. We will drive back to Alabama next Wednesday. But for now, it is great being here in the midst of this joyful, hospitable Benedictine community.

Stopping in our tracks

You know how sometimes a work of art, or a beautiful view, or maybe a sublime piece of music will grab your attention and cause you to just stop in your tracks? Whatever it is, you stop, you stay, you stick with it. You return again and again to the painting, or the poem, or the favorite vista. If it’s a piece of music, you listen to it (or play it) over and over, perhaps for years. Whatever it is, there is both depth and beauty, and one encounter is never enough.

In the last post, I wrote about pausing to look beyond our usual perspectives to encounter the beauty and wonder of God’s creation. Yet we also need to pause and focus and enter into the depth of the matter, not just the breadth. I’ve been reading a book by an art historian who spent months returning, sometimes daily, to the same two paintings, as he came to realize that images don’t revel themselves all at once. There is always more to be seen.

For us monastics, God has “grabbed our attention,” you could say. Through sustained, repeated encounters in personal prayer, liturgy and scripture we come to know God with growing depth and intimacy. For us, prayer is not the time to scan the horizon (although scanning a beautiful horizon may lead to prayer). Prayer is a time to stop in our tracks and turn yet again to the “one thing necessary,” to turn to God who gradually reveals Himself to us over a lifetime of steadfast seeking and deepening relationship. The monastic rhythm of prayer, work, and leisure helps us to stop in our tracks, to stay, to stick with it, to return again and again.

Yes, it’s vital to pause and scan the horizon and encounter the beauty (and also the suffering) of this world. But we also need to pause and focus with single-minded devotion, to encounter God in a sustained way in the depths of our heart. I think of it like this – pausing to look around can lead to wonder (awe), while pausing to ‘enter in’ can lead to wisdom. Both are essential dimensions of our search for God.

“Happy are those who…delight in the law of the Lord, and on his law they meditate day and night.” (Psalm 1)

Pauses and perspectives

Earlier this week, a lovely snowfall graced the morning hours here at Sacred Heart. I went out to walk and watch, and lingered for a while on the porch of a small house behind the monastery. I’ve been on that porch many a time, but that day, as my eyes traced the path of some birds in flight, I saw the back of the chapel from a vantage point that I’d never viewed it from before. This snapshot doesn’t capture the serene beauty of the scene, but the unexpected sight of the chapel - not only from a new angle, but through the pines and the gently falling snow - was a moment of grace.

Later that day, in the evening hours, I took a walk along the far bank of the small lake on our property. I paused, cast a sideways glance, and in the glow of a street lamp noticed a series of fishing bobbers dangling from a power wire, the fruit of some unfortunate casts of a fishing rod. They were strangely beautiful as they dangled against the night sky like an array of planets in miniature.

Like the porch, I had walked the far bank many a time, yet had never noticed those stranded bobbers. All it took was a pause, a glance in a new direction, and the half-light of a nearby lamp for something new to suddenly be revealed within the ordinary landscape.

If you’re anything like me, in our busy-ness we can sometimes tend to walk in straight lines, to move between hither and yon in the most efficient way possible. Not only do we fail to pause, but we keep our focus straight ahead, our minds on the work at hand. Our perspective stays fixed, static, and familiar. Yet a simple pause - even one as fleeting as a gesture, or as subtle as a turn of the head - can sometimes be enough for us to see anew the beauty and goodness that surrounds us. All we need are eyes that are alert, open, and ready to see beyond the straight lines of our usual perspectives.

Reading

Yesterday, was “Read Across America” day in our nation’s schools. We here at Sacred Heart are avid readers. Almost everyone usually has a good book going – spiritual reading, of course, but also good literature, biography, science, current events, history, theology, poetry... At any given time you can find almost any literary genre bookmarked somewhere in the monastery.

A quick survey of just a few Sisters this afternoon yielded the following books in progress: Having a Mary Heart in a Martha World, by Joan Weaver; The Mystery of Christ, by Thomas Keating, OCSO; Bess Truman, by Margaret Truman; The Selected Poetry of Maria Rainer Rilke; Carry Me Home, by Diane McWhorter; St. Edith Stein's The Hidden Life: Essays, Meditations, Spiritual Texts; and Words for the Journey: A Monastic Vocabulary, by Edith Scholl, OCSO. And that’s just a quick survey of a few of us.

Reading is a fundamental monastic activity. Our primary text, of course, is Sacred Scripture. We hear scripture read throughout the day at Eucharist and in the Liturgy of the Hours. Each of us also reads scripture as part of our personal prayer and study, as well as daily praying with scripture using the ancient monastic practice of Lectio Divina (Sacred Reading). Our reading of scripture is complemented by spiritual reading of various sorts, and reading in other genres helps us grow and become balanced and whole individuals.

In addition to our personal reading, we also read as a community. Whether table reading at supper during Lent, or an assigned book we each read and then gather to discuss, spiritual reading in common is one of the ways in which we seek God together and grow as a community. Right now we are all reading Michael Casey’s Strangers to the City: Reflections on the Beliefs and Values of the Rule of St. Benedict. Each Wednesday night we gather to discuss the chapter assigned for that week, so tonight, after the supper dishes have been washed and put away, we will all gather, books in hand, to "read across the centuries" of our Benedictine tradition.


Postscript on Thursday: As I was reviewing this post, a Sister walked into the office to pass a book back to me. Passing good books back and forth around the monastery is a common practice here at Sacred Heart as we share "good reads" with one another...