Strangely familiar

Do you know the sensation of simply taking a breath or casting a gaze and being flooded with a sense of memory, as if the air itself, or a even a scattered leaf blowing within it, is familiar, is family, is somehow part of you? Yesterday morning, with sodden maple leaves underfoot and the air damp with laurel and rain, I had that sensation as I gazed across a Blue Ridge horizon. The atmosphere was heavy with a kind of high barometric pressure of familiarity and the memories of many a rainy Blue Ridge day.  It was an atmosphere that I knew, within a landscape that unfolded like an old family quilt. And then, yesterday afternoon, when I opened the car door to the salty, sulfur breeze of the Carolina low country, the same sensation swept over me.  Humid air, palmettos, wooden porch steps – everything felt familiar.

Each Sister has a family story. We have big brothers and little sisters and favorite aunts and uncles and treasured nieces and nephews. We have hometowns and favorite childhood haunts and landscapes that are etched within our very being. For each of us, certain places and people awaken a sense of home, of familiarity, of family, of memory. Certain vistas unfold like an old family quilt.

Each Sister also has a story of coming to Sacred Heart and somehow knowing that this, too, is familiar, as if monastic life is somehow part of her being.  It’s as if in entering a new life we are somehow returning to something already within us, like shaking out an old family quilt that we've never seen before, but that we recognize as ours.  The air just seems right. The vista unfolds like a memory. It’s all strangely familiar.

For some of us, it’s the rhythms and patterns of community life. For others, it’s the monastic liturgy. For most of us, it’s probably some combination of the two. For all of us, there is something about the Benedictine way of life that feels etched within our being. When each of us encountered the Rule of Benedict for the first time, it somehow felt strangely familiar.

At a recent Vocation Awareness event, a high school student asked me how I knew which religious order was right for me. I don’t recall my exact answer, but one way to express it would be that reading the Rule and experiencing my community for the first time was like unfolding a new landscape, yet recognizing it as something long known.  It felt as natural to me as autumn air full of mountain laurel and rain. It felt, and still feels, familiar. 


Postscript: When we enter monastic community, even though the nature of our commitment is unique and all-encompassing, we do not forget family.  Some of us are from Cullman and encounter family members regularly in the course of day-to-day life and ministry. Some of us are from much further afield and make one lengthy home visit a year. Some of us are somewhere in between and see family occasionally.

I am currently on a home visit in the Carolinas. For a sense of the many landscapes we call “home,” you may be interested in viewing our Meet the Community web page and seeing our various places of birth.

The sidewalk side

Care of the sick and the reception of guests are about the only reasons we don’t head to chapel at the sound of bells, so it was a strange sensation last evening to be standing outside as the final Vespers bell called the community to our evening prayer. Guests were expected though, and it was my charge to greet them, so I planned to pray Vespers at my desk in the Retreat Center office.

As the evening air absorbed the last reverberation of bells, I paused outside the office. Quiet chant began to flow from the open chapel windows and I suddenly realized I didn’t have sit at my desk for Vespers. I pulled a sidewalk chair within a viewing angle of the retreat entrance and grabbed my prayer book. With the retreat center to my right and the chapel to my left, I prayed the Psalms of Friday Vespers surrounded by climbing vines, a delicate breeze, slanting sunlight, and quiet lines of chant that streamed from the chapel windows.

Our chapel is arranged in traditional monastic fashion with the choir divided into two facing sides. We informally refer to the two as ‘St. Scholastica side’ and ‘St. Benedict side’ based on the statues that anchor the apse. Last night, with the breeze dancing and the Psalms of Vespers flowing, I sat on the ‘sidewalk side,’ yet united as one in prayer with the community in the chapel above me.

Yes, a guest did arrive as I prayed. I put my book aside to greet her, and together we carried her bags down the long sloping sidewalk that led to her room. I walked back up the hilld through the breeze, the sunlight, the fading colors of fall, striding along the tree-shaded walk, ever alert to the presence of God in the beauty of the late afternoon, in the voices of my Sisters, and in the presence of our arriving guests. And that, too, is prayer.


All guests who present themselves are to be welcomed as Christ...
Rule of St. Benedict 53:1

Gladness of heart

One morning this week, a slip-o’-the-fingers fumble was followed by an semi-athletic and somewhat comic search-and-recovery effort that I won’t even try to describe because it falls into the “you had to be there” category. Suffice it to say, we had some gentle laughter with our toast and coffee. Admiring the athletic retrieval effort, someone joked about the "morning calisthenics."

Here in the monastery, humorous situations unfold with regularity. It seems that putting a group of people to live, pray, and work together is an invitation for humor. Sometimes it’s the intentional humor of telling a good story. Often it’s simply the joy of being together. But sometimes it’s the comical situations that seem to naturally arise in the course of day to day life. As some of us often say to each other, “you can’t make this stuff up.” It seems that a bit of comedy is simply woven into the warp and weft of community life.  Always, it is rooted in gladness of heart and love for our Sisters in monastic community.

We often remind each other that a good sense of humor is essential, especially in community. Healthy humor is kind of like calisthenics for the soul. Being able to laugh well and good-naturedly helps to work out kinks, smooth over misunderstandings, and keep community life, and our individual spirits, healthy and limber and strong. A good, healthy laugh that flows from gladness of heart and Christian charity is often just the right “exercise” to help us pursue this very serious monastic endeavor with the perfect blend of faithfulness, fervor, and joy. It’s worth searching for, even when we look pretty funny doing it.

The Benedictine Express

We recently hosted a small gathering of Benedictines from around the country.  On the morning of their departure, a few envelopes began to appear on a table near the morning coffee.  As departing Sisters sipped coffee, cleared their meeting room, or passed by with their bags, they invariably stopped to look through the envelopes, many taking one or two with them.  When Benedictines encounter envelopes such as this, no explanatory announcement is needed. We know what to do. The Benedictine Express is second nature.

We Benedictines have our own mail system.  It is one of the many ways we keep alive the monastic connections that we forge over the years through various Benedictine meetings, conferences, etc.  When a Sister travels to another monastery, she becomes part of the Express, bringing greetings that flow between Benedictines from different parts of the country (or world).  Yes, we e-mail. We Facebook. Some of us Skype or text. But none of these beats the Benedictine Express. 

Central to the tradition is written acknowledgement of the kindness of the one who bears the message, an expression of gratitude that is characteristic of the Benedictine Express. We appreciate the greeting itself – a handwritten message, hand delivered from a distant locale.  But we also appreciate the kindness that accompanies it. Cell towers and wireless connections can get a message from here to there, but it is kindness that actually connects us to one another.

The simple acknowlegement of gratitude for the kindness of the messenger is not mere politeness.  It is a stance of humble gratitude.  And it reminds us that through kindness we can become bearers of the message of God's love.

To show kindness, no explanation is needed. We know what to do. May it be for us second nature.  And may we always express gratitude for the many kindnesses shown to us.


Postscript:  Not to spoil a good line, but I should point out that the phrase "Benedictine Express" doesn't really exist in actual usage.  It's just a phrase that came to me in order to describe a messenging process that, in practice, is way too informal and second nature to need a descriptive title.  It's something we just do, without a need to name it.  May our kindness be the same, borne so naturally within our being that it doesn't even need a name.   

Happy Birthday Sacred Heart Chapel!

On this date in 1931, a Solemn Pontifical High Mass was held dedicating our chapel “to the honor and service of Almighty God.” Today, as we do every year on October 11, we celebrated with a special anniversary Mass and remembered with deep appreciation our Sisters who first envisioned this beautiful chapel and who had the dedication to bring their dream to fruition. We also gratefully remembered the benefactors who helped make possible this grace-filled space which has held the prayer of our monastic community for so many years.

St. Benedict describes the monastery as a school of the Lord’s service. To borrow the image, it could be said that a monastic chapel is a school of the Lord’s beholding. It is a place set apart to listen, to gaze, to attend, to apprehend the One who loves us so. Here we behold God in Word and Sacrament, in speech and silence, in lament and longing, in praise and penance. We behold God in the beauty of the chapel, and we behold God in the simple tasks that make and keep it beautiful. We behold the presence of God in those who gather here. We behold the pain and lament of the world as we bring the needs of the world to God.  Over a lifetime of fidelity to monastic prayer in this "school of beholding," we learn to behold at ever-deepening levels and in ever-widening ways, carrying our beholding far beyond the chapel walls.

This chapel, vast and yet intimate, has held our beholding day after day for nearly eighty years - securely, faithfully, beautifully, and with quiet grace.  Our gratitude is unbounded. 


Postscript: Sister Mary Ruth, our community archivist, placed on display in the dining room today a copy of the program from the 1931 dedication. Following are a couple excerpts from the program notes:

"Finally all was ready. On June the sixth, 1930, - which was First Friday - the ground for the chapel was blessed and broken. Only eyewitnesses of the ceremony can realize with what loving enthusiasm each of the dear senior Sisters dug up her spadeful of earth. "

"...our Right Reverend Bishop is here today to ask, through the sacred rites of Dedication, that God will make of this great material edifice a yet greater spiritual edifice: a tower of strength and protection, a fortress of counsel and graces, an ark of sanctification and salvation."

I might add that "loving enthusiasm" endures, and the "spiritual edifice" continues to grow.

Sister Anastasia's orchestra

Yesterday when I arrived for Vespers I found in my choir stall a sheaf of blank music composition paper marked with the name of Sister Anastasia. I'm not sure who put it there, but someone must have come across it and decided I was the likeliest one to use it. As soon as I saw the name on the folio, I felt humbled and happy to be the inheritor of even a minuscule part of Sister Anastasia's musical legacy.

Sister Anastasia has been deceased for many years and I never knew her, but I've heard story upon story of her musical talents and of "Sister Anastasia's orchestra." For years, she was the heart and soul of the music program of our former academy and college - as musician, teacher, conductor, and composer.  She has bequeathed to us far more than manuscript paper.

From the earliest days of our community, music has held a privileged place in the life of our community, both academically and liturgically. When we operated an academy, instrumental instruction was required of all students. In our monastic prayer, liturgical music, including chant, has always been of the highest priority.

This rich musical heritage expresses itself today in many ways. We still chant the Divine Office using Psalm tones based on the ancient Gregorian modes. Sister Magdalena, our principal organist, routinely plays traditional music from worn books that are decades old, while constantly adding to her (and our) repertoire the work of current composers and hymn writers. The organ anchors all of our liturgies, but at times we  incorporate flute, hand bells, and/or guitar. We still use manuscript paper to sketch out, for instance, some hand bell parts, but are just as likely to use music notation software. We routinely use three different hymnals, with publication dates ranging from 1986 to 2009, while occasionally mixing in favorites from other, older sources. Just this morning, I walked into the chapel and Sr. Magdalena was reviewing some chant lines from a 1930's hymnal (pictured above).

Suffice it to say, music remains central, and I would say indispensable, to the liturgical life of our community. We draw deeply from the well of our musical heritage, even as we constantly incorporate new compositions and texts. And while it is a delight to come across some old music or composition paper, especially when marked with the name of a revered elder, our real heritage is the love of music imparted to us by our forebears, and the deep impulse to join the eternal song of praise God.  A rich heritage indeed, passed along to us by Sisters Mary Grace, Cecilia, Imelda, Anastasia, Martha, Genevieve, and so many other Sister musicians who have gone before us.  With choirs of angels in heaven, and her musical heirs here at Sacred Heart, Sister Anastasia's orchestra plays on...


Pictured above: Sister Magdalena reviewing chant modes from a 1930's hymnal
And below: Sister Mary Vincent on organ (a student of Sister Anastasia's, and violinist in her orchestra); Sister Sherrie on guitar; Sister Elisabeth on flute; Sisters Eileen and Therese on hand bells 

Story upon story

Sister Magdalena has returned from Wales along with the Benedictine Journeys tour group that she led for two weeks. I met them at the airport, which meant that I was the fortunate one who was able to hear the first rush of stories. They told of Cardiff and Snowdon and Hay-on-Wye and old churches and warm, friendly folk and wonderful tour guides and beautiful countryside and green upon green as far as the eye can see.

For two weeks the travelers formed a community, and by the end of their shared journey they had shared stories to tell.  Delayed luggage meant an airport dinner, and over a grilled cheese sandwich and iced tea I listened happily to their animated conversation.  Their individual remembrances darted here and there, yet converged to create a larger story of a common journey.  As I listened it seemed as if both shared experience and shared remembrance helped create their pilgrim community.

Our monastic community has been here in Cullman since 1902. Our stories are countless, and while we live in the present and prepare for the future, our conversation is constantly peppered with remembrances of the past, both recent and distant. Our common life and monastic commitment constitute us as a community, yet the telling of stories helps to sustain and form our monastic bond over the decades and generations.  The stories move ever forward, incor-porating new characters and new events along the way, while remaining embedded within a larger narrative that      reaches beyond the present moment and transcends any single individual or event.

Yet the stories we tell are not just ours. We are Benedictine, and share in the legacy of St. Benedict and centuries of Benedictine life. More importantly, as part of the Body of Christ, our story belongs not just to us but to the People of God and to the world. We are woven into the fabric of the Church and share in the Church’s story. Our liturgy is marked with the stories of those who preceded us in the faith, and images from the narrative of scripture and the lives of the saints fill our chapel and monastery. And daily we encounter the story of salvation history as it unfolds through the liturgical year. 

It’s like a set of nested dolls – our individual stories held within the community’s story held within our Benedictine story, and all held within the grand narrative of God’s salvific love that forms and shapes us as a community in Christ. May we always tell this story with the enthusiasm and wonder of a traveler returning from a distant isle, who has experienced green upon green as far as the eye can see.


Photos:
1) The journeying Sister Magdalena 
2) Sister Therese took this photo yesterday as Sister Mary Jude described to her the original parish school where our founding Sisters once taught
3) Sister Tonette reviews upcoming plans with the community as we carry our story forward
4) Our chapel is full of images of the Christian story, as well as images that convey our Benedictine heritage.