From confusion to confession

Tonight I was reading a pdf document on the computer that was shrunk down to a miniscule font. Being too lazy to right-size the text with the cursor, I just squinted and read on. When I got to the part of the document about the Prayer of Confusion I was, well, confused.

What in world is the Prayer of Confusion, I thought. I mean, I’m reasonably well-versed liturgically, but I’ve never heard of that! Squinting even further I saw what it really said: Prayer of Confession. Oh.

I chuckled to myself over the mistake, but as I thought about it I realized there is hardly a more appropriate malapropism than accidently substituting confusion for confession.

Truly, I am confused most of the time. I’m even confused in my confession, not always fully aware of my own mistakes or the condition of my own heart. I stumble through confession as I stumble through life, not always knowing the true state of affairs.

Indeed, I - and dare I say "we" - see through a glass darkly, confused about the extent of our infirmity, or too afraid or too spiritually sluggish to open our hearts to the illuminating light of Christ. We just squint, and walk on in the darkness.

A good Examen can go a long way toward leading us out of confusion, out of darkness. Before Compline tonight, our Prioress called our attention to the Holy Father’s remarks of earlier today as reported by the Vatican Information Service. She suggested that they would constitute a good Examination of Conscience for each of us and challenged us to take his words to prayer in these final days leading toward the Nativity of the Lord.

As I do so, I pray that I can cease any spiritual squinting, that I can open my eyes and see the way from confusion to genuine confession, and thus to true reconciliation.

May the Light of Christ, shining in the darkness, illuminate our hearts and minds.

http://www.vis.va/vissolr/index.php?lang=en
(click on the top two of the entries dated 22/12/2014)

Like a litany...

These days of mid-December have always felt a little awkward to me.

On the one hand, we still are still draped in the shawl of Advent, with the color of violet filling the chapel and the O Antiphons filling our O-shaped mouths with the sound of longing.

On the other hand, we are busy decorating trees, arranging crib sets, draping garland along the Ottilia Hall banister, wrapping gifts and hanging wreaths. We’ve had our Employee Christmas Party and received seasonal visitors. We are writing cards and receiving cards. Except for the chapel, the whole monastery is looking a whole lot like Christmas. (And even the chapel is full of Christmas strains as the schola rehearses for the upcoming season.)

This year, I’ve participated a little less than usual in Christmas preparations around the monastery. Yet I’ve paid close attention as others have gone about their tasks – first one tree, then another, then the garland, then one crib set, and then another, and then another, and then another tree…and on and on.

As I've watched, I've begun to feel less and less awkward, experiencing the preparations this year as a kind of litany…first one thing, then another, and another, then another…all variations on a theme...all punctuated, like a litany, with a cry: “O come, O come, Emmanuel”…like a litany that says first in one way and then another that we long, and that we believe. We long for the Lord, and we believe the Lord is nigh.

I also see it - indeed I feel it - as a litany of footsteps, the footsteps of a donkey on a darkened road under a shawl of violet sky…the footsteps of a tired husband and fatigued wife walking on the words of an angel…a litany of footsteps that says, against all odds, I believe.

And so now I don’t feel awkward at all. The violet vestments in chapel somehow seem all of a piece with the shimmering lights on the trees and the garland that drapes the staircase. The lights, the garland, the trees, the cards are like the lines of a litany that says, I long, and I believe.

Come, Lord Jesus.

Artaxerxes

With as many scripture readings as we proclaim during the course of our daily liturgies, we regularly encounter unpronounceable names that must be pronounced – out loud and in public and in a liturgy - which means it's important to get it right. Sometimes we ask one another how to pronounce Akkub or Shephatia or whatever the name may be, or we consult one of the biblical pronunciation guides that we have. But still, for me anyway, there are occasional stumbles. I will practice a name ahead of time, and then when I proclaim the reading I draw up short and stumble and stammer over something like Pahathmoab and will wind up saying Pahathmabob or something equally and awfully wrong.

In this morning’s reading from Nehemiah, the name Artaxerxes figured prominently. The Sister who was reading handled it correctly (although who would really know?) and with aplomb. But still, each time she spoke the name there was a barely perceptible pause, as if the name were a miniature mountain range that she must quickly and deftly traverse and she needed momentum for the journey.

With each tiny pause, I began to realize how appropriate it is that a name should be unpronounceable. When we can pronounce something, we think we know it. But an unpronounceable name ‘speaks’ to the reality that each of us is – in our depths and in our fullness – unknowable to anyone but God. We are all mountains and valleys of mystery, with depths and crevices and heights and precipices that cannot be fully known by another. We are mostly unpronounceable even to ourselves as we strain and stammer to understand our own hearts. There is no deft traverse.

Only God truly knows us – the One who created us, formed us, and calls us by name. It is only God who can truly pronounce each of our names in their depth and fullness. Thus, it is only God who can truly pronounce the name of another, no matter how well we think we know them.

When we approach the unutterable mystery of another person, and of ourselves, it is only fitting that we draw up short in stammering unknowingness, and that we pause in reverence of the One who created, formed, and calls us each by name.


Lord, you have probed me, you know me: you know when I sit and stand; you understand my thoughts from afar. You sift through my travels and my rest; with all my ways you are familiar. Even before a word is on my tongue, Lord, you know it all. Behind and before you encircle me and rest your hand upon me. Such knowledge is too wonderful for me, far too lofty for me to reach. Psalm 139:1-6



Postscript: We are blessed to have in our community numerous Sisters who have studied theology and/or scripture at the graduate level. These are the ones most commonly turned to for pronunciation help, in addition to the reference books on hand. What a gift to be able to study and learn, and then to sit in the silence of unknowing before the source of all Wisdom. The ancient monastic practice of Lectio Divina offers us a way to pray with Sacred Scripture that draws us toward contemplation in God's presence.

Plymouth Rock, Noah’s Ark, Turtledove…

Yesterday, on the weekend between the departure of the demolition crew and the arrival of the earth movers who will smooth and shape our hillside, I took a walk across the upturned earth of the demo site.

I don’t know if I was supposed to be there because caution tape still surrounded the site. But there I was, carefully making my way across a moonscape of scarred earth riddled with broken brick and cratered rubble and shards of shattered wood and glass…trace elements of the life that once was there.

It was just a Sunday stroll, but somehow it felt epochal. The twists and turns and ups and downs of renovation and construction for year after year after year have felt like the longest of the longest of ocean voyages. Will we ever reach land? Will this ever end? Will the construction crews ever finish? Will things ever get back to normal?

For me, yesterday was the first hint of “yes.” Exploring the now-open slope, I saw the surrounding monastery grounds and structures from this particular spot for the very first time. The new Guest Houses were just a glance away, visible even from the Sisters parking lot. The east side of Ottilia Hall basked expansively in full sunlight for the first time in a hundred years. Our dear little lake was just down the slope, within the gaze of anyone looking out a back window in Ottilia.

Looking around at the transformation, and seeing that it was almost complete, I felt like a pilgrim catching sight of Plymouth Rock. Or like Noah seeing the leafy sprig. Or like hearing a turtledove begin to sing in its mother tongue of tranquility.

There’s still a bit of work to do – maybe a month and a half or so. There are some sidewalks to pour, some earth to sort and smooth, a parking lot to pave, and a bit of electrical work. But Plymouth Rock is in sight. A sprig is in the bill of the dove. And a tranquil song is heard in the land...

Thanks be to God!



“Arise, my beloved, my beautiful one, and come! For see, the winter is past, the rains are over and gone. The flowers appear on the earth, the time of pruning the vines has come, and the song of the turtledove is heard in our land. The fig tree puts forth its figs, and the vines, in bloom, give forth fragrance. Arise, my beloved, my beautiful one, and come!" Song of Songs 2: 10-13



Postscript: Even though the construction crews will soon depart, we are still working hard on the Capital Campaign to help us complete the final funding of the new Retreat Center guest houses. Here's a link to how you can help us with this. Also, we have a wish list to help us finish outfitting the new Retreat Center spaces in a way that will improve the experience of our guests. We will soon be posting the list on the Retreat Center pages of our website. God bless you for partnering with us in this ministry venture!

Inhabiting a life

Structures which our Sisters have inhabited for generations have been falling all around us…and none of us seem upset. I’ve heard no moans, no sighs, no poignant words of regret. Our guests routinely bemoan the loss of Mary Hall, the old Rafter Room, etc. and say things like “The Sisters must be so upset”, but I’ve heard hardly a trace of sorrow from a Sister.

In a way, it seems curious that there would be so few moans among us over the loss of these trusty (though rusty!) old buildings in which so much community life and ministry has unfolded over so many years. But I think the answer as to why there is so little sorrow can be found in an after-dinner scene from a week or so ago. I had been in the scullery washing dishes with Sr. Lynn Marie. I rolled the cart of clean dishes through our new kitchen and saw Sr. Brigid silently preparing for the next day’s breakfast. I rolled the cart onward into the dining room and saw Sr. Bertha silently wiping the tables and Sr. Benita rolling the crumb sweeper across the carpet. It was so normal, so ordinary…a post-dinner monastic-community tableau that looked as if it had been plucked up from the old kitchen and set down intact in this one. The same people, the same tasks, the same monastic heart, the same Spirit animating our actions….

I think our lack of overt sorrow over the old buildings isn’t a lack of appreciation for them, or a dearth of thanksgiving for the many years of community life which these buildings upheld, or that we haven’t told story after story about events that happened in the old structures, or that we don't have the fondest of memories. Rather, it’s the implicit realization that we don’t inhabit buildings, we inhabit a life. Whether the kitchen is old or new, our monastic life continues right on. We are the same people living the same monastic life with the same monastic heart and filled with the same monastic zeal.

This morning I passed through the kitchen and saw Sr. Emilie peeling apples. I paused, she handed me an extra knife, and I worked with her for a few minutes before continuing on my way. It was so simple, so ordinary, so absent of the sentiment of either gain or loss…simply two monastic Sisters silently peeling a rich and fragrant fruit. We were working in a kitchen, but we were inhabiting a life.


Postscript: New pictures of the demolition - with descriptive commentary - have been posted on the Community News page our website...

“When foundations are being destroyed, what shall the upright do?”

Mid-way through Lauds this morning, during a silent pause between Psalms, the demolition crew began their day by toppling sections of the old cellar walls next door and trying to burst through the concrete foundation. The giant excavator’s ferocious work sent repeated jolts through the chapel that we didn’t just hear, but felt.

I opened my eyes long enough to see that no one else was opening theirs. We just sat - silently praying - through the earth-shattering shudders that were occurring just outside the window. One Sister who bears a specific responsibility regarding construction activity briefly left her choir stall to investigate, but she was back within the same span of silence. And so we just sat. And prayed. And then began the next Psalm when it was time. Like nothing was happening. Like foundations were not being destroyed. Because when foundations are being destroyed, what shall the upright do, except keep praying? Except keep trusting in the presence of God?

The demolition process for Mary Hall and Joseph Hall started with the upper floors and has now reached the foundations. It is time to pull down the final stone walls and crack through the cellar floor.

This was the work they began today with their furious whacks from their fierce machines.

So when the Psalmist asks, “When foundations are being destroyed, what shall the upright do?” (Ps. 11:3) I now know not only the answer from the Psalmist, but the answer from us. You just keep on praying, confident in the presence of God.


The LORD is in his holy temple; the LORD’s throne is in heaven. God’s eyes keep careful watch… (From Ps 11)


Postscript: There is actually one other thing that Sisters do when foundations are being destroyed, and that is to watch! I can hardly pass a window without finding a Sister who has paused in the stairwell, at her bedroom

window, in the dish room, at the back door, or at any of the countless other vantage points from which we can watch the demolition. And of course I can't just pass by. I have to stop, too! It is a fascinating process to watch as the workman wield these giant machines with such care, precision, and even, at times, gentleness.

In the photo at top right, the excavator takes the final "bite" out of the northwest corner of the old cellar below the former Sisters' dining room. For more demo pictures, there are several photographs from the early phases of the demo process on the Community News page of our website (July 10th entry). We will be posting more recent photographs soon.

Brick by brick

This morning, brick by brick, I dismantled my day in prayer. Lingering in the quiet chapel after Lauds I took the day apart before it even began, letting my plans, my constructions, my assumptions, my dreams absorb back into God like the nighttime dew absorbs back into the day.

Sure, I will follow the calendar. I will be present for the scheduled arrival of guests. I will attend to my assigned duties in the monastery. But I’ll do so after having first let the day implode into praise, after letting the Dawn from on High break upon me and shatter my heart into freedom, into shards of light that will illumine the way as, brick by brick, I construct the day.


Blessed be the Lord, the God of Israel;
He has come to his people and set them free…

…In the tender compassion of our God
the dawn from on high shall break upon us,
to shine on those who dwell in darkness
and the shadow of death,
and to guide our feet into the way of peace.

Steward of the Morrow

Lately I’ve had a few administrative tasks added to my usual duties here at the monastery. I’ve never done much administrating so it’s been, as they say, a learning curve.

But it’s not just a new set of tasks to learn. It is the taking on of a whole new métier which involves taking on a whole new way of thinking as I slowly realize the degree to which administration is concerned with what seems like feeding the future. Daily I look toward an ever rolling horizon of days and months and years and I sow plans like seeds onto square calendar plots, hoping it will all take root and grow. And I throw bread crumbs before me, not behind me, hoping to find the way forward, not back. The future lies open before me like a hungry mouth that must be fed.

For someone like me, more geared to the here and now – to the dishes that need to be washed, the guest that needs to be welcomed, the words that clamor to be written – it is a strange shift in orientation. I suddenly feel like Steward of the Morrow. It's enough of a shift that it makes me sit up and take notice and wonder exactly what it is that I'm supposed to be stewarding. And isn't it hubris, this tossing of breadcrumbs before me as if I know the way? And what, exactly, is administration?

Dictionaries are useless for such questions. I have to think of stories. I have to look to witnesses. And the first ones that come to mind are the disciples who were sent to make preparations for the Passover. “Go…,” Jesus said, “make preparations…and they went off…and there they prepared the Passover.” (Lk 22:8,13)

The word “minister” is at the heart of the word “administration.” And so I can only think of it as such. It is not feeding the future. It is preparing to feed the Lord’s people. It is not so much stewarding the morrow as it is preparing – stewarding – the way of the Lord. It is living in full awareness that the way of the Lord is not just 'now.' It is now and forevermore. It is, was, and will be. And planning is not hubris, it is simply giving myself to the call of our dear Lord who says, “Go…make preparations.”

And so like the disciples, I go. Into the morrow.


Postscript: Work here at the monastery takes different shapes and forms and sometimes responsibilities shift. Our prioress may ask a particular Sister to take on a new project or we may swap things around for some reason or something new comes up and must be dealt with and so on. Just like any family. Just like any workplace. Just like any place where life goes on. It is good. Thanks be to God.

Sister Gee, Sister Haw, and the cultivation of a monastic heart

Here in the southland (and maybe other places, too) we have an expression for folks who don’t exactly see eye to eye.

“They just don’t geehaw," we say.

Or perhaps they do see eye to eye, but they still somehow manage to work at cross purposes despite their best intentions.

The phrase comes, of course, from the days of mules and plows and the farmers who steered them to the right and to the left with a “gee” and a “haw.”  When two folk "just don’t geehaw” it simply means that one of them heads one way while the other heads another and nothing much gets done except for the intentions that get tangled and the footfalls that get scrambled and the stubborn necks that get sore from pulling too insistently and hard.

Monastic formation – both the initial kind and the kind that goes on until the day the Prioress calls the funeral home for you – can be seen as a kind of parable in which Sister Gee and Sister Haw get teamed up to cultivate a pasture but wind up getting cultivated themselves. It’s kind of like Haw trying to get Gee to become more Haw-like, and Gee trying to get Haw to become more Gee-like, but each becoming transformed into something entirely different in the process. Somehow amongst all the miscues and crossed purposes and tangled footfalls, absolutely nothing gets planted in the field but something manages to get planted in each of them. And it grows. And bears fruit. And they are transformed.

Each of us enters the monastery with our own particular experiences and outlooks and all manner of certainty that our way is the best way. It’s natural. And it’s very human. But the monastic call requires of us a pliability of spirit in order to be formed more and more closely into the likeness of Christ. In the monastery we often refer to this as a docile heart.

This docility doesn’t come overnight. While some may have more natural docility than others, for each of us it takes some time to stop pulling Gee when we’re asked to Haw, or to stop Hawing (or howling!) when we’re asked to Gee.

None of this is merely about compliance. While to a certain extent monastic obedience is oriented toward an orderly community life that allows contemplation to flourish, a far deeper principle is at work. A docile heart is directed as if to Christ and is ordered entirely to learning to hear and respond to His voice.

This deeper orientation is part of what makes the monastic endeavor so completely different from other forms of the common life. And it is what makes our relationships with Sisters with whom we don’t naturally “geehaw” so vital and ultimately life giving. For each of us, the true pull isn’t against the other, or toward the center, and not even toward compromise. The pull, the voice, the draw, is toward God, and that gives the tangled footprints and miscues a sacramental character.

The Rule of Benedict is full of practical guidance on how to seek God together in mutual love and service. Benedict recognized full well our human weakness, and I would guess that he perhaps did his own share of geeing and hawing in his time. He tells us to not be presumptuous, to be the first to show respect for the other, to let mercy triumph over judgment, to show unhesitating obedience… And he reminds us that it is love that impels us.

In Benedict’s day, an era in which Barbarian tribes were overrunning a falling and failing Roman Empire, he sought to integrate these rougher individuals into the life of a monastic community. Today, we generally think of ourselves as civilized and cultured.  Yet we still, interiorly, have hearts that are, to one degree or another, stubborn and uncultivated. We resist the yoke of the Lord.

The ‘yoke’ of monastic community life doesn’t always feel easy, because even with those we know and care for best, we may still feel at times as if we are Sister Gee to their Sister Haw. At those times, it’s good to remember that we are plowing together in the fields of the Lord, and it is our own hearts that are undergoing cultivation in a living parable of trust and love.           

Winter lullaby

When the earth trembles, is there someone to hold her hand? When she shivers with cold, does the firmament drape a warm wind across her shaking shoulders? When her hidden springs well up into a torrent of tears, do the heavenly hosts comfort her with a lullaby?

On these cold, cold days, when the earth seems to need a blanket as much as we do, I pray for those who tremble in the cold – whether from the icy blast of an arctic storm or the icy isolation of loneliness or fear, because we don’t need just physical warmth. We need the love of others.

Life in the monastery is filled not just with sisterly camaraderie but with mutual love. St. Benedict and the Gospel call us to no less.

The “monos” of “monastery” means “single” or “one.” It means not that we live alone, but that we seek God with a single-hearted devotion, and that our entire life is oriented toward God alone. For those who are called to monastic life, this takes place within the community in which we make our monastic commitment. Here in this community we experience our own times of trembling and times of tears, and we learn to walk with others through their own times of suffering.

So as the earth shivers along with us, I think not just about the physical cold, but about the loneliness and fear that are part of every human life, and I pray for all who tremble in the cold, no matter its nature. I pray, too, that I can learn to sing with the comforting warmth of a winter lullaby.

For weeks now, even since the early days of Advent, my thoughts have been filled with the anticipation of Epiphany. My thoughts were partly sad, because I felt that all I could bring to the Infant Jesus were empty pockets and counterfeit coins. But there was also joy, because the Feast of the Epiphany is a kind of icon of all my hope and all that I yearn for and journey toward.

Yesterday, on the eve of Epiphany, I took a journey of a different sort, returning to the monastery after several days of visiting with family in South Carolina. As always, I was driving a community car.

We don’t have GPS in most of our cars, and I am glad for the ambiguities and uncertainties of GPS-less travel. Instead, I usually drive with a map spread out on the seat beside me and an eye open for a new back road or an unexpected turn that suddenly looks compelling. It keeps my quizzical brow from softening into certainty and keeps me alert to ways in which the Lord bursts into this incarnate world like a star tumbling from the heavens.

Yesterday I took an unplanned right hand turn in Blackville, SC. A few piney woods later I stumbled across the loveliest country store you can imagine with a welcoming wooden sign that promised sandwiches and sweet tea.

The store was run by members of the local Mennonite community. It was a simple place without all the commercial accoutrements of most convenience stores. There were women in bonnets and men in beards and loaves of just-baked bread and a few locals and a few passersby and more than a few kind and cheerful words.

The store anchored the turn to a place called Healing Springs. But I was so ‘healed’ by the store that I didn’t even bother to look for the springs. I had already found a kind of icon of what I yearn for and journey toward.

In these days of GPS travel and authoritative electronic voices, the story of the magi reminds us that the journey toward our true destination is marked with uncertainty and ambiguity. Yet it is also marked by the certain hope that that the Lord ever bursts into this incarnate world, the joy of our beholding.

I journey to Him with counterfeit coins bleeding from empty pockets as I forget things and drop things and take endless wrong turns and let the glory of God slip through my fingers and fall to the side of the road as I stand by helplessly wondering what happened.

But I travel in hope and I travel in joy, knowing that even my sorrows can be transformed into a gift fit for a King.