Category Archives: Cloistered life

Cloistered life, Men's communities, News

Cistercian Centenary

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August 20th is the Feast Day of St. Bernard of Clairvaux and this year the Cistercians are celebrating an extra-special anniversary for 2013 is the 900th centenary of St. Bernard’s entrance into Citeaux, the Motherhouse of the Cistercians.  The date of his entry was either 1112 or 1113 so for the past year the Cistercians have been commemorating this anniversary with a daily prayer for vocations.

Citeaux

Cîteaux Abbey was founded in 1098 by Sts. Robert, Alberic and Stephen Harding, monks from the Benedictine Abbey of Molesme who were seeking to follow the Rule of St. Benedict more closely. St. Bruno also resided in the vicinity of Molesme around the same time (1082) but he left to become the founder of the Carthusians.

When St. Bernard arrived at Citeaux, which hadn’t had a vocation in some time, there were thirty men with him, including his uncle and four of his brothers! When he was only in his twenties, he established a new Cistercian abbey in the Valley of Light or Clairvaux. At the time of his death, 700 men resided at Clairvaux and 68 new abbeys had been founded by him. What a difference one Cistercian made in the life of the Church!

 

So let us join the Cistercians today and pray their prayer for vocations:

Most gracious Father,

in setting up the New Monastery our fathers followed the poor Christ into the desert.

Thus they lived the Gospel by rediscovering the Rule of Saint Benedict in its purity.

You gave Bernard of Fontaine the ability

to make this new life attractive and appealing to others,

in the joy of the Holy Spirit.

Grant that we today, after their example,

may live our charism deeply in a spirit of peace, unity, humility,

and above all, in the charity which surpasses all other gifts.

May men and women of our time be newly called to follow the Gospel in monastic life,

in the service of the Church’s mission, and in a world forgetful of You.

Remember Lord, Cîteaux, where Bernard arrived with his companions.

May the brothers there continue to live in the enthusiastic and generative spirit of the founders.

Remember all who live the Cistercian charism.

Remember all Cistercian communities, those which are aging and those newly-born,

in all parts of the world, north and south, east and west.

Let them not lose courage in times of trial,

but turn to her whom Bernard called the Star of the Sea.

 Holy Father, from whom we have already received so much,

grant us again your blessing that our communities may grow in numbers,

but above all in grace and in wisdom, to your glory,

who are blessed for ever and ever.

Amen.

Cloistered life, Papal Address

Entrustment to Mary

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On this feast of the Dedication of the Basilica of St. Mary Major which Pope Francis visited on the eve of his departure for World Youth Day in Rio de Janeiro, it seems appropriate to post the counsel he gave to seminarians, novices and those discerning a vocation in a gathering held on July 7, 2013:

I entrust you to the intercession of Mary Most Holy.

She is the Mother who helps us to take life decisions freely and without fear.

May she help you to bear witness to the joy of God’s consolation,

without being afraid of joy,

she will help you to conform yourselves to the logic of love of the Cross,

to grow in ever deeper union with the Lord in prayer.

Then your lives will be rich and fruitful! Amen.

With cloistered Nuns in Rio de Janeiro

Cloistered life, Men's communities

The Faith of Peter is Our Faith!

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A priest and friend of the IRL from the Maronite Monastery in Petersham, Massachusetts, recently sent us a picture of a beloved confrere who died (or as the ancient monastic saying has it was “perfected”) on June 3, 2013. He was by all accounts everyone’s favorite, a lovely and holy priest. The picture says it all. May he rest in peace.

As an Eastern Rite Church, the Maronites are a beautiful example for the Church to take inspiration from today. They are and always have been in full communion with the Catholic Church. Despite persecution, their belief in the teachings of the Church and in the authority of the Chair of St. Peter have never wavered. Over 350 Maronite monks were martyred in 517 A.D. for their defense of the decrees of the Council of Chalcedon (451) which defined Jesus as “true God and true Man.”

The ancient roots of the Maronite Church are quite amazing. The early Maronites were descendents of the people who received the gift of Faith from Saint Peter himself. The Maronite Patriarch resides in Antioch which is where the early followers of Jesus were first called Christians (Acts 11:26). According to Eusebius, St. Peter founded the Church at Antioch and became its first bishop. Aramaic, the language spoken by Jesus, is still the liturgical language of the Maronite Church.

The cloistered, contemplative Maronite Monks of the Most Holy Trinity in Petersham were founded in 1978 and are dedicated to a life of prayer and Eucharistic Adoration. “The particular goal of the Maronite Monks of Most Holy Trinity is to participate in the hidden and suffering life of Jesus Christ. The spirit of the community is especially to consist in this: that it is joined to Christ as a body appropriated by Him in His love and adoration of the Father and pouring out of Himself in love for His brothers.”

On the Feast of  St. Peter and St. Paul, the Maronites pray in the Divine Liturgy: “O Lord, preserve your children from all error or deviation, grant us to live and die proclaiming: ‘Our faith is the faith of Peter, the faith of Peter is our faith!’” May we today have the faith and courage of the early Maronites!

 

 

Cloistered life, Women's Communities

Daughters of Elijah

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Last week, I had the privilege of visiting the Hermits of St. Mary of Carmel in Houston, Minnesota, a diocesan institute of autonomous right following the Primitive Rule.  I was not planning to spend more than an hour but the conversation was so lively and the tour so interesting that the time flew by like the breeze. We found we had a lot in common, where we grew up, etc., so there was a lot of laughter.

The prioress was a Carmelite for the Aged and Infirm for 25 years. Another sister was originally a Poor Clare until she experienced the call within a call. The youngest sister was a Carmelite in Singapore who felt drawn to the hermit life which took her to Ireland and finally to Minnesota. One sister, in search of the hermit life, worked on Mount Carmel then went to Italy and finally to Minnesota. There is also a postulant and 3 others who will soon be coming to experience their unique life.

Most of the women who “come and see” what the life is like do not stay. Some feel called to live a solitary life as a canonical hermit (Canon 603). Others return to traditional community life. The blend of community life and eremitical life is difficult. St. Bruno said that some amount of community life is necessary to make the life livable. Nevertheless, it is a call for the few.

This is not a place to escape to or a place to escape from problems. If anything, if you come in carrying a lot of unresolved issues, they will be brought to the cold light of day.  Many people come but “few are chosen.”

The center/community building is on a hill overlooking a valley and the individual hermitages. The chapel is in the middle with a bay window overlooking the hermitages. The tabernacle is made of glass containing a large consecrated host in a small monstrance. The tabernacle is lit at night so that all the sisters can see it from their hermitages. It must be quite a sight to see the golden glow of the Lord in the dark of night.

They accept only alms for their support. If the Lord wants their life to continue, then He will provide.

Visitors are welcome but silence and quiet is the norm. You can write to them for more information at 33005 Stinson Ridge Road, Houston, MN 55943. They do not have a website or use email.

Cloistered life, News, Women's Communities

The Heartbeat of the Church

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Somehow, I don’t equate southern Florida with a cloistered, contemplative community but on that point, I am wrong in more ways than one! The Poor Clares of the Monastery of San Damiano of St. Clare in Fort Myers Beach recently celebrated their 25th anniversary in the Diocese of Venice. They, in turn, are a “daughter house” of the Poor Clares in Delray Beach, Florida, who came to the newly created Diocese of Miami in 1960.

Much like the papal line of succession, the Poor Clares can trace their lineage back to the first monastery that their founder, St. Francis of Assisi, began in Assisi, Italy, in 1212, with their foundress Saint Clare. St. Clare lived with her sisters for 42 years in the monastery of San Damiano in Assisi. Going forward 800 years, Delray Beach was founded by the Poor Clares in Bordentown, New Jersey, which was founded by Jamaica Plain, Massachusetts, which was founded by Evansville, Indiana, which was founded by Omaha, Nebraska, which was founded by San Lorenzo Roma, in Italy, which was founded by Ss. Cosmas and Damian Rome, which was founded by San Damiano in 1233. And if this isn’t enough to make you dizzy, their are over 800 Poor Clare monasteries in all parts of the world!

The sisters’ life in Florida revolves around the traditional monastic blend of work and prayer. Their ministry is prayer— for the Church, for the diocese in which they reside and for all God’s people.

Bishop Frank J. Dewane expressed his feelings about the Poor Clares in a letter to the community: “San Damiano Monastery has remained true to the mission of its founding. This Monastery participates each and every day in the same charism which filled and motivated St. Francis and St. Clare… like your two venerable founders, you have left all and given yourselves entirely to living the Gospel life — for the greater glory of God and for the salvation of souls. Your life of prayer and community is the ‘heartbeat’ of our Church.”

Mary Almighty God bless you. May He look on you with the eyes of His mercy and give you peace. 

Here below may He pour forth his graces on you abundantly, and in heaven may He place you among His saints. 

Blessing of Saint Clare

Cloistered life, Women's Communities

A Daughter of St. Dominic and the Church

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Christendom College has seen an extraordinary number of young women enter religious life. One beautiful story is that of  Sr. Mary Jordan, O.P. (Ida Friemoth, ’05), now a member of the Dominican Monastery of St. Jude in Marbury, Alabama, who made her Solemn Profession as a cloistered Dominican nun in August of 2012.

She chose to attend Christendom College because she desired to learn Truth, especially the truths of Thomistic philosophy and theology. The great Dominican, St. Thomas Aquinas, and his teachings were “an incomparable preparation for our doctrinal study as Dominican nuns, and even more so for understanding and living the virtuous life.”

For Sr. Mary Jordan, her time at Christendom was her first exposure to the Latin Mass and Gregorian Chant. When she visited the Monastery of St. Jude for the first time and heard the Divine Office sung in the traditional Dominican chant, her heart soared; “God was using the liturgical formation I received at Christendom to point out to me where He wished me to be His.”

At Christendom, she learned that the highest use of anything is to dedicate it to God. Now her whole life is dedicated to Him and as such, concerned and praying for the whole world. Every day the nuns at the monastery take turns keeping an Hour of Guard, praying the Rosary before Our Lord in the Blessed Sacrament as Our Lady’s Guard of Honor. Someone is always there, in the chapel; interceding for the world.

Sr. Mary Jordan said, “I have discovered in the monastery the truth of what Peter Kreeft once said: that perhaps the most powerful warriors in the fight between the Culture of Life and the Culture of Death are the contemplatives spending hours a day in prayer before the Blessed Sacrament.”

For more information about the Dominican Monastery in Marbury whose common life includes the solemn celebration of the Liturgy, Eucharistic Adoration and Perpetual Rosary, Marian Consecration, and fidelity to the Magisterium of the Church, visit their website.

Cloistered life, Men's communities

Gregorian Masses Said Here!

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We often get the question about which religious orders say Gregorian Masses. While doing research on Saint Bruno, the founder of the Carthusians, I discovered that the Carthusians in Vermont take offerings for Gregorian Masses. The only Carthusian Charterhouse in North America is in Vermont. For any of you who have seen the movie, Into Great Silence, you will know how remarkable their life is.

A Gregorian Mass consists of 30 masses said on 30 consecutive days for the repose of a soul of a deceased person. They cannot be offered for the living. The customary stipend for a Gregorian Mass is $300.00.  The address for the Charterhouse is:

Charterhouse of the Transfiguration, Carthusian Monastery, 1084 Ave Maria Way, Arlington, VT, 05250

They do not allow visitors to the charterhouse. The monks’ life is one of prayer and fasting totally dedicated to God. The Carthusians were founded in 1084 by Saint Bruno in France. Their Motherhouse today is La Grande Chartreuse in the same valley.

In the interior and exterior silence of his solitude, the monk lives for God, and for God alone. The members of other monastic Orders also seek God in silence or solitude, but for Carthusians silence and solitude are the principal means to find Him. Inner silence – poverty in spirit – creates the empty space necessary to experience God’s presence in our heart, which transcends all words. “Let him make a practice of resorting, from time to time, to a tranquil listening of the heart, that allows God to enter through all its doors and passages.” (Statutes 4,2)

 

Cloistered life, Men's communities, Women's Communities

Two Communities, One Act of Praise

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Something you don’t find everyday in the modern world, much less in the U.S., is a twin community of nuns and monks. Such a community of Benedictines exists in Petersham, MA. The St. Scholastica Priory houses a group of nine nuns and the Monastery of St. Mary, a group of seven monks.  Both live a contemplative life of prayer in service to God, the Church and world.

St. Scholastica Priory is an independent priory of Pontifical Right. St. Mary’s is a dependent house of the Abbey of Pluscarden in Scotland. When there are enough members in the men’s community, they will become an autonomous community as is typical for Benedictines.

The nuns and monks live a monastic life according to the Rule of Saint Benedict and pray the office in Latin using Gregorian Chant , except for Matins and Vespers. Monks from St Mary’s serve as the sisters’ chaplains. The monks’ Novus Ordo Mass is in English with sung parts in Latin and Greek.

As it says on the St. Scholastica website: The Benedictine life is both ordinary and human, extraordinary and divine. It is ordinary and human because St. Benedict in his Rule encourages us to get on with the business of monastic life; it is extraordinary and divine because it is a response to a call from God and it is a life lived for others.

The sisters will hold a Monastic Experience weekend for young women who may be called to this life from February 15-17, 2013.  Please email smangkloss333@aol.com or call 978-724-3213 for more information.

To thee, therefore, my speech is now directed, who, giving up thine own will, takest up the strong and most excellent arms of obedience, to do battle for Christ the Lord, the true King. Rule of St. Benedict

 

 

Cloistered life, Women's Communities

A First for Albania

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When I was growing up, I remember Enver Hoxha claiming he had established the first completely atheistic country in the world – Albania. Nuns were driven out of their convents and priests were murdered. The homeland of Mother Teresa was devastated and impenetrable  from all but those who pray.

Pope Benedict called Mother Teresa “this chosen daughter of Albania” who “proclaimed to all that God is love and that He loves every human being, especially those who are poor and neglected. In fact, love itself constitutes the true revolutionary power that changes the world and leads it forward towards fulfillment.”

Well, just recently, the Carmelites have established the first-ever Carmelite monastery in the country. A group of Croatian nuns from several communities have left home and homeland to bring the light of Christ to the Albanians in Nynshat. Monsignor Gjergj said that there was so much sin in the country and so many prayers are needed for healing and renewal. For years, the sacraments have been unavailable to the people or the people were not prepared to receive them.

The Carmelite vocation is to live a life of prayer and penance for the Church and for the sanctification of priests. Here, they also pray for the Albanian Church. Many people view the Church as simply a social service organization. He hopes the Carmelites will be a witness of the life to come that is prepared for by sacrifice and suffering and self-abandonment. Now a new springtime can begin.

Pope John Paul II visited Albania in 1993 and encouraged the people  “to continue united and strong on the journey which leads to complete freedom.”

See this YouTube clip of the sisters inaugural time in their new homeland.

 

 

Cloistered life, Women's Communities

A Technology Leap of Faith

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Not much has changed for the Carmelites over the past 900 years. Their priorities remain unchanged – prayer, solitude and work to support the community. But for the Carmelites of Santa Fe, New Mexico, a new era has dawned – they have a website! www.carmelofsantafe.org

This IRL Affiliate community of 8 nuns was established in 1945 by Mother Mary Teresa who was forced to flee Mexico in the face of the terrible persecution suffered by Catholics in that country. She died in 1997 in Jefferson City, MO, at another Carmel that she also had founded.

The Santa Fe Carmelites are situated in the foothills of the Sangre de Cristo (Blood of Christ) Mountains, on the high desert of northern New Mexico.  They are a part of the Spanish Catholic legacy that has been present in Santa Fe for more than 400 years. Santa Fe means Holy Faith!

The charism of the sisters is guided by their foundress, St. Teresa of Avila, and by St. John of the Cross, another Carmelite. They live in the presence of God, in imitation of Mary and the prophet Elijah, who awaited God in his hermitage on Mount Carmel, 900 years before Christ.

See a story about the Santa Fe Carmelites in the Santa Fe New Mexican