Those to whom you have given the gift of faith, you may also do peace. Faith and peace. Now in many minds I understand that very well. Because of our commitments here, and because of the restricted number of people the great number also of unseasoned people the fact that we are not yet really provided constitutions therefore it's the question really are we spiritually or physically strong enough to make a foundation.

[01:07]

And if one puts that question kind of in this way, then I'm afraid the answer would have to be no. I think I would ask, you know, for it to look, let us look That's the thing in concreto. Why does the problem come up right now? Now, they are simply a chain of, let's say, really, in some way, accidental circumstances. It's not a thing that comes out really, let's say, organically out of our the general situation grows, so to speak, as a ripe fruit, you know, that is kind of ready to fall off the tree.

[02:16]

It is rather, if we do it, of course, everybody realizes then it is a certain risk which is undertaken, I'm saying under the occasioned, you know, by circumstances which are not, let's say, don't come completely out from the within. Marcus Deli. There is, first of all, there is no doubt, there is that this project wouldn't even have come up without the person and that's the very special initiative of Father Hirte. Father Hirte had a great longing right away when North Syria was stated to come and to join us.

[03:25]

However, he was then detained. He didn't get the permission. Why? Because he was headmaster at the Portsmouth Priory. And he was, as such, the time was spent to be indispensable. There was also quite a number of younger people especially who put great stock in him for the future and maybe for the possibility of his becoming superior and so on and then to give to the whole monastery a certain different direction. So that all I say then, because it shows, you know, which I think the picture is important, that Father Erwitt really has now suffered a lot.

[04:39]

I mean, he came into the monastery with, you have to say, pretty clear inner a call and an inner direction was of course on one side there was a great attachment and inner attachment to Portsmouth. There's Portsmouth, there's place and people there and so on. He went to school there and but on the other hand there was in him a also a strong and, I think, very clear monastic call to the monastic life. And he entered Portsmouth with that in mind and with the hope, you know, that that eventually would be realized. He entered when Father Gregory was prior in Portsmouth.

[05:46]

Then the general development was towards a stricter monastic, deeper monastic erection. But then, of course, he was, he joined Portsmouth and he became a mermaid in his profession. Then, of course, he was right away very much diverted from the from the thing that really had been the purpose of his joining the monastery. As I say, he was involved right away in the things, important administrative things concerning the school as headmaster. And he did that with, I must say, with great Generosity, but always, always with a certain sense also of, I wouldn't say only frustration, but a certain sense of inner, to say, inner doubts, you know, that he, was he really following there the will of God for him.

[07:11]

As I say, he came later on, He was eager, you know, to join Mount Saviour, but then again he had to wait for many years until he was finally granted the permission. In that, or in some way, now all these things are part of divine forbiddance, but I think that's a long delay. He contributed a great deal to the fact that he then, later on, now one can put it maybe this way, somehow, it was maybe too late. Too late in that way that for him, with his strong inner, let us say, direction, let's say, with that inner thing he has, in him to become fully a cult.

[08:17]

He was here, as you know, for long years as a guestmaster, and as guestmaster he was now half in, half out of the community. Now we all know, of course, that that we owe him a great deal in what he did. for Mount Saviour. We also have, I think, during these years, we have learned to appreciate him very much and the seriousness of his monastic aspirations. It's not, of course, now he is approaching the 50s, you know, so it's Some way, I think, the way it presents itself to him, also left for him, is a great question.

[09:21]

Not, as you know, very real. I mean, there is no question of, let's say, lack of a sense of obedience or lack of any kind of spiritual qualities. But there is a certain sense of frustration, you know, but of a deeper frustration. Now, all these things were kind of became more and more acute in the course of the years, especially during the last year, and it finally culminated in this, that he asked for a leave of absence to gain a proper objective distance to things, and also then with the idea of looking around maybe for a possible foundation in connection with this monastery.

[10:34]

And at the time I gave him that permission. A little I must confess the idea that Those things usually take a long time to scan the horizon from Maine to Canada, Michigan and New Mexico is of course a long range proposition. Now as things turned out they really They fell into place, at least it seems to be, in New Mexico at a rather fast pace. The location there is, I mean, another thing that he feels, as you saw that yesterday, as really very favorable.

[11:41]

for the purpose then there is the readiness which I can only subscribe to and confirm of the people down there for this kind of a monastic vocation and then of course the other factor which was completely up in suspense, because the Archbishop, as you know, had just died, just a week or so before I went down there, of the Catholic Art Association, and of course, who would be the successor, nobody would know, could know, and all these factors of uncertainty were there, and then, lo and behold, the Archbishop is chosen and installed and one must really say that of course that is to my mind an enormous factor in the whole picture to have an archbishop who comes new into the diocese and one of the first things you know is this very deeply favorable reaction to this

[13:07]

to the idea of having this very monastic foundation in his archdiocese so one can be sure that he is and he understands the nature of it and he agrees with it. That's, of course, an enormously important factor one wouldn't find so easily. So, all these things then, and also then the fact, you know, that at the present it's a, let's say, a delay which naturally would put off the thing practically not only for one year but what would mean a really longer delay until monastic life could start down there and so the All this chain of circumstances brings us into the present situation.

[14:08]

It forces us to some kind of a decision. At the moment when many factors are naturally in the air which would give us the general feeling that this is, to say, a rather hasty and a rather risky undertaking. So as far as this timing and the present situation goes, it really doesn't come out from within. It's kind of dictated to us by external circumstances. but and therefore the question arises now and could be asked maybe now do we do this then merely to to accommodate Father Erewhead and now there I would just indicate a few points that you probably have in mind yourself too

[15:17]

First of all, do we do this merely to accommodate Father Irwin? No, now if one takes that simply on the surface, let's say, on a surface appearance, you know, then one would say we cannot naturally do this merely to accommodate Father Irwin. However, we, because is not a member of the community. However, one should, I think, consider that, in fact, Fr. Aylward came here. Fr. Aylward's coming here seems to me, cannot be simply considered as an accident. I mean, there is in all these things, I would say, if it were evidence and became evident to us then in the course of the years in which he was here, that he was one of these people that Saint Benedict describes in the chapter on a monk who comes from the outside.

[16:35]

If he is a man who demands this, demands this, is not satisfied with this, not satisfied with that, anything like that, then the decision would be clear, there is, we cannot accommodate to this person because this person is not directed by the Holy Spirit. So let us say an individualist couldn't get along, you know, in his own monastery or something like that. I think we can sincerely and in this important moment we can say before God that is not the case. Father Erwin has shown that his monastic spirit and qualities, he has shown to us that he is absolutely ready to accept the situations, he is not a complainer, not in any way murmuring around, he is not an individualist.

[17:40]

There are therefore, as far as human frailty can know it, there are signs there, you know, that this is something, you know, that the saviour is in God's providence, it is, somehow we must see there a divine intention. Then it's of course also true that in concerning a person of Father Erwitt, so that in accommodating, let's say once, ourselves to Father Erwitt in this way that we are helping him, you know, to do this thing, I would say that on our part I think there is a the basic motive would be, and absolutely can be, sincerely, a spiritual one, a monastic one. We would do this really in the service of monasticism and with a certain inner assurance that his person is known to us as

[18:57]

acting in the Holy Spirit. And then there is also, naturally, there is the call of the church. There's no doubt about it. It's down there in New Mexico, with which the whole Latin area of South American era really opens up and this call of the church is kind of to us is officially brought to our attention by the unusually welcoming attitude of the Archbishop of that church down there. Then the question is also that we do we, the small saviour, derive any other benefits from it? To my mind, one of the reasons why we even were thinking of a foundation is the fact that up to this moment we are isolated here in this

[20:05]

country and for us the formation of a congregation is really a tremendously important thing. But we can't do that, as you know, only if there is a number of monasteries. I think it's at least three or two or three. that are required, you know, to form. So we would, as you know, as soon as a congregation is constituted, this congregation is really The primate always emphasized that to me again and again and in Rome is really an order by itself, and therefore has a great amount of independence and therefore a great amount also of freedom and possibility of legally, authoritatively establishing its way of life.

[21:10]

And in that way, it affects us, certainly affects us in a very positive way. It's a step also, I would say, in our own development. And there is the other factor, which is that the ideal of the foundation, as Father Herold has in mind, is really an idea and an idea which is very much our own. The individual, the concrete realization of it, Yeah, that must be in many ways different from here, but the general idea of what we call a monastic foundation which is therefore not geared to a certain definite work.

[22:17]

which is in that way therefore contemplative, which is the monastic life lived for its own sake as a way of life. For example, the whole idea too, which is rather Heriot's idea and becomes also clearer and clearer to us. For example, the whole thing, the monastic community as essentially a lay community. Then also Heriot's ideas concerning the monastic worship, all these things that through the council are brought and are being brought into the fore. All these things, naturally, it's very eager and completely rooted in that essential direction, which is essentially also ours.

[23:26]

If another foundation like that here in this country seems to me is for us a positive gain and therefore would also contribute to solidify, it seems to me, in the long run our own position. Then comes naturally the other consideration, a concrete consideration, which would have a great influence, say, on our practical decision at the moment is the, let us say, the nature the nature of this new foundation as far as the, let's say, its geological position is concerned. You would certainly think, you know, that these common ideas that I just touched upon are offering enough of a common ground

[24:36]

in order to establish the houses, these houses, eventually in one congregation. At the present moment, the question is, of course, what kind of a house would it be? And now there are, as you know, there are possibilities that uh... the house would be a uh... to really be constituted as a uh... depending house and uh... with uh... let's say depending on the uh... superior here and so on, maybe also uh... sending novices here and things like that I think that all the considerations that we have had together in these last weeks, or days, since Father Ehrlich has been back, have more and more brought to us, at least also to me,

[25:53]

He made it clear, you know, that such a foundation needs naturally a, let us say, a maximum of independence. It must be able to live up to its own laws, so to speak. It has to have, therefore, it would maybe canonically, at the present time, it would be constituted as a Prioratus Simplex. or as they sometimes call it, a chela. But I think it would be so that the superior, then it would be appointed as it was, I think, in our case, where the prior was appointed, I think, first for a period of three years or so, and then it was renewed, as far as I know, it wasn't, it was constituted, or was it ad nutum? Ad nutum. I mean, at least one would give such a setup, you know, which would give Father Hilbert, let us say, a maximum of assurance, you know, to be able, you know,

[27:13]

form and developed this house, you know, according to the nature of the place. It's so different, you know, here from our setup here, according to the all the climate, all these things, the nature of the people, all that has to be taken into consideration. Also, let us say, Father Erwitt's own, let us say, charism as found a place and so on. All that should be given, I think we all agree this, it should not be simply a copy of this house. There must be a certain liberty and freedom of development. It's so important, I think, for Fr. Erwin, and we know that from our own experience here at Mount Savior, one of our great, of course, at the same time risks, but at the same time also of our advantage, our great advantage was just this great freedom and independence that we had, which enabled us to

[28:35]

let's say, establish a community with a definite inner spirit. And that must be, that possibility also, I think, should be provided there. I'm sure, for example, the question of, you know, Vichy, I'm sure that if people come there and there's no doubt, no reason why they couldn't be there as, I mean, as candidates, nothing canonical, postulants or candidates, you know, for A time, a place like that, attracts from the vocations down there. So when I was down there in Santa Fe, the rector there on the seminar told me that it was the diocese with the most vocations in the entire southwest.

[29:40]

and that they had so many applications that they couldn't accommodate them in a seminary. So, I mean, there are vocabularies. If it catches the imagination down there, then I'm absolutely sure one has the facts. We can at any time, we can apply to the congregation of religious, to the Abbot Primate, to give the house its own officiate and therefore, let's say, make it not have it dependent on these poor Spaniards coming to the Elmira in the winter and all kinds of things, going into the unsettling circumstances, you know. But, I mean, that is, I think, a very serious consideration. We must do our most, you know, that a thing like that really gets its original native face.

[30:46]

And that then brings us to the other concrete question, you know, which is, of course, plays a great role, and that is then what is demanded of us in order to do this, you know. Now, I would say that, it seems to me, the best thing is to do this as a matter of a foundation, as I say, a priorato simplex. For that, of course, we absolutely need also the permission of the Habit Parliament. But I think we leave it to the Habit Parliament. The Habit Parliament thinks under these circumstances the congregation is religious, you know. Should the house maybe canonically arise in the beginning and somewhere else they did it with us? Now that is then another question. they may decide that by themselves. But what is the merit of us in practical help?

[31:51]

And there's the first question is in as far as manpower goes. Their father Hilbert's ideas are very definite that he really of course he knows the situation here But he does not think that under his circumstances, the situation, the fact that we cannot give much help in the way of manpower would be a detriment. But just as in our case, when we started here, is in some way a positive factor. It forces, let us say, people into a closer bond so that as far as that goes, he would count on One man, at the most, two. And that, I think, would be that. Then, as far as financial assistance goes.

[32:55]

Now, the question of financial assistance, I think, from what we know at the present moment, The property then has been offered to Father Ered to acquire it. The man, Galegos, there asked for $25,000. And that is $25,000 for about 115 acres. That is, of course, about twice as much as we have here, even a little more. But that are the prices down there. he has asked the lawyers down there if that was in any way an exorbitant price and they said absolutely not that is what the usual thing and especially considering the nature of the of the place itself it is river valley and of course the river valley down there probably is the most considered the most valuable land in New Mexico and as you know it is rather scarce

[33:57]

then the, so that now in what form, you see, that financial assistance is given by us, you know, in what form? In the form of a loan or something like that. Then there could be also all the questions. One thing is sure that Mr. Gallegos would ask right in the beginning for initial payment of $15,000. And then we would naturally also, I think, have to back him up, at least be ready, you know, to help with the putting up of the necessary buildings and enlarged buildings. And that would come probably between $5,000 or $7,000, but the question is naturally if that would be, as I say, the most.

[35:00]

And the question is, however, it's a factor that we do not know. People now are enthusiastic and they promise all kinds of assistance, but we have our little experience in that too, and many of these promises then later on go up into smoke and that might be there too. So there must be some kind of security on our part that we are willing and able, you know, to give that kind of assistance. Therefore, it seems to me that neither, as far as the help in manpower is concerned, nor the financial assistance would be really beyond our possibilities. But that we may then discuss among ourselves.

[36:03]

I just wanted to outline is there kind of tonight. I think we must think of our own beginnings that were rather risky, of course not. Risks are not always too absolutely desirable, but we came here with all we had, the debts. Of course, from the natural point of view, it was rather risky, very risky, However, they were invisible or visible, there was a cloud of systems, you know, around, and I think that that is the case here too. One cannot put the thing around too much, and Father Hewitt, of course, cannot say now here, I'm sure I will get so much money on this one, I will get so much money on that one, all that, but we know that there is a

[37:11]

a cloud of witnesses around this foundation too. So then perhaps tomorrow we will kind of continue and then discuss that. Today at Mars we started the enjoyed multe tribulationes justorum. many other tribulations of the just at the same the next sentence that next from all these tribulations God will save and that is also our wish to you Father Herod and to Father Placid and Father Basil and we think of our own tribulation too, because to lose you and to send you away is for all of us really a great sacrifice.

[38:20]

I would like to express this morning on the anniversary of your ordination Father Ered, also our thanks for anything that you have done here in the service of the gifts and especially also in the service of the souls in the community. And the fact that you, we are going to lose you will be very much filled by all the same. Naturally also for Father Placid and for Father Berzel in that way. We take part in these tribulations justorum. What we do, we put it on a pattern. You and our own loss that God may accept this sacrifice and that it may help you and save you out of the many tribulations that you have to expect.

[39:29]

We all, and you, have no illusions about it, that this work of a new foundation is not simply a pushover, but it will be a tremendous and difficult job. The devil will do what he can in order to tempt you, in order to divide you, in order to make things difficult. In every way he can. The country and the nature of the foundation too is of such a nature that it imposes, will impose many hardships on you and also your own intention. The spirit in which you begin your foundation, the way in which you want to build the community life, all that shows to God your absolute, complete willingness and surrender to give your life for Him.

[40:36]

And naturally, God in His providence, in His loving kindness, He will take you by your word and in that way lead you into peace. That is our great inner assurance. That is also what this moment, which is in many ways so sad for us, is also a great consolation. Every sacrifice that we offer, we offer it really as a Eucharist here, as a thanksgiving to through Christ who has given his life for us, through the Father who has bound us as it were in the flood of his mercies. So I wanted to express that in front of the name of the whole community and I think also the Mass this morning, the way it was sung shows to you that we are deeply with you and that we rejoice over the decision which has been made and that we consider that as a great special grace from God that after relatively few years we are able to

[42:00]

to do this, and in that way willing to serve the cause of that monasticism that we have tried to define during these days, and which I think all those who listen to it, and all those who receive this message, feel that it is really a truly seeking God, and that is an acceptable sacrifice. I don't know how you feel, but the day after one might be feeling the loss more than yesterday. Our Savior is not the same without those three of our brethren that have left. I think it's a great consolation for all of us that the sacrifice which we bring is the sacrifice of men in whom we trust, who we can be sure will not disappoint us.

[43:18]

will be a good foundation for that new beginning there. And our sacrifice therefore will be, I'm sure, be blessed by God. And whatever being done down there, also difficult circumstances as we know, and by people, our three brethren, who are eager to follow Christ into the desert, and to live with Him there, as a way of total dedication of their lives, that is for us a blessing. being done there, we will reflect here, we will help our own spirit, we will feel more rich, we will feel really before God blessed in that special way in which a mother is blessed for that has brought a child into the world.

[44:28]

Before that is Birth parents are there and there is much Christicia and sadness, but then once the child is there, then the mother rejoices. And that is also for us, I think, is true. So, however, this sacrifice we bring has a certain concrete repercussions in our own family, parents, the work that has been done, the offices that have been administered by those three conferors now have to be filled again. After the experience we had yesterday with the first new charter, the council got together right away.

[45:31]

And shook their hat again. And the paintings are as follows. There is the guest master is Father Luke. He is helped by assistant guest master is Father Martin, who then also takes care of the of the monks that come here, monk visitors. Maybe Hortzum has a special eye on the babies. I mean, I think that... The single tale chapter is Father Lohn's. the Chronicler, Father David, the Archivista, also Father Lawrence, Stephen Javius, Father Martin, who then also is Master of the Diptychs.

[46:46]

First Cantor is Father Gregory, Housemaster, Father Gabriel, and Ortulanus, or the Elias, special admission to be careful in the preparation of war out of sorts, handling all the graves. I think we all feel the same. In the same way, I mean in this way, that we are leaving up, or at least quite lost,

[47:57]

But I wanted to just say a word of encouragement and consolation in this situation. I think the whole process through which we arrived at this conclusion and this decision that became pretty clear to us that here generosity on our part towards this and towards the brethren that are involved in it.

[49:17]

Indeed be a great blessing for the community by now to a great extent also because a, let us say, a stuffing stifling of this initiative, the circumstances in which we were, to my mind, would have not led to anything. It would not have brought about a real say, solution. But by the fact that we have done this, then I'm sure that even, for example, if still Rome would say no to this project, which is possible, not probable, but possible, we put it into the hands of the authorities, even if the project may for one or the other reason not

[50:24]

will have the success that we hope for. I think that the community as a whole, and the brethren who go down there, have gone down there and embarked on that they would come home and that we would be reunited and we would not be poor but we would be richer. Hence the whole community would have experienced, as we are experiencing that already now, an enough, I would say an enough purgation. Something that we have done in faith and that we have done, I think, in the end, and Christ has helped us to do that in the end with a maximum of generosity.

[51:31]

That is a victory for Christ, for all of us. That is therefore something that would interfere with us with great peace and with great joy. It doesn't mean, as in all supernatural things and all things of grace, it doesn't mean that the suffering is taken away. It doesn't mean that we don't feel the loss and that we don't feel that those whom we were very close to are not now daily, say, in the realm of our eyes and of our meeting and of our voice and so on. That on, indeed, is a great sacrifice. But let us take it, you know, really in this sense. Let us break through this crust, or this lostness that is there.

[52:39]

Let us rejoice in the inner happening, in the inner event. inner grace for the whole community. And let us remember that the absence of these brethren and the experience of the loss of fraternal opportunity, fraternal love and rejoicing and living together, that this lack will be filled by Christ and by the special sweetness of his presence. Provide us that we interiorly, that we kind of all together aspire wise to the occasion, that means take it deeply in a supernatural spirit. and that therefore also we, those who are now here, that they would, in their mutual relations, consider this, the loss that all are suffering, and would therefore try, by themselves already, to do what Christ wants us to do, to replace, to make up for this loss by our own goodness, kindness,

[54:10]

patience. For example, in our mutual relations, which in many ways may be even more burdensome than they were before, to realize that we are all suffering, therefore to refrain from outbursts of any impatience. And in various things in which we get into contact with one another, for example, also to point out in relation, in the context of this chapter of thoughts, the writing of notes. These writing of notes to avoid deliberately studiously anything that would be sharp, or sound sharp, or would in any way be able to Always leaving the door open for reconciliation, for better mutual understanding.

[55:16]

Not slamming doors shut, you know, but open always. Therefore, in that way, carry one another's burden in a real positive, inner cooperation of charity. And that would be for all men, for the community, tremendous help. And then to consider those who have left us always as still with us, so that what they do is what we do. Their doing is our doing. they do in the desert, you know, that is our riches. It's part of the riches of this community. So it's a great, it's a great reason for rejoicing. And we know that the three who went down there are with the grace of Christ, of God, able to do that.

[56:24]

be pleasing to God in their efforts. And therefore we say, Lumen Christi, Deo gratias. Consider that, you know, that we all cooperate to replace the loss that we have suffered by additional and increased war mutual consideration. Long-suffering and kindness, avoiding any grumbling of thunderstorms and so on. All that should be deliberately avoided. Instead of that, building up the house of God and the spirit of that love that Christ has planted into our hearts. that of the journeys for the novices. It's already several days that we have the joy to have Father Peter here among us.

[57:36]

Sometimes these tricks of Divine Providence just came at the moment in which our little group left for New Mexico. himself is thinking of going and has been accepted by the bishop in North Carolina to start a little group there here on your to lead the monastic life in a section which is I think 1% Catholic at the present time and of course presents the problem of the He caused special difficulties, but also special opportunities of witness. So I know that we are all very much interiorly behind Fr. Peter, so I ask him to give today the Verbum Bonum for the community.

[58:42]

Fr. Peter. Thank you. When starting a little foundation, there are some questions which always could be put. And who I am? So many little foundations. And the question was put to me incidentally during my trip of prospection by a man who was a potent curandio at Curia Romana. It concerned me that some of their monasteries, which I have to see in Mexico, and he told me, Father, truly are all those new foundations, worked by the Holy Spirit. And the only answer I could tell him was, why not, Father? I smiled and said, yes, why not? That is a tough question.

[59:44]

Also, why many and not one? But there are also so many ordinary small circumstances when we are involved in this question, we see how we are a little part of the decision of ourselves, and we see how many circumstances, what we know, what we don't know, what happens, made several foundations be done, and it is among those causes accordingly by which the Providence is leading things, and we may suppose that they are the way the Providence wants it also. I think not only the foundation in New Mexico, but also one I know very well, this foundation of Father Pedro Sánchez, whom you may know because he spent a few days here a few years ago, found in the state of Nuevo León, in the Pacific coast of Mexico.

[60:49]

He is exactly in the situation of being when there is a bishop who is his relative, but he has a handicap because he has three small Indian villages to take care of at the same time as his foundation, which makes it difficult. And I recommend it to the community. I could spend a few days with him and help him as I could for the office, for the organization of the Mass. similar things. All these foundations are according to almost the same pattern, which is very small, the number of members being 10 or 12, and there is a little problem about it, because vocations could not be limited to 10 or 12, there could come more, many, but I see for my case, already the bishop had told me, when you have more than 10 or 12, I shall give a land for each group which will be separated.

[62:00]

It is not always so good to have this good proposition. He announced once, when I went with him to confirmations, and to graduations, everywhere he was announcing the foundation, and once he foresaw the future where his diocese will be spread by little communities at that time. This diocese had is more than 600 miles broad. There is space for it. They say that dioceses could and will in the future make five, five dioceses, but for the time being, due to the little number of Catholics, it was 0.3% three or four years ago. It is now 1%. but it is still less than China, for the Catholics, and less than black Africa.

[63:04]

It is truly a mission country. We feel it very much, more than in any other country I saw. In Martinique it is not a country mission, but there it is. And the priests who come are very good. They came from the North. several came from this diocese, others from Hartford, and they came to be missionaries, to spend their life in a place where they would not have beautiful rectories, where they would not have money, and they received for each month fifty dollars. And they had to pay their food, and their laundry, and everything like that. And they know what they are facing when they come There are about 120 priests in the diocese, I think, and there are not 20 from North Carolina.

[64:06]

All the others came to help missionaries. Until a very few years, they had a trailer as a... working parish with mass being said in many places because the parishes are not very many and it could be multiplied with that. One of the purposes of this, one of the main intentions of what I would like is unity. It is why I wanted to do that in a a place where I worried the color problem. I even thought a little more in the South. And the problem, as we were speaking yesterday in recreation, is acute in all the South, but is existing truly still in North Carolina.

[65:09]

And even if there will be no ministry at all and the bishop is very much wanting it to be purely contemplative to live among people who are in need of unity is something which could be useful in the diocese and also being de facto when the bishop that is not exempt could have the source of difficulties but also is a good thing because now the stress is so much put on what is the diocese in the church that to have monastic life also inserted in a diocese with the special work which is the monastic work the prayer, the intercession and being close to God in union with all the priests of the diocese and united with the special intentions of the diocese was something very well understood and wanted by the bishop and it seems to me.

[66:18]

that it has also something good besides the other situations where monks are ordinary. Unity in concerning race, It is not an extraordinary thing to have mixed communities, but even now in those parts of the States, rarely the colored members of communities are in the South. They are still in the Novi Shets, in the houses they have in the North. They hesitate still now to come to the South. And I would like to have in Nix, but we cannot, in matter of vocations, count those who got calls. There is one young negro who asked me for a confirmation that the Franciscans had already assigned him to be a thief.

[67:22]

But later on, I hope to have some colored moths. Even here, there is something of the... I remember that the first, who called the first white, the first non-Indian, who dwelled on the spot of one's saviour was a slave which had escaped from the South at least a hundred years ago. That makes a little of the idea common. He lived in the marsh which is close to St. John. And also there is the idea of unity in Ecumenism. The diocese of North Carolina is very advanced in ecumenical works, and the bishop is best friend of the heads of all other congregations. They meet very often. Last week I had the request from a young Episcopalian minister to join the community I want to do.

[68:38]

That is maybe kind of like, but I am not sure that the communicable views, official ones, would accept it. Because he is one who knows this new communicable community in Missouri, that he wants something more benedictine, and something where the divine office could be sung in common. And now they, in Missouri, they plan to have, not to have, the divine of it in common with the Catholic priest to put that condition. And I don't see why not. Since when two or three are together, Christ in the midst of us, and the Corf and the Patriarch bread together, Then I don't know, but I would like that to be possible, is to prepare it, and to be, ah, there are so many non-Catholics, when they would know, and it could help to have the divine office in English, could be something which would help them to understand a little.

[70:00]

ordinary one, for the mass nothing in English, because the bishop is very strict about it, but open to all. That is another point I would like very much to try about the Divine Office, having a little the same questions and desires as you share all here about an adaptation and what is to be done in the Divine Office. I am in a privileged situation because in a Pia Unio there is no canonical status for a while, and there are lenders. I am the priest with them, but I have to guide them. Then they are not obliged canonically to a certain fixed divine office. And we could make experiments. And I would like to, first, to do what the Holy Road does.

[71:07]

We have been seen here for several days. With us are some of our omblates. This is the Kennedy of Eden. This is Father Tom Phelan of Eden. And there are now the Wayburns, Albert and Elsie. in a technical sense, spiritual sense, I also count in our old friend Dr. Morgana who is here with us. And I wanted to just in that connection out of the joy of our being together and also realizing the spiritual fruitfulness and the enormous importance of these contacts

[72:11]

for those of our oblates who come here for a time, but also for the community. If I cannot speak for everybody because it is impossible in a community like this, and that is also not essential to it at all, And every member of the community would have a personal contact, a deeper personal contact. But after all, if the superior has a contact, that is, as he feels, of great importance also for himself and he knows that anything that in that way is valid for the individual is in the structure and according to the will of our Lord and in the facing and living in the reality of Christ's mystical body

[73:20]

These things are never private things, but they are spiritual bonds on which the individual person certainly profits, but from which also the whole of the monastic community. I wanted to point that out. I think it has at least been from the very beginning one of the characteristics of this community. And it was very much always envisaged also and looked over to by me when we started this community. I know the same is also true of Father. Gregory, I always remember in that connection the exhortation given at that time by the, who is now our Holy Father, Father Six, that don't lock the doors, don't exclude people, include.

[74:22]

And I wanted to say then that one of the ways in which this kind of openness, I mean, in the Holy Spirit, this kind of enriching, you see, of this kind of entering into a certain spiritual fullness, is in a very special way realized in our contact with our own blades. After all, it may not be yet, we may not, we know that all these things are still in a kind of flux, you see, that we don't have a program, the United or Unified program of action, that an ombre has to do this thing every morning, has to do another thing every... evenings, prayers, and so on, and do something of this kind or that kind, that would be somehow put down black and white in the statutes of the oblate thing.

[75:31]

We are not, of course, in that way, and the oblates are not. a Catholic action group. But thank God that not everything in the church today is in that way, you know, conceived on the same terms, you know, Catholic action. A monastery is not Catholic action in this modern sense. It is a family which is united simply in the love of God, in the love of Christ, in which this love extends and is realized, the mutual personal relations of the members of this family, else death then naturally kind of abounds, it somehow radiates. And I think that this kind of thing, which is not, let us say, a matter of program, a matter of concrete, you know, points to be done, that for that reason, you know, could be in any way despised or could be ridiculed or anything like that, you know.

[76:45]

Know that this kind of thing flows from the voluntary and therefore loving, binding oneself in the oblation into a spiritual union with a monastic family to which one feels called, where there is a certain bond of sympathy, where there is an inner harmony of spirit, where there is a similarity of approach, where there is the appreciation of the divine things, of the beauty of the house of God, of the liturgy of all these things, that what makes the church the bride of Christ and where that love then takes a kind of concrete form in a, let's say, spiritual friendship between the Oblate and this family in which then the Oblate is also personally, interiorly, deeply interested which he, for example, carries in his prayers

[78:00]

to which he is interiorly open and which comes to his mind every day when he prays and says Compline or one or the other part of the divine office he feels he does that with the spiritual family there in the hills of Elmira that does the same thing at this time And if you think like that, you know, with several visits over the years, you know, if there's a thing which lasts for years and years and years, it isn't something very conspicuous, it isn't something that one can register, you know, in any way, but I think it is something enormously important. The world and the church don't live only on programs, but they live on personal relations. That is the oil in the machine of the church.

[79:04]

And I think the institution of oblates is and can contribute and be to a great extent just this kind of oil in the wheels of the church. But people today are also lay people. What is a layman? He is a baptized Christian like everybody else. Today one says, you know, the layman is there to work in the world. Now, that to my mind is a very one-sided aspect of a layman. To my mind, every layman through baptism and confirmation is called into the fullness of Christ. And this fullness of Christ certainly also includes the, how do you say, the fullness, the specific joy of the contemplative life. As an oblate he has an access there, he has a bond there, he has a connection there.

[80:08]

There is something where his heart kind of rests, where he can let his roots sink in. When he comes to the place, he knows that he is welcome. He knows that he is not, you know, then has to fill out, you know, some questionnaires about who it is and what his intention is, if he has a recommendation from his pastor or not. He is known, he is a friend, you know, of the house, you know, and therefore he gets the pugs, you know, the big ones. All that is of great, great, great importance. If one takes, for example, the fact that our brother Aidan is here now, our relation goes back, he may correct me, but I think it goes back into the 1940s. It was down in even keyboard already.

[81:11]

So, over these years, I mean, in attending then the operating meetings and so on, and something simply filters in. There is a process, you know, of inner growth, you know. Again, one cannot measure it, you know, stick, you know, how much growth this year, how much growth next year. But then a human person simply goes in another way. It is something that is simply in, one can say, and concerns the inner sanctuary of the soul. But then problems after years and years and years, then, for example, Our blade comes to this, you know, at the idea of the priesthood, you know, and suddenly the call, the reality of this call, you know, is kind of there. One can ask, now, where does it come from?

[82:12]

Now, I would say that's all, I mean, the merits of the monastery, of God's Saviour, of course. But, I mean, it all contributes, you know, And so the lay people today, you know, I mean, we know how the parishes are, and we know how necessarily, how impersonal they are because of their meekness, and so on. And how needed in our days is the apostolate, you know, of joy, the apostolate, let us say, of friendship. And it is good, you know, if people and Catholics and lay people in the world have desire to live in the church not only as a wheel and a machine or as a paying member in a successful organization, but as people who are welcome in the depth of their heart, who are accepted as souls, as people.

[83:26]

And that is, of course, what attracts people, and that is one of the functions that a monastery really can fulfill. This oblate relation is always a spontaneous one. It isn't artificially. We don't go around, we don't advertise, you know, that we are looking for oblates, you know, and so on. Or they are members to join the ranks. We don't do that. It's a thing that's completely, for that matter, unorganized, absolutely spontaneous, you know, that clicks with one and it doesn't with the other one. And it works through this bond of the operation. It is something that connects, you know, many people. in a way to the monastery, which exactly fits, let us say, our idea that we do not enter into the organized, let us say, administration of souls.

[84:40]

But that we do things where they are calm and are prepared by God, which kind of are extraordinary, and I would say that the oblate relation is an extraordinary one. And that the oblate relation is a relation which kind of is, as I say, not in a great programmatic way organized But it is a thing which simply depends very much also on the initiative of the individual of late, but which in many, many cases, and of that I am absolutely a witness before heaven and earth. stand up for it really to the end of days. God willing that sometimes the last day that all these things would become manifest.

[85:50]

What a tremendous blessing, what a light. all of us and how many nonsensical barriers would disappear and prejudices would just be dissolved, you know, in the sunlight of the sun of justice, you know, and how the hearts would rejoice then in that time. You see, all these things, all the splendor also of the future world is being prepared now. being prepared now. And I think that these contacts that we have and just also with these present, you know, friends, you know, to which I feel in a special way deeply united, I'm sure that I'm not alone in that. That is something that I would hope and pray, you know, will stay as one of the features, you know, of this monastic community.

[86:51]

Not in order to make a big organization out of it, you know, but to do it in this unconspicuous and rather spontaneous way. It has been blessed by God and it is still being blessed and it isn't only for the monastery to give to others, it is for the monastery also to receive. not only in this relation of operates, we are not only also in a kind of patronizing way, you know, kind of shower our spiritual gifts, you know, but it is also so that we receive simply something through this for which the monastery becomes fuller and richer in itself, provided that we are not we are eaten up by that of course that is that is certainly the apple cleaner therefore the contact with oblates which is most fruitful of course is just this contact of visits here the monastery and that's entering and sharing the life of the community so I want to

[88:07]

Welcome our friends and members of our spiritual family. lifts up our hearts, that is what it was intended for, the manifestation of the Lord's glory. And it receives for us a special note and a special urgency and a practical reality by the fact that in founding this monastery that was our idea. The Lord had shown his glory anticipating it before he went into the last crisis of his life and to his death.

[89:20]

And that our life here as monks is in some way a reenactment and a repetition of just that kind of anticipation. And that our aim, one couldn't call it an aim, but I mean our whole wish and ardent desire in establishing this place on this mountain of the Savior and with the chapel, the hut, the tabernacle of God's glory. That was our desire that from here this glory of the Savior may radiate and may find hearts that would be consoled by it and be lifted up and be confirmed in their faith and be strengthened on their pilgrimage until they appear before the glory of the Savior at the end of days.

[90:34]

And it is even more accentuated in an opportunity like this, where you come, my dear son in Christ, and where you ask for mercy, where you come to this mountain, and it's in that deep desire to see God's power and God's glory. Thus we think that and say it so beautifully in the Psalm 66. That is the great desire of man. In our days, we all know that, and you know that from your own experience, our world, the world today, is not geared to this whole world that we indicate by the word glory.

[91:37]

It is an age in which civilization is groaning in many ways under the burden of achievement and of the labor and the effort and also the exhaustion that may accompany this. And in a world like this the idea of glory is a strange and a new one. I think it's one of the difficulties that people today have when they are absorbed in work when they also realize either the fascination of work or the burden of work, that they don't appreciate or don't have an access to the goal

[92:46]

for which we strive as Christians, and I mean that the heavenly world, the world of glory. People think of it as a time where, what shall I do? Eternity. So it's the idea of our everyday life, which to a certain extent makes us numb. Numb for the realization that there is something behind it. And then we have a goal which is far beyond all practicality. And that is, of course, what glory is. Glory has nothing to do with usefulness and practicality. It is simply, as we sang it in this hour of thirst, where we celebrate and commemorate the descent of the Holy Spirit, and that is the glory.

[94:04]

that his face began to shine like the sun, and his garments were white as snow. And the face, of course, what is it? That is the expression. It is also the access to the inner, eternal beauty of man. it is the expression of his unique dignity. And the Christian faith, the Christian faith which is in so many ways determined by the word, that means by wisdom, by listening, by the occupation with the things of the Spirit. That Christian faith is a manifestation, a reflection of the dignity of the Christian as child of his Heavenly Father.

[95:16]

That is, I think, what we have to keep in mind when we also, for you, my dear son in Christ, if you come today here and if you kneel there, for what purpose do you kneel there? To see the power and the glory of your Lord. But what is the power and the glory of your Lord? It is the eternal, absolute love of your Heavenly Father. There is the source of glory. The love of God brings forth, begets, as it were, the sun of glory. So the root of our glory is not ostentation. It is not the cruel or arrogant display of power. It is not either simply the clarity and the sharpness of the intellect.

[96:24]

All that is not glory. Glory is, in last analysis, absolute love. That is glory. And that is why our Lord is the Son of Glory, because He is the Son of Law. This is my beloved Son. In Him I am very pleased. Hear ye Him. And that is also that is addressed to you. The grace of God has put into your heart this inner seed of desire for the glory of God. your soul, your heart, they are longing for the wings with which they can be lifted up beyond the world of the utilities, the usefulness, the practicalities.

[97:25]

And where you can then really and truly as a human being, as a human heart. But where can we do that? Only in the light of the Father's love for us. We, we derive our dignity from looking at the face of the Father, which appears to us in the face of His Son, Jesus Christ, made man. So glory is, you can see that, it is not something that stands before us as an overwhelming block or splendor, blinding splendor of divine reality. It stands before us as an invitation stands before us and we hear it as a loving word directed to us.

[98:33]

You are my son. You I have chosen. and that is what makes this hour then so happy to give you today this opportunity to put on the habit and you realize of course yourself that that is the continuation of the search that you are engaged upon and which you feel interiorly deeply obligated already for so many So let us take this feast and let us take this hour and this minute as a pledge of glory but a pleasure of glory in the sense of love, of this inner contact with the Father's eternal love. That is, I think, my wish, which of all those who are here present as your new brethren in Christ, that your inner desire may find its fulfillment at the heart of Christ Jesus.

[99:47]

So we rejoice and we take this as a great adage and reason for gratitude. Because we must say that if love derives from the heart of the Father into the Son, then it is reflected again in the gratitude of the Son. And that gratitude of the Son is expressed in the Son, in the Eucharist. And that is what the monastic life is. So may this moment be true for you, the moment of your adoption as a son of your Heavenly Father in Jesus Christ. May your heart feel the happiness that springs from that and may it be ready to sing the song of His praise.

[100:57]

On this beautiful feast of St. Lawrence we greet our Father Lawrence. In our practice and our prayers to him we also express our gratitude for all the things that he constantly does in the service of the monastery out in the fall. that the grain of wheat is being buried. Maybe that was the case in years and years back, those heroic years when the farm started down there in the mud hole around St. James and the work day by day had to be done And I have the feeling that in those months and in those times there was the decisive inner bearing being done which then brings about blessing.

[102:15]

The whole Feast of St. Lawrence is so much a feast really for us monks. I think there is a a deep relation between the deacon and the monk. I wish a time would come where ecclesiastical legislation would allow again the coming of the diaconate into its own I mean I don't know how that will work out but many bishops in many lands evidently are convinced it would work out very well benefit of the church and I don't know but from a monastic environment from our experience one must say that if we as in our community and our surroundings concerning diakonis would be avoided.

[103:22]

That the order of diakonatus really could play an important, good, meaningful role in our lives and could develop also to those who receive it the inner spiritual qualities in a beautiful spiritual order, various charisms in the church. Let us on this beautiful feast, let us think of that, let us also pray for that, that might become possible. And then in order to celebrate the feast a little. I wanted to read you because otherwise I'm afraid we might not get around to it and read you a letter that Father Basil wrote from Christ of the Desert. I think that there are a lot of bearing of many grains of wheat is going on there too.

[104:29]

in some way it resembles very much our own experience. He says, yes, this comes to wish you, darling, fathers and brothers, the very blessed feast of the Transfiguration. I can hardly hope that this lowly epistle will be so honored as to appear on the program of events on Thursday nights recreation. Would have loved, but it came a little too late. But perhaps it will show up on the chapter room table. I hope provision for one is being made in the new building. What would life at Monsignor be without a chapter room table? And be scant by the many to whom I owe replies to notes and letters they have sent, said replies are coming. So do gladly and wait for them. What he knows is that Ramon, that is the hand, the handyman who works there every day, has finished plastering the outside of the house and the new windows are in.

[105:44]

As a matter of fact, Bernie MacDonald is painting one of them at this minute outside the refectory's Couturium Sacristi Parlor. I am writing this. The place really looks fine, though his father Erwitt would have it authentic. There was some talk of putting cement stucco outside and painting it adobe color. That was my suggestion. And this father of five became positively ill. but almost gave in when informed that the next rain might melt the whole blooming mess. But he held out for the real thing, and now we have the comfort of knowing. that even if it melts, we are living in authenticity.

[106:51]

It's not as bad as all that, and it's so much fun to rip our hair. Remember that seminary of Santa Fe I wrote about when he had just been expelled. I simply don't have the same capacity as Father Jane for making the right kind of friends. Another chapter has just been written in the history of our road. Remember our own day. History really does repeat itself, doesn't it? But this baby is beyond anything ever experienced in the old day of Mount Saviour. Father Reared and I had an adventure the other day right out of a western movie. We had gone to Santa Fe to pursue various politicals, road commissioners, and other shady cabs.

[107:54]

Weeping copious tears and showing the mud stains all over the scouts. In particular, we were on the trail of one Guy Scurll. The man who, who bought Arthur Ranch down the road. Peace, in one extent, down the road. A piece, and whose signature I've approved. Was necessary for the county. to go through his land in order to improve the road. When last heard of, he was in Atlanta, Georgia, and Father Erie telegraphed him there a week before, but received no reply. It's too complicated to go into all the details But from the office of the former mayor of Santa Fe, we telephoned the Western Union. He is probably one of the political also. He telephoned the Western Union office, and then scurred back when we were told he had appeared just that night.

[109:03]

The excitement mounts to feel the pitch. What is that? P-O-S-S-E. Posse. What is that? Search of Search and Gun. The posse takes off in a Lincoln Continental. And follows the trail. But the heroic band is stumped. We finally found ourselves at about four in the afternoon in Española. We were coming out of Cook's hardware and lumber store when a booming voice, like something from Mars, rolled out behind us. It's one of you, Father Wall. But Ered and I turned to see a mammoth bearing form, a mammoth form bearing down on us.

[110:13]

And the prior somewhat timorously admitted that he went by that name. whereupon our new acquaintance threw out a large paw, and announced dramatically, Guy Scull of Canyon Ranch. Honest to everything he did. I'm not making up a bit of it. He finally gave us the desired signature with the great great flourish. Got into his truck and drove off singing through his portable loudspeaker and tooting his fire siren. That can't be complicated. And he continues on Sunday, August 2nd. This has been a somewhat less than contemplative Sunday afternoon. Immediately after noon I mangled a pineapple given us by Mrs. Lieberson for tonight's supper.

[111:18]

Then I took a very laborious sponge bath down at the well. The river is very high and very muddy due to the recent rains. The recent rains had other dire effects, too. About 3,500 adobe bricks made for us last week, partly as a gift and partly under contract, just washed away. Well, not literally. They only lost something around the edges, which quite effectively stops their building power. Fortunately, the brickmakers, not we, suffer the loss. Their part of the contract is not fulfilled until we have stacked the bricks. But we'll probably set back our sales a few weeks. Pray for a long, warm autumn. Yesterday I was looking for something of the wisdom literature to read, thinking enviously of the tons of material

[112:26]

in the Monsalier library, and recalling how last Lent, in a burst of ascetic enthusiasm, I turned in our copy of the Robert Feuillet introduction to the library. If that sounds like a hint, Brother Beetham, believe me, it couldn't be more pointed. I settled for the notes in the Bible of Jerusalem, which I have retained at Buzo since my Roman days. Ah, the glories of holy poverty! But my scouts inform me that just hordes of books are on their way, and the lumber for the shelves is sitting just outside the door of our storeroom, my scriptorium for the day. This is really a nice quiet spot and makes one understand why people from the area take exception to our calling the place Christ of the Desert.

[113:31]

The tamarisk trees just outside the house and further down at the rail the big box elders, the green field beyond them, it's only tumbleweed but it looks enough like grass to make you happy. And then comes the river, quite high, as I say, sagebrush and wall trees on the other side, and finally, to top it all, the painted cliffs with ponderosa pine sprawled for hundreds of feet below them and crowning them on top for a hundred or so walk. Now I'm not working for the New Mexico Chamber of Commerce. I'm assigned, and it's only on Sunday afternoon, and I generally notice all this. Much more time is taken up with the realité terrestre, like Bab O, sweeping. What's Bab O?

[114:32]

How does he do it? Oh my, is that a hint? That's the thing, probably. Is that the same as Dutch cleaner? I don't know about that. One of my days as ceremonialius at Maria La, the Pontifical Mass, I think I told you that. It was in all splendor, you know, I was standing there ready, Father Herbert was walking. in all his pontifical glories, you know, up to the altar, and the altar flowers, and tremendous candlesticks, and the whole thing, and everything was just wonderful in it. Suddenly I saw his face change, you know. There was a big cloud, you know, sitting there all over.

[115:36]

Then he looked at me with this kind of... I looked around and I saw a big box of Dutch Cleanser Wipes standing in all its glory. And one of the bench banks on the altar. Perfect. What a piece of the assumption I'll never forget. If that earthly touch, you know, is ever-growing. That's so like Berg-O, that sweeping compound that the novices on that minute menage take note. and other choice tidbits that keeps one's head out of the clouds. On that cheery note, I will close with more wishes and prayers for a happy feast, on which day I hope you will give special thought to us desert fathers.

[116:40]

Remember you and pray for you always. Special greetings to the new postulant. then father, then some father. It has befallen not only us but the whole neighborhood around here with the constant drought and all these things remind us of our position before God, our Lord and our Creator. We should also be mindful of our own failings and shortcomings, our unwillingness, so often we meet it interiorly in our reactions to things and to enter into God's intentions and loving intentions with us, as soon as they in some way interfere with our own tendencies, ideas, predilections or what not.

[117:43]

So let us therefore celebrate this day as a day of real fasting, the other thing that goes together with the bending of knees, but then I also want to invite and urge all to, in this day, on this day, to be careful, keep it as a day of silence and avoid unnecessary talk, any kind that would express a kind of levity of mind. We want to, in preparation for tomorrow's feast, this really spirit of sorrow out of repentance, live before God as supplication and intercession for our neighbors, for the country, for ourselves.

[118:47]

Then we could have the absolute. stay in this methodology that we read there, the causa nostra lititiae, the wellspring of our joy. And we have two great ideas before us who are associated in an intimate way and one is Saint John the Baptist and the other one is our lady and both the birth nativity of Saint John the Baptist as well Instead of Our Lady, I'm greeted by the church with that great joy that greets the dawn of salvation. It's the first beginnings of a new life, of a new era, that sharing, communion between

[119:57]

God and man in that intimacy and then the Holy Spirit later perpetually and in a definitive way established between us, the Church, and our Heavenly Father, that union of the Holy Spirit. Now the two St. John the Baptist and Our Lady, you can compare the two in relation also to our own monastic life, which is not only limited to the monastery, but which is really a part and parcel of the whole. Christian heritage and in Christian maybe better to say in Christian endowment and heavenly endowment that we have received there Saint John the Baptist represents the man, our lady, the woman and both man and woman fulfill in our lives

[121:10]

The life of every human being has a complementary role. They are related to one another. They make one full man, as we say. We can see that. Our monastic life has a great importance. In St. John the Baptist we see the willingness and the inner decisive the renouncing of the world, the taking upon himself the hardships of the ascetical life, and also the bluntness and absoluteness of the one who announces the coming of the kingdom of God and denounces those who oppose it and relate Pharisees with the preacher of repentance, penance and therefore conversion

[122:28]

On the other hand, we see our lady, the activity of our lady, the woman, and representing, showing, just in that way, not so much the sword, but the mother's heart, that wisdom that also is always preached of her in the lessons that we read yesterday at her feast. And then the whole lineage, the whole line of descent, you mean, where everything human can say good and bad in some way, inter-intuit and contribute to the coming of the Savior in human life. And I think for our life, I think every one of us realizes that. Monastic life being a life of those who devote themselves completely in a life of virginity to God in the context of men.

[123:45]

It may involve and always involves certain Hardships is certainly the lack of the amenities of the nice things and beautiful things that the delicate devotion of the woman brings into the life of man. these things where a monastic household is not like a household presided over by a mother, but it is definitely a household of men with its limitations. and those limitations and that let us say that lack has to be taken has to be taken courageously and has to be taken realistically in that way also our community life can never in last analysis provide

[124:53]

that element of human fulfillment, human satisfaction that the woman could provide. But of course for us there is another form and that is in which these values and the spiritual aspect of the role of the woman is realized and that is the devotion to Our Lady. And that devotion to Our Lady has, all in the course of the centuries, always been taken as a certain seal, as a certain mark of the Catholic, of the full, full entry into the spirit of Christianity. While Protestantism may much more be on the line of John the Baptist, the line of the preacher, the line of the forerunner, the voice crying in the wilderness, and all these things.

[126:01]

Catholic Church has always kept sacred and in great emotion the picture of Our Lady, not only for a kind of certainly natural reasons, but under the impulse of the breathing of the Holy Spirit, who overshadowed of a lady who filled her heart, who determined her silence and her words, her actions, her contemplation and what she did for others in the service of others. So also for us as monks I think this inner, really, devotion of the heart to Our Lady is such an important element, and I would just hate to see that suffer in the souls of the members of this community.

[127:08]

The word of St. Benedict doesn't mention the name of Our Lady, and it is true, because he is, after all, in white snow in the terminology of his time and the spirit of his time, which is of course very, has a tremendous value as norm for the future. But without mentioning the name of Our Lady in it, because that devotion to Our Lady, as it developed later, similar to the influence of great saints like St. Bernard, simply was not there at this time, and the whole idea of kind of an order with a special devotion and so on just didn't exist. or simply the curious. And the curious is all in all. The curious is the head of the church in heaven and on earth. He is

[128:10]

the one who incorporates the whole fullness, the Plenitude or Christi, in himself. But I would say that, and in St. Benedict's rule, the spirit of Our Lady is so visible, and that is in the wisdom of the whole, and in what we call the discretion of the whole. This real inner care that is taken to not to impose anything harsh or burdensome on the community as such, but to take care and to understand the individual needs. All that is, I would say, the spirit of wisdom which is so visible in Our Lady as the Mother of Christ. And so, through the renewal of the not mentioned impact, through the tenderness and the goodness and the balance of the soul and the heart of Saint Benedict, through him as our

[129:28]

The lawgiver, Our Lady, works and reaches our hearts. And just this chapter that we read, and are going now to read, on the abbot, just shows that the abbot is not supposed to be a kind of xenobiarka, representing to the community only, say, the seriousness of the discipline of the monastery. But she should work with the monks in the Holy Spirit, for in that Spirit that overshadows our lady. So he should combine in himself try always to do that, the St. John the Baptist and Our Lady. And that is, of course, the office of every individual monk, to do that, to deliberately to work towards that fullness, that the wisdom and goodness and mercy, the motherly spirit, as it were,

[130:50]

of Our Lady in our lives should not destroy or disintegrate the structure and the rigor of the monastic life. While on the other hand, the rigor of the monastic life should learn and should bend wherever it tries, you know, to assert itself in rigidity, should try to learn and to be mellowed and transfigured by this other aspect of which Our Lady is the representative. So let us think about these things and also, as you know, in our buildings there, that we put up and that we are going to dedicate on these coming days, these weekends in which we are now,

[131:54]

You are all busy in preparing. You are all doing cleaning and window washing and all kinds of things. Watering the grass. You have to do it spontaneously. All these various things. At this moment we are really all engaged as it were in the work aware of the room preparing the whole. I think we should look also in that light, look at the buildings themselves. You know and remember in our own history and the way they came up there were these tendencies that we saw some concrete way also in our own community, the question of the balance, the question of discretion, the question of poverty, the question of simplicity, all these things.

[133:02]

It's evident that a building like this never will satisfy the wishes of every individual in the community. I think that with the buildings more and more falling into shape, I think that also the reaction of the community as such as a whole is ever becoming more favourable to this undertaking one sees really the aptness and the beauty which is in there together with the simplicity and the attempt at the same time which is made here in these buildings to give it a I would say a kind of a human touch, a kind of make it in some way make it a home as we have it in the West Building where, let's say, the one roof, you know, that ceiling, as well as the garden which is in the heart of it.

[134:11]

They represent just that kind of motherly gathering spirit, you know, that also the architect tried to express in that field. The roof and the garden is the protecting and the rejoicing. And also in that little garden there and a little fountain. I don't know how far our water reservoirs will be able to deliver the goods, you know, to make a complete living symbol. Anyhow, there it is, you know, and that is the way we should look at these things. They are not simply, you know, kind of nice things, but they are simply and should be part of our life, you know, part of our mentality and our spirit.

[135:14]

And the other building, the refectory, chapter room, also the common room, one can see there also a certain one hand, a certain simplicity on the other hand, a certain amplitude, which I think is good, you know, for a community, and provided it's understood, you know, provided people enter into it and kind of say their amen and make it then, and also their being there, a real canticle and song of thanksgiving that we were able to do this. We moved in here 13 years ago, it was certainly more under the sign of Saint John the Baptist. But things have developed in such a way and God has helped us in such a way that we are able to put up these things and they are not to say things that are simply designed to make life easy.

[136:35]

but they are designed to express fullness, goodness, beauty of the community life, see how wonderful it is when others live together. In that way, you know, too, I would know that I wish so much that we all would enter into that and really make this dedication day and also the hospitality we extend during these days all the expression of that spirit of our Lady Esther, Mother of God, the mother of the church, the mother of our household were shows to us. In this context I might also mention that we were discussing about the form of the dormitory takes, and as you know we had various accommodations.

[137:43]

And we have these two dormitories. The question was how to furnish them and how to repair them. And I had asked, you know, that various members of the community would express their opinions and they have done so and I must say in a very good spirit, in a very fruitful way also. also some suggestions concerning the things which were really remarkable also as an idea as such however the majority of those who have expressed themselves they seem to be one can say maybe crystallized you know of course as you know about three main problems. One is the open dormitory and the other is a dormitory with a partition which however would not destroy, let us say, the common character of the dormitory.

[138:57]

while others extend and make the Partisans or the Partisans in a more rigorous way. But there are nuances, as I say, in the same group, and the other group is more in favour of sailors. The majority of those who expressed themselves said that we should, in the dormitory as it is, start with an open dormitory. And that also would be the easiest thing, of course, for us. do right now. For me personally, I mean, I don't want to anticipate any future discussions about this point, but it seems to me that It would be a good way to face this question. We have dormitory, and to have the dormitory really in its full meaning, so clearly then in the way in which the rule of St.

[140:05]

Benedict really speaks of it and sees it. Therefore, let us say, give the full possible also spiritual advantage of the reality of that arrangement to those who live there. I had some misgivings about if there was anything in the law of the church decrees and so on that would prescribe a partition, but we have Martin has looked into that and asked. There seems to be nothing, at least for a monastery of men, there seems to be nothing of the part of the church against it. So that that element of doubt is removed and so that would be then our Those who we love for reasons, you know, of physical reasons, nervous reasons, don't find it, you know, that they can't do it, they will be provided with a cell and so on.

[141:26]

said so right from the beginning. However, it seems to me that if the dormitory in this, let us say, full form doesn't work out, you know, it seems to, for the members, for those who use them, then I would personally really suggest that then we should simply accept, you know, the full division into fully closed cubicles then. But then it's another matter for the future.

[142:10]

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