The week and the retreat connected with it, we have to see how it works out. It's the silence point. We had this meeting about it on Saturday and we didn't come down as you realize to the little rules and norms that were proposed in this paper. Now, that is simply because we, it was good, I think, an opportunity was there to react to the various points which preceded these practical norms. I think one could see there that there was on the part of the community, and I hope I interpreted it in the right way, in one way, feeling that made this whole thing could be placed in a more concrete context, a little preamble, so on, with the general principles of the renewal of religious, the various suggestions of the Council.

[01:23]

And on the other hand, it might be more take on a certain character of greater practical urgency. That, of course, would be a matter of later discussions that we can have. It's not so clear that it has great advantages. for us to be all together when these things are being discussed. But we see how it works best. But I would regret if our not being able to to set these concrete and take these concrete norms, proposals for this week. I would regret if the general spirit of silence and also the practice of silence would suffer from that. So I think the only thing we can do at the moment just to stick, or as Father Martin says, try the rules that we have set that are existing

[02:36]

or concerning silence. That would be the best, you know, for this week. You all realize that the Holy Week is a time of intensified activity and influx of guests and all these things, things that might disturb, you know, the spirit of silence, I think. we should really make a special effort, especially in the house, for example, to keep the silence in the west building that we always had agreed upon, at least in the open places. Another question is, of course, the sales. They also would say that the talking in the sales, especially during the retreat, should be limited to a minimum. Conversations should be also limited to what is necessary in the spiritual sense.

[03:41]

Then also the other thing, for example, contact and of course it's necessary we all agree on that during the day the necessary contacts have to be made and conversations concerning the work to be done And again, that we follow there the old rule, that one marks a little this. We have forgotten that. And I must say, I myself, too, have been very relaxed in these things, to do that a little in corners and areas apart, which are not so immediately accessible to the public. You realize that we have guests, and the guests are being told that the other side of the door, when they pass through the parlor, and there is that holy line of the enclosure, that radically on the other side, on the side, silence should be kept.

[04:51]

And of course it's devastating when a kind of group of guests, you know, are shepherded into the refectory and the first thing they see is people talking in the mail room, you see, so it looks a little rather strange. So it's necessary therefore for us, for us as a community and also for our the relation to the guests, their edification, it's necessary that we stick to these rules and are very careful. I think the main thing is a kind of a general attitude. It isn't so much, you know, this regulation and that regulation, but just that everybody, that's also the whole meaning of this, of these various points that we read on Saturday. To shift the accent to the inner attitude and have that in mind and remember it in our

[05:56]

than in the practice of the exterior silence. The main thing is the interior silence. It's that inner, you know, that inner fear of the Lord, you know, which is there, and the right sense, you know, which makes us, as the poems there express, listen to what is the will of God for me now. And of course, it's terribly important then for everybody, when he makes that kind of shift from the interior silence to the exterior silence, that he really asks himself, you know, makes a little stop, just for a moment, you know, is this now the will of God for me as well? The fact that I speak is also what I say. It is sometimes even more important. So I just wanted to ask you for your cooperation in this.

[07:04]

It would be so wonderful if we could make this Holy Week a real community experience. And I must say that I have asked Father Bernard, you know, to come and urged him to come here during this time just for that reason, because I think that he is a man who will be able, you know, also to give, to radiate and to give to us a certain help, you know, just in this direction of entering as a group, as a community. in this Solemni Tatum, St. Leo the Great so beautifully expressed the solemnity of the passion of Christ. That is the real spirit and of course you realize silence is a tremendous, tremendous help in that way to to keep us concentrated on the one thing necessary during these times.

[08:12]

And we know, we do it during this week, we know absolutely well that everybody of our brothers who keeps the silence does it out of charity for the whole community. And always with this idea of, for heaven's sake, in these days of the retreat, give the Holy Spirit a chance. Give room to the Holy Spirit. And therefore, don't clutter it up with all kinds of unnecessary talking. That's, of course, one of the great advantages. So let us help one another. And everybody who keeps the silence, every brother who sees it is edified by it. thanks him interiorly for it, and is carried in that way by the love of that brother, expressed in silence.

[09:16]

Father, John, that kind of crystallizes in me, in that vis-a-vis, from I to I, or from I to thou, eye in eye, which is so clear and wonderful in this Easter octave. I had a great longing and plans, you know, to maybe speak a little about contemplation and contemplative life during these days. days have been lost for that purpose, but still we might still try to do it. You realize that the difficulty with the word contemplative life today is that in the original kind of setup

[10:30]

The contemplative life was a stage, a last stage of perfection, of being fixed in the contemplation of the face of God, and being fixed in the table light. and Mount Aethos, you know, where the whole, this whole movement, monastic movement there, not only there, but also in other places, just, you know, just lives in the glory of the table light. And so, We have come then, in the course of time, we have come to consider contemplation, the act of, let's say, of an ultimate contemplation as something that, first of all, can be achieved and can be reached only by a very severe renunciation

[11:51]

renouncement of the world, of the body, of all the things that for some people even, I mean, the good things of the world, all that in the end becomes a distraction. And then this idea of contemplation is so, how can I say, rarefied, I mean, it becomes unique and rare, that it really is not reached, especially in our modern world and I think in our more Nordic atmosphere and climate. This kind of life also may be because of the temperament of the people who live in a climate which is ex-climate, which is exposed, where it changes from the heat to the cold, from the summer to the winter, from all going through all the

[13:02]

phases, you know, of the year, and have to struggle along, and are therefore much more active in their whole relation to the world. It may be it is, and I think we all feel that. We speak today, for example, we would speak about Monsavior this month, there is a contemplative community. We don't understand. We are not contemplatives. I think everybody of us realizes that. We are not contemplatives as Abbot Moses, you know, who just could stand, you know, for on the evening and seeing the sun setting, you see, until it rises in the morning, you see, in this, I cannot say, in an immobile ecstasy, in something that in which he, they say, leaves behind the body and everything.

[14:13]

That is, we are not of that caliber, and I think the general climate of the community is not of that caliber. We, therefore, the word contemplative has to be, means really something different in our days than it used to be. We speak about contemplative, say the difference from the active life. But this difference is is a difference which in some way is subtle, you see. It is not something which means a difference between somebody who is lukewarm or makes compromises on one side and somebody who absolutely goes to the last perfection on the other side.

[15:18]

I don't think one can speak about it. Therefore, the word contemplative for us has a new meaning. It's not that I don't say it has no meaning, it certainly has one, but we kind of have to find it. And just in living the Easter octave and thinking of the Easter octave, here this Easter octave is evidently dominated by all the essential concepts of what we would call contemplative life. It is dominated by, for example, the concept of seeing the Lord. They saw him, they recognized him in the breaking of the bread. Then they received the water of wisdom.

[16:24]

Aquasubstientia potavide, he gave them to drink the waters of wisdom. Wisdom is one of these concepts that certainly belong to this whole realm that we consider, that we would consider as belonging to the contemplative life. Then there is the other word which is so outstanding, I mean, also, and significant for the contemplative lives, the word peace. He is, we do you. Then the other, if you go through the concepts that are constantly put before us during this Easter Octave, you will see it, you will see it in every direction. For example, the concept of liberty, libertas, as we have today in that beautiful ovation, perfect liberty.

[17:27]

I mean, this concept of perfect liberty is one of these typical, I would say, concepts. We long to be contemplative into that category, or how one may call it, the contemplative life. It's an essential part of it. Then you have others. You have, for example, the whole, the Eucharist is so much in the fore during this week. Therefore, the meals. Again, you know, the meal is in itself something which belongs into the realm of the contemplative life. Why? Because the meal is communion. And this contemplative life, necessarily, if it is peace, it must be charitas. We died with Christ. Christ died for us, so that we may not live for ourselves.

[18:30]

but that we may live for him who died for us. Therefore, that is, that's the liberty and that's the unity and the communion which is so evident. Therefore, universality, for example, is another concept which belongs into this general realm of the contemplative life. And then, of course, the whole element of song. Confessio confitevini domino coniam bonus, for he is good, and his mercy lasts forever. That is, then, his typical response, to say, to the contemplative life as is lived, as it is before us, in the inner life of God, the Holy Trinity. Then we have other, for example, the concept of a reindeer, Azalea Kingdom.

[19:32]

It's another one that belongs, you know, to this whole realm again of the contemplative life. Come, you blessed of my father, because and receive the kingdom. Achieve the reindeer. Receive the kingdom. It's a typical, again, too, belongs to this world. And if we then come down to it, you know, we find, of course, this kind of, maybe today, kind of surprising discovery, yeah, of whom and to whom are all these things said. They are said to every Christian. And they are said in this week, in this octave, they are said to the neophytes. That means to the ones who just, through baptism, dying with Christ, have entered into the eight days as the picture and symbol of that one day of their salvation.

[20:41]

This is the day the Lord has made, and we sing that during the offering every

[20:47]

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