I would like, my dear brothers and sisters, in Jesus Christ, with the help of God, whom I felt in your love and patience, to say a few words on this Sunday about the transfiguration, which we've just heard in the Gospel. The transfiguration is our feast in a very special way. In its place, it is simply the Sunday of Lent, And then our parents ignore it, and they're very silly. Our visitors, our brothers and sisters, we celebrate all of you groups with us here today, especially perhaps that college students who come all the way from New York with us may not know that this Sunday has a very special meaning for us at Mount Savior.

[01:04]

And because it has a very special meaning for everyone, it has a very special meaning for you. who are courting us and who celebrate here with us today. We might say that Mount Xavier really is the equivalent to the Mount on the Transfiguration. The Transfiguration is on August 6th, of what I call the Mount of Good and grasping creatures, but also, you know, with Christians, we want to make the most out of every feast, and celebrate every possible feast. And so we celebrate it today on the second Sunday of Lent, and get the Gospel of the Transfiguration as well, but not always to say. It reminds us to have a feast in the late winter as well as one in the summer.

[02:05]

Now, why did we Why did we call this place, this monastery, Mount Savior, the Mount of Transfiguration? Why did we take this mystery of the Transfiguration of our Lord to dominate, so to say, our life here? I think the very same reason that the mystery of transfiguration should dominate the life of every Christian, of all of you here who are not God's and who are the selves of us who are, the reason is because the transfiguration is a central mystery and the end in that total mystery of Christ. It's a focal event, a focal history in the history of Christ. And it is central and focal, we might say, both historically and theologically.

[03:11]

Historically, just take up your New Testament, your gospel, the first three gospels, the synoptics of Matthew, Mark, and Luke, and you'll see just right Where Christ's incarnation is, click-clack, in one of those gospels, it's pretty much in the middle of the world. And it's there because it's pretty much at the middle of the life of our Lord on earth. Because it parts the pines with a chain point in his life. In each of the first three Gospels, it's preceded by Jesus' confession of faith in Christ as the Son of the living God. In each of the first three Gospels, it's preceded by Jesus' announcement of the conditions necessary to be his disciples. And in each of these three cosmic, it's preceded and closely followed by the first and second announcements of this passion and resurrection.

[04:24]

We may study that Jesus' life and teaching lead up to transfiguration and then come to transfiguration to get there and resurrect. And this is focused, a central point of climax in the life of Jesus. Therefore, we should find a focal point in our being near Jesus, a focal point of our discipleship. And theologically, too, the transfiguration is at the center of the mystery of Christ. Jesus transfigured softens up so to say, all that he is in all his life. It is his body which is transfigured. It is man, man's flesh and blood, or blood. It's his body which is transfigured.

[05:28]

This man is the stuff of God. It's divine. It's God. So the whole history of the incarnation is here, in the transfiguration of Christ. And in his death, Jesus is the son of the witness of the law of the prophets, of the old covenant, of the digital virus, and he's the son of the new witnesses of the new covenant, his apostles, In those three who were substance and dearest to them, Peter, James, and John, his son led the representatives of the old and the new law to a dialogue concerning his passion, which in St. Luke's Gospel he tells us Jesus entered into with Moses and the Bible. They were speaking with him about this exodus that Newcastle speaking is going to go to Jerusalem.

[06:34]

And teaching with James and John were drawing him to that, a previous style. And they all saw an anticipation of this glory, of this new hope. It was actually, in all relevance, the preview of the glory. It was lost to them, it was hidden, and was to be revealed only at the end. And so the whole history could be left to be seen, to be pointed and to be left. So you see the transfiguration of my price as the revelation of the Father, In Christ Jesus, the Savior, who by his crucifixion and resurrection with the Lamb, contains for us the gift of the Spirit. So it is the obligatory cycle of the ministry.

[07:37]

It's strange that in the West, the ministry of the Transfiguration hasn't been paid more. They put more up in the homily and the piety of the church in the East. with the quadradar loss in the West. But this is the case. We do have something to learn here. We have so much to learn in the East. It's always been a puzzle, I must say, to me, why the mystery of the transfiguration wasn't, for example, one of the mysteries of the Rosen. If you might ask me a more embarrassing question, if you stop thinking that we've only given you an opportunity, by saying, why isn't the mystery of the Transfiguration contained explicitly in the Gospel of St. John? It's not. Well, I bet it's not, because St. John's Gospels say it all filled the whole spirit of it. It is the spirit of the Transfiguration.

[08:38]

And so, of course, the whole mystery of Christian life, the whole mystery of the Church, all our faith and all our piety will be filled with this mystery. So it's this focal, central point, and that's why we've been chosen as the dominant mystery of our last required era of non-saving, and why we celebrate it in such a special way. We rejoice to celebrate it with you today. We cut out the celebration of the Transfiguration on this second Sunday of Lent. How is it belonging here? It seems to be in such contrast to last Sunday's Gospel, last Sunday we saw Jesus captured by sin in the desert. This is when we see Jesus' glory on the mountain. to very different things. Yes, there is a tremendous contrast here, but there's also a very profound similarity, which we're perhaps apt to overlook.

[09:45]

Last Sunday, we saw Jesus not only tempted in the desert, but victorious in the desert, over Satan, over temptation. We saw Jesus as victor In the battle, you might say, in a kind of preliminary scourge, it's the temptation to condense the dark, to lose everything that later took the commandment that caused the end of this life, and we celebrate the end of which we participated, and we start the way at the end of that. This suddenly received the glory of the one who also was able to conquer. with glory which is stronger than the ordinary spirit, but which will only be fully revealed at the end, after the death of man. We see that no matter what makes Christ as tempted, as in the last Sunday's Gospel, or as in the previous, as we shall see in the next Sunday's Gospel, and on the next Sunday,

[11:00]

As we see it today in every face. The Church is proclaiming a risen, victorious Jesus, which we celebrate solemnly on Easter Sunday, the climax of all the Sundays, but on our weekly Easter, every Sunday, every Sunday, including the Sundays of Lent, our Feast of the Resurrection, our call to faith, to faith in the risen God, our whole life, our life of faith in this living God, is a risen God. Now, as to our transfiguration, we have been, in a very real and very deep sense, transfigured with the glory, which is the glory of Christ himself, and yet belongs to us, but that we shall have as its owners only later on.

[12:12]

and which is now what we've already been in. And this is the grace, you might well say, the glory of our baptism, our confirmation of all of the sacramental graces which give what theologians call a characteristic to the soul. That is, which make us indelibly, indisputably the possession of Christ himself, which make us granted the experience in his life and in his powers, even though we should be so foolish and unfaithful as to reject them or to reject the use of these powers which he put at our disposal. This glory, which we received from him, it's ordinarily, as I say, hidden in us.

[13:18]

It shone forth again for only to all of the miscastigations we've just heard. It was part of this plan, this loving plan, For us, the dwellers of Peter, James, and John, the teacher manifests his glory on this occasion. Our glory is very manifest. It's good witness. Some chapters are good manifest, but you know what it is like to see it. Some of us know that wonderful example of the Russian saint who writes all of the As we know, early in the 19th century, St. Sutherland of Salo, over that wonderful conversation we had with this friend, about being equal to the Christian life, being in the possession of the Holy Spirit, under that conversation, it states that it's all about radiating with light and Christ.

[14:24]

But such things are also not God's mysterious loving plan to bring an acceptable thing. Normally our creative glory is manifest, as in fact it is normally manifest in our Lord himself through our good works. That is the way in which the light part is manifested, the works of love that God which involves all things of the richly. Our Lord said, I am the light of the world. When he said that, it wasn't a transfiguration. It wasn't visibly manifest in the light. And he said to his disciples at the beginning of the circle of the mountain, you are the light of the world. Let your God start showing all of them that they shall seek your good works and glorify your God who is in heaven. You see, Paul tells us that we are sons of God and called to the light.

[15:31]

But the way to this light, the way to our transfiguration, is the same way as that which Jesus himself took. It's the way of the cross. We hear a bit at the end of today's gospel, as they were going down the mountain, Jesus gave them this commandment. Don't tell anyone of the day, until the seventh man is raised from the dead. But what does that mean? It can be also the day. What is it? Is it possibly just suffering? just kind of reconciling ourselves to what's disagreeable and right. If you've been to the cross so often, maybe just that. No, the cross, of course, means something. It means far more. Notice that the cross means everything that raises us up.

[16:37]

And Jesus was lately at the cross. Everything that extends us, everything that carries us beyond our usual limitations, What are some of the rhetorical requirements in today's gospel to see? These things that are the cross, that bring us up, that extend us, that take us, carry us beyond our organization, are the things that happen to the apostles in today's gospel. First of all, this is the program of our own life, the program of the cross. First of all, the knowledge of God. A certain separation, a certain breaking away, a certain distance, a certain going into the fight. Into the silence, or the fight of the mountain, or the same place where you live, the desert, or the sea shore upon the sea.

[17:41]

Today's gospel begins by telling us that Jesus took Peter, James, and his brother John and led them up a high mountain by themselves. Going on is an experience of a person, a necessary experience. How can we speak so much today about involving ourselves? How can we involve ourselves unless we also go up and get our response? How could we carry anything in the areas in which we're involved unless we first of all restrain? And how can we act involving ourselves, involve ourselves further nor further unless we take time out? So to say, no harm is considered. So this knowing of harm is absolutely essential and it's the first step. Secondly, it's looking. Look at this thing. Vision.

[18:44]

It was transfigured before there are others. We have to look. We have to annotate God's plan. We have to do this by understanding the scripture. By understanding as the apostle caused them to understand why Moses and Elias were there. Why Jesus was speaking of his activities. We have the pride of his recognition in sacred reading, in the Scripture, in the Bible, and in the Bible. This is for all of us, for all Christians, not just for none. Once an only Christian, you were trying to make a Christian life under some special circumstances and special weather. Basically, essentially, it is our treatment. And besides this, seeing this vision, this penetrating, we must listen. We must hear it, the Word. He was still speaking when suddenly a bright cloud rose from the shadows, and now a voice came out of the cloud.

[19:47]

Listen, my beloved son, you must take flight. Listen to him. It brings us somewhere. You wish to see. If you wish to see, then first listen. Hear him. It's the way to vision. So, who's listening? And then after that, when we see, when we capture glimpses, when we hear, just a little bit at the moment, we will only start praying. And that's another step. Going up, looking in faith, listening in faith, and then responding in prayer. And prayer has two elements to it. One is delight. And the other is fear. Said Peter expressing to the light of the city, Lord, it is good that we are here with your condition.

[20:49]

I have set up big tents here. One for you, one for me, and one for God. But don't like to take it to the floor. God calls to us sometimes. God gives it to us from time to time. We also fear. Fear made us confronted with God and being confronted with ourselves before God. When they buried us, the disciples fell haste and drowned and were killed with tears. So we might fear our God, but that finally made ourselves available. not making ourselves obeyable to God's will, but letting God have His will with us. And this we see in the Gospel of the Word of our Lord. Get up and don't be afraid. Get up. You can't just continually enjoy this to buy it as you yourself would like to have it. You can't even remain here prostrate on the ground in fear.

[21:54]

Get up, and fear not, and can't dread as you would like to. What? You must follow my will, wherever it takes you. And it takes us down, and it takes us, as I said, to the valley, and it takes us to the forest. But that takes us, of course, into glory and joy, and this life and the next. My inner self is completely certain. Of course, you should always do that. That's always the best part. When you go down on the hill, the momma can't speak or anything, but we have to go down it, too, even though we seem to stay up here. I would say, momma, we go down on the stairs to the crypt, and then the mommas can inquire if we lay down. We must complete the search. I suggest that you do it. and treating the ceremony now as mutually dismal, they were prior to us applying it to ourselves. Now, I suggest that you do it while thinking of those who took part in the transfiguration.

[22:56]

Moses and Matthias and Peter and James and John. They were all thinking, we ought to believe. But they had to go through this process of participating in the passion of Christ and cross of Christ. We can by which one can live it, and probably to a spirit, in order that we may be the witnesses of our knowledge in Christ's last place to be. Let him that hath the power to reign, bless the body, the heart, and the body, said Benedict, When we passed by, we celebrated that. And to celebrate this past year means to enter into this house. Now, the first thing that made me realize, when we came, and it was probably Brian and Benedict, and I was down on the island, and they'd be here, and I was saying that it was not only walking past,

[24:10]

But many, every one of them, every Christian, realize the same thing. They first have to ask how it is to be fasting on this earth. In truth, in any case of life, God did it for us. Sorry. and the security of what is here turns the power of the jungle. They live in a closed enthusiasm for the world and all the things we're doing. People are on guard, night and day. The father who cursed the mother, the evil, everything of the world that is pain.

[25:28]

That he would rather carry the neighbor than be on pain. And so he left Rome. And then he entered into his second pastime, the pastime of his solitude. He hid in the cave, and on the caravan, for even a minute, he knew how old he was. On promised land, under the island of the rock, he looked upon It's lovely. It's palatable. It's deep. It's open. It can't fall. That's the back of an old one. He wants to visit it.

[26:31]

The pledge is very, very hidden. It can't be brought up. The back of the old one is more difficult. by the fact that he was alone without a head or grave around him. But then he made a decision, he offered his body and he said to the pastor of this parish, he let me introduce me made him able to lead all the people, become the corner of the community, to follow the education of monks, and then he came back up.

[27:35]

And then another pastor took place. And that, perhaps, was the most difficult of all. We are true to be more than entered into this new field of faith, life, or powerfulhood with the greatest enthusiasm. But it was deeply disappointing. And, considering the circumstances that he found in which he found himself, we would not be surprised to think that perhaps in his own mind, he is getting the deep so-called moments in which, in his own mind, he began to talk about the work, the value, the righteousness of the Master God.

[28:41]

What is real, will not be died, but can be used in such a way, and open the way to such liberation, and to such madness. So then Father requires the most powerful, who? He had to stand up, but he did not lose. And then the other pastor, he had to leave. And out of all of them, he came with the real wisdom of interiorly clean, completely clean. So he was able to gather them up. He piled them with all the power he needed.

[29:45]

And there is he today, at the moment in which he stands erect in all his worldly weakness. He can still recall this time, in his last words, these characters, carried by the Bishop Paul, of his father's life, of his son's life. And then, so to be, may it list its last outcome, it will be. It is then there is still the blessing that can tell you to see. Ye, ye and we, we have put in, Lord, the praying and inkling heart of destruction. suppression of the inner, of the heart, of the being and mind, and of the animal.

[30:53]

But what was the freedom of the transformation? The word in which it comes, bliss, and then also the word in which we think of bliss. Bliss it comes from anger, sin, And, of course, blessing is something that feels and that feels and that functions. Blessing is the communication of God and of Creativity. And love, that legit love of God, can never, never, It can only lead him into the thought in. Through the adaptation of the truth. Of the grief of the earth and the dark of the past.

[32:01]

And now it brings forth truth from it. It can then take him out. is the same one form that is full of radiating intelligence, radiating the best of consecrated, unformed, uncreated humanity. The light of the door is in maintenance of the power in your spirit, the darkness, Lord, Lord, God, touch me here, and with what I have, lead me to Father, Father, in the most great avenue of your beauty. I understand, my dear brothers, that you today, as the people who are in us, as the Jewish men, that we ought to touch

[33:09]

Lately, they think of the experience as a very large gift. But in fact, it's good. Long for the state of the human being. And thus, you have a mating song. In this, it's better weather. But in order to carry, it's evil. And to feel the weight of its burden. And this is the reason why we left. And this is the reason why I'm saying it's worth it. Not for the sake of any person, not one, but for the sake of any cause. For the sake, for the sake, And then at the beginning of the night, then come before us spirit of chastity, purity, defilement in this, that they ever will enter into that inner diamond of the Vedic state of the Vedic power.

[34:38]

The taste comes. When it's good, it's the same love with the resurrection, which is of Jesus. And many of us also, when we win ourselves, we meet with the difficulties, personal difficulties, obstacles, pains, and bruises of the community. I have been there for so long. It's that bruise in our inner faith. And that's why it's said, it's beautiful. It's beautiful. He didn't have the splendor of the resurrection of Jesus. Honestly, that happened also with Peter. And therefore, he walked with Peter. And then, in that moment, it happened.

[35:47]

It was a moment of God that happened. I would expect them to step in and stand where they enter into the community of faith and get to see the fact that all of them are God. The remarks which I will share with you this morning come from an Old Spartan, from an English Benedictine named Sebastian Horwath. And I found in certain essays in a small book that they called God's Redeemer. And for that reason, I have lived down to now to get to that topic, read his thoughts at that time.

[36:51]

But they do, I think, pertain in a way to the mystery we're celebrating this morning. to that faith in our life, in our movement towards God, of where we find ourselves today. The opening words of the intro, and that makes the whole piece take its character, is rejoice. Rejoice, Jerusalem. It's both a command and an invitation. And it feels to the city. It's given to the dwelling of the men with one another. It's forewarned that in the end Christ was personified as if it were a mother, a woman. And it speaks of the conservation of the child which they need for nursing. In the communion, it speaks of that Jerusalem and the city built as it should be, compact, together.

[37:54]

That city, which as we know from the apocalypse, comes down perhaps like a rock. And in some way, between these two figures, between these two women, mankind recognizes the origin of it, and its progress, not its turn, but that to which, and in union with which, with which man is truly man. There are many things about which we could rejoice, and many things in the text which are given us in this view. But fundamentally, I think what we are supposed to be rejoicing about is the fact that we have found, not at that point in time we went, but partway in understanding of the history of Easter, the overshadows of the New Year, part of it.

[38:56]

In a sense, we'll never get all of it in time. Even then, Paul will say, we know in part what we prophesy in part. And we have to wait for that same time, for that point beyond time, when the fullness of Christ's resurrection will be made known to us, will be experienced by us. But here we are, more or less, having deepened understanding of the mystery of Easter, of the Passover, of the dreamish feast of Passover. And what we come to recognize is that salvation is followed in and shown forth by a new community, and the community which is identified as God. not an opinion of people who follow a certain religion. For then, people who are in fact, one way, identify with God.

[40:03]

In this same chapter six, at the Gospel of St. John, in which Mark Green would take a warning, Christ tells people of a very strange and almost harsh thing. And he said it very strongly. that you were not looking for me because you saw the sign, but because you had offered bread you wanted to eat. Christ leaving this people to go back to the mountain alone It was precisely because they had missed the meaning of the song. They were looking for a union community. They were looking for someone who could give them bread. And they were so, they're so poor. And he saw it, put a pot of water. And as man has from the beginning of time.

[41:07]

And the dictators and tyrants will. And that's why they got the car by Kelly Bond. But mankind will, mankind looks for bread. And this bread is fine, but Christ gave it. They look for Christ to king. For someone to teach them. Not for a new kind of relationship among themselves. Not for a marriage with those thumbs. for the fire that hath besought us, and it rise, and the fire that whiteneth. Christ says, don't wait for the fruit to perish. Don't wait for the fruit to perish. And we ourselves know how much of our lives are concerned with labor you need before food. And he gives us then a work. What work did we do? What method should we put it now?

[42:09]

What goal should we be aiming for? And without this, this is the work. Believe in the one who God has made. This is the work of God. This is not only religion. This is not only what comes about by reading. And this is the labor that God has given them. And it is the labor. Christ, as a teacher, We see him putting out all his, all his effort, all his skill to get something across to the people of New England. And what is it that he's trying to do? And it's always a new thing. It is to change the basic human condition. You have to go which is more less than the to change the basic human condition.

[43:13]

Religion is a social phenomenon that belongs to culture. It's a human phenomenon in a very real fashion. One important thing is that every time man tries to become religious, he does it at the expense of living. Religious people can be the most unhuman in so many ways. And yet we know religion is a part It should alert us to the fact that no form of human religion can satisfy man. Man himself has to be changed in such a way that religion is like him, breaks him like him, enables him to live. The basic human condition which Christ came to change is to change the community of men in the relationship which exists among men. and to make the community which is itself risen, which is ever growing.

[44:18]

St. Paul tells his people to whom he writes, you are our message. Not written in ink, and not paper, but in flesh, gather your heart. And some of them said, the medium is the message. It's the, it's the heavenly healing, which is the whole love of God. We are the life of the world. We are the city of God. We are the good of the world. And the risk which Christ comes to teach, comes to accomplish, comes to ensure in the faith to bring about a socialization of men, not in religion, but between God. And it fits what is difficult for us to grasp.

[45:24]

This goes into the very roots of our own condition, where nature itself has made us one after her own fashion. God's message comes again to a deeper root of the human condition. to make us one in a way which makes your foot not wet. Knowledge of God, as we were reminded recently, that it is not a concept, it cannot be. It's a process of needed understanding. Our coming to know God is in part a coming to know one another, and a coming to know ourselves. And we recognize about our knowledge and about our condition that there is something there which is a cloud of unknowing in us. But we are much less cloud of unknowing in the whole distinct community.

[46:29]

So the real sense in our unknowing is transformed, is changed by us. The earliest accounts of miracle from Scripture, in the fourth chapter of Exodus, would give us the indication that the ancients understood that, perhaps, that we ourselves are the people to whom Christ was. Moses, in quote by God, records certain signs in the first, because it is required, in order that they may know The whole reality of the Father is that we have a duty to do. In America, it's not to know. America is God's influence, God's presence, Father, God's people. What do we say? God's leading way. God's being with Moses.

[47:30]

This is the message. This is the teaching. This is the reality. Not the fact that a staff becomes a saint. It becomes, again, a staff. Even the Egyptian Christians could do that. But they couldn't make God present among them. When Aaron appeared, he told the people all that the Lord had done. And he performed the sign that God told him to perform. And the people were convinced. And then the word of righteousness. for us this day, and they rejoiced that the Lord had visited the sons of Israel and healed their misery, and they bowed down in worship. It's this day, rejoice, that the miracle in the lake of Galilee is calling out of us God's presence on earth, not the accuracy of prayer.

[48:32]

And we need not deny it, but it's difficult for us to recognize it, more so because our ears have become dull with fear. The liberty which the law speaks of in the epistle is not conflicted between men. It's conflicted between sons of God. It's a bit of change. not only in status, but in quality and in form, to be created to be. We're free as sons of God. We're ready for a still place as men. And in fact, we're free. We're in friendship with the possibility of life required through the presence of God. The presence of God, put that as co-subject. This is the mystery of what we are.

[49:36]

It's not that we have to recognize the depth to which the apostles themselves went when they were dreaming of Messiah and Christ. And then, when they saw him again, they recognized that it was not a revival. It was not a spiritual life. It was a resurrection, something entirely new, in the end, by God Himself. And they all came together. or the only one with God. And we ask them as they eat from death to life, eat for us, breathe out the breath.

[50:43]

It's precisely our relation to community, which is the easy and open and free feeding, our only and biggest and fixed drink. It is the measure of the evidence of our holiness God. and our understanding of what is present and what must be. In the joy of which we are invited, the joy of which we are our instinct. And for most of us, I assure you, Holy Thursday reminds us of the institution of mediocrity. And it's with hearts filled with thanksgiving, the certain wonder that what God has done, and that it's present among us, that we come together.

[51:50]

But in Bible Church, The particular celebration which we experience now was primarily done to reconcile public penitence. Her thanksgiving is, as we can say it, deeper even than the penitence of the just man among us, of Christ himself. It's the greater miracle of the reconciliation of mankind, of the justification of mankind. And an awful task, if we put that word around us. Which means, ending it. And it's in this context that when we come together, it's in this context that the Church has selected these texts.

[52:54]

And it's with... wonder then, at the mystery of unity, at the mystery of reconciliation, that I would ask you to include me in violence. And in the moment, in the two minutes at which we speak, it means nothing if you don't return to these texts again during the day, and often again during the year. We begin with the praise of the cross of Christ, of the Lord, the element of suffering and kingdom. We hear in the talk of the confession of a thief which brings salvation, and of a chosen one, unity with this name, refusing to be reconciled with this name, refusing to be united with this name, in whom he had lost confidence, bruised all men, treachery, betrayal, guilt, despair, and death.

[54:16]

And we read in the Epistle of the League for Reconciliation, even in apostolic times, within the church. We read how resembling such parishes is. So we establish, too, the meaning of their being gathered together. And that which they were about to undergo. That St. Paul had to be gathered in the liturgical renewal of the arrival of a man, had to change the ways of doing things, lest the depletive man would distort to man's own destruction God's great goodness. And we read in the Episcopal and the Gospel of today's Benin something which is more wondrous still. And we recognize that In this, what we would call a ceremony, but in this action which Christ himself performed, and in the setting it forth, in the proclamation of it, St.

[55:34]

John feels himself fully justified to admit the atonement of his sins. So important to him, so fundamental to Christianity, was this event of Christ washing the feet of his disciples. That he could let it, not replace, but stand for, takes the place of what the other evangelists gave as a and the institution of the Holy Spirit. So important. So what is this mystery of our service of one another, of our union with one another, that what they say, it doesn't replace the mystery of God, but it makes of God and man one mystery. And it brings into

[56:37]

into focus the other possibility of separating what is done, what is done of God, and what is done towards one's neighbor, the love of God or the love of neighbor. And we read in the first and the only passage of the Gospel of the love of Christ, which was the cause of his life. the reason for his being man. And the love that's described is the love that gives honor, which is complete, total, will be entirely to the end. We read in the other text of his father, of his immortality, and of the immortality that he had given to us. And this is the mystery which has gathered us together.

[57:41]

We are brought by Christ into the very heart of the Trinity, into a unity, into a unity which is beyond all expression. And it is this unity into which man is being introduced. To do before the same action today is perhaps more of an obstacle to your understanding than a help. Christ, in putting aside his poverty and put upon an infant, took upon the dress of a slave. Certainly, you've never mistaken for a slave. but it was clear to them what he was doing. He performed an action which was common in those times, and performed it twice a day, simply to wash a person's feet.

[58:51]

It was an action of such insignificance they could have done it themselves, and certainly at home many of them did. It was an action whose value in time with horses. In a few moments, he got a dusty street and dirty again. Yet, somehow, this relationship of one human being to another, by act of ever simple, by act of such little worth, had given me a drink of cold water in his name, we hear him on the way. is an act which can bring together, which is an empty and deep grace, which brings together, which is the greatest mystery known to man, although the Trinity has stopped, although the very unity is expressed.

[59:56]

So these are the things that Christ and the Church will have us think about. The priest pray today that his peace may be in all the day. At the mass, there is peace which the world cannot give. Many kinds of peace they can give, but there is peace which it cannot give. And when a priest is born, he refers to either individualism, We're going to cut himself off, or becomes a despot, or a collectivism in which he can hide, or which becomes a question for us. But there is a peace which comes to man. It's a peace which only comes through Christ. And it's a peace which he won in his own body on the cross. when he absorbed the hatred of the Jews, and the hatred of the Gentiles, and the benefit of what he had chosen.

[61:07]

Certainly one could find people for whom reconciliation was less possible, or less deserved, or less capable. nor the person who would be the instrument would be the one who would act the sign. Then this would be called Calvary. And of reconciliation, by reason of this man, by reason of the synonyms he chose in the Word he would be, by reason of the one which was so perfect, by reason of his courage, by reason of his suffering, If he holds this reconciliation, he will be qualified. And this qualifying then must be given to anyone who expects to be an ambassador of that reconciliation. God requires the reconciling of all to himself.

[62:13]

And in this reconciliation, you can hire an ambassador. If you want worse, he has yet much to do. And this is how we must be dressed, one may say. This is how we must be armed, as it were. And lest the hopelessness of the task overcomes us. He has commanded that we gather at least once a week. And cannot be called that. An assembly of reconciliation. and recognize one another. Recognize what we know of our daily life is an impossible thing of being together. And recognize that being together is something which he has done, which it were he has convoked or called.

[63:18]

And he has called us precisely to reconciliation. and that we ourselves are the earnest for the pledge of the hope of its success. And from a gathering such as this, the reconciliation that we can but must and is to spread throughout the world. This, then, is the context in which the Church calls us here today. And it's a context certainly which calls the joy. God is something that we can only experience directly by that is impossible. And he's done it so perfectly for us. And he's done it so beautifully. And he's done it with a gift of himself. The form of worship, the veneration of the cross, which we're about to experience, is one of those private devotions.

[66:12]

It had origins in Jerusalem. And with the veneration of the cross, it was found by St. Camden. I've just read of the relics and food costs throughout the world, this devotion itself also spread. But it has a place here, as do all of our kind of devotion. The only suggestion that I might give you today is to follow the text that the Church with which the Church receives and gives us back this devotion. Changes were, and to a certain degree, seen anew by herself. Very often, we feel that we have kissed the cross.

[67:16]

We have somehow embraced it. But that really isn't the point of this devotion. that it's all right in its place, and it should be all right to feel that way, and to have that notion. But we kiss the cross today because Christ accepted it. And as a matter of fact, he accepted it from us. It's our gift to God that he accepted it. And we thank him that he has done it, that he has embraced it, that he has gotten its message and lived it to the full. He, perhaps, he was a carpenter, but this is our piece of furniture. And this is something that only man could make.

[68:17]

This is how man treats his fellow man, his gift to his fellow man. And God became man, had to accept from us our relationships with one another. And He did. And in doing it, asked us to accept a new relationship. a relationship which can't be extinguished by playing a human paper, by a steadfast kindness that can't be abandoned or done away with. And so I would ask you as we make the tree genuflection, of images or remembrances, perhaps, of Dr. Kiley's vision of Christ falling under the weight of the cross, to remember that we fall under the weight of our own sins, and to thank him who has raised us up, and to let this

[69:38]

My favorite devotion, for that is private devotion, then has so changed my heart that we can check from him the gift of himself which could be the final portion of our mission. And it was a complete, perfect mind. It slipped from here to an arm of goodness, to the perfect guidance of this night. It's a beautiful, wonderful time. I wish you were in my place. You would use your death. You would have to think, what is it that makes this night different from all other nights? Why is this good? That is the message of this life.

[70:42]

And if you understand it, then you would have also a desire that the world, you would pray to this Lord, whose brothers and sisters in Christ may come to their house like the kids of the rich saint. That is my wish. May the Lord be with you throughout the future. I was thinking what would be such a good and would reach out for our help with us. And I thought it would be the goodness of the first law, the first one. It's a general we know from the inscription, the time of the apocalypse, and the Holy Spirit came to the church of heaven. And there is the picture. You are wonderful. You are working hard.

[71:46]

You have these other controls. You are patient. You have a human. But one thing that is that you are lacking, and that is the first law. And if you don't return to your first love, then I have to get your candlestick out of my way. I was thinking of that when I saw the gear of our divine. This is the candlestick of the Church of God's Savior. I was wondering how it would bring us out of this community here. I think the first time we celebrate Easter was in 1952. And now it's 1968, so for 16 years we are celebrating Easter in this chapel. I have to ask myself naturally, what about the first law of this community?

[72:53]

And we know it's an important and critical thing. But not only for our community, but it's also for the church. The church is an institution that has proudly appeared on the bank. What about the first law? Church should be what it should be. We return to the first law. Is that really what we are doing? So those objections that are in law That requires to answer them. What gives them the first love? You think that is an important thing? It's not very good, it's not love, it's not being good, hard. Keep things under control. They're patient, and patient, and have a new one. That means all you can work with it after sex.

[73:56]

and still that all is not good for God. Now, what is it then? I think in this light, and on this Easter day, we can see before our very eyes, because of this, the nation begins to turn, returning to God. Mary Magdalene went to the tomb, and there what did she do? She was looking for the Lord. My Lord, where have they put my Lord? She was looking for Jesus. Ask Jesus. As the flame of their arms, as the one who handled in his angelic mercy and forgiveness. They turned his daughter into spirit. They are in that moment they heard He detailed his personal grind in love for the Lord.

[75:00]

She learns that word at restful go on this Easter morning. There, from heart to heart, from the heart of the redeemed, from the heart of the redeemed, from all the mind, mind, and the eye, in a choir, joy, joy of the heart, That is what I would call the first love. It is the love between the first and the emotional love to which I try. You are the way I see my world. That is the first love. And that is not always the case. And it's always the same thing. Are we not in the future? Is Christianity not, to a great degree, a matter of sometimes convenience, sometimes a matter of custom, or a matter of routine?

[76:04]

Is it not, to a great extent, a matter of the law? Don't we always think about capitalism and Christianity? and all this kind of beautiful, fair and special. Would we really have in the depth of our heart that inner deep personal love for Christ as one? Do we seek His face? Do we look in at His face? Are we really conformed for the glory, glory, thanks, protection, and power of the personal love? And with our heartless love for helping our heart, I would say this, that it cannot be never. If we do not also give a thousand what not of our heart, we alone are given deliverance from sin. We alone. As Mary Magdalene did, how did she enter into this even of her intimacy with Christ as the bridegroom of the heart, weeping over her?

[77:24]

To pick my gift and to be with me. Will we take the commitment to receive after in this life? Will we take it as the kingdom? First will we act in a way that will be very good for God. You remember that Saint Peter did not have the third one as long as he was thinking about the messianic kingdom and the kingdom and about the whole great thing. But he had the possible moment in which all the men he dwelled with were left in the face of a servant man. And she asked him, do you know this man? No, I don't know. At that moment, his own dog was hundred feet long, and the dog was currently walking, because he was not the first dog. Well, when he went bigger,

[78:26]

And when the Lord turned to him and told him by a command of his heart and out of his own heart that this, his denial, was forgiven him by giving him his personal love of the power of the Savior, then we entered into a love. Then we could ask the question, do we love him? Yes, Lord. You know that I love you. This is a genuine personal mystery between you and myself. You know that I love you. That's this first love. This first love, like we have today, we have to come out of the legal energy of the state, of our need for grace, and we have to follow the curse of the English nation. That is the answer. For there is an inquiry in our thoughts.

[79:29]

How does it express itself? It expresses itself in, it won't say it in words, in things that are beyond the language and the words of reason. Like Mary Magdalene breaks this veil and unfolds the eyes of the Lord, that of the camp of the first love. And that is the way it is. First of all, it's a matter of the fund. It is not a matter of how genuinely or how much do I invest in religion. How do I solve my obligations? How do I do the reading of heaven and of heaven? No, it's a matter of the fund. It is so that our hearts sing of the goodness of God. Not only this, my dear friend, but there is also a God that moves earth, air, and wind, and that of the wind.

[80:36]

But this first love, this first love for Christ, cannot exist without reaching to me and loving the wind. How does this first love for Christ Not by telling two people of one's own family, two people of one's own love, two people of one's own spirituality, of one's own ways of life, and so on. Not to look up and speak of the fake world and [...] the fake world I think I want to say not only that for those who are not open to it, but with the same effort, take upon ourselves the will of men, of all men, and look for those who need the poor, for those who need protection in the good works, in the good works of life, of the different people.

[81:46]

from those who are not easy to oppose. Well, it breaks through all this war, and it is impossible to compare myself with others. I see the statements of my own statements, and the statements of others as my own, and they have opened up a flood of forgiveness. Perhaps it will bring it down. 12th law of the world, forgiveness, forgiveness, forgiveness. The reader asked the Lord, how often? Seven times. The Lord answered, seventy times, seven times. Thank you, 12th law. Even if it was written upon one's head, and then made for a gift of it, she had said, what? We are put to the mercy of the United States so that we have love, but we don't have that.

[82:50]

Because in Russia, it's this way. They have a tax cut, but no money. That might be an oversimplification, at least as far as the pressure is concerned. But here, it's really not that way. Here, for us, it's not so. You feel yourself that we have love, but we don't have that. Our Lord is the light of the blind. Our Lord will give genuine things that we don't believe in, and that we did in such a way that we don't suffer, that we really don't live like that. And then I will say, it's not the first love. The first love is the one that we take into the depth of suffering. This celebration is coming here now. What does it mean? It's the night of suffering. of the third law, true love, is born. And therefore, love is anything to a third law.

[83:52]

When it continues there, wherever things are not very easy to go, we need a coaching with big steps to find when the Church in this country may be in that position without doubt, if not by obvious logic, as it still was a long time years ago. And that, I think, was a kind of project to identify ourselves with the Catholic Church and to the church as one. What belongs to a well-established social organization And there was power behind it. There was money behind it. There was a real, separate, lonely church and productive institution. Now, going in another way, one after the other. One after the other.

[84:53]

The number of those who put to the scale and the exposure of the church and their vocal mind are quickly less than 10,000 years in the practice. So, we have to learn, and I'm going to pass this, we have to learn to attest by ourselves that the church and Buddhist church will find, when they begin, all the mountains, roads, are taken. And all we can barely imagine for the future and blow away this freedom. Till then, we need to long for it. The Lord has said to the disciples, Where I am, there is the God of my life, the being. And many people have asked, do you know what that means? Because as long as they were at a level about the kingdom of God and when it would be established, when things became very good, and you know, it was hanging on the wall, and the glory was great.

[86:02]

Why, Father, did you never worry at all when all the apartments disappeared, except whom? Except, except St. John the Evangelist, the representative of the apartment on the first block. And a lady was there, Mary Magdalene, who was there. So who was there? Who was there? The way he was treated is on the first day. They were there with treatment for his own sake. And because he was there to fight of their heart, so they stood there. But it was only there to learn that, I would say, of the third one is dead, he never died. In heaven, what do we have to do with heaven? How can we socially rest in heaven? As always, the people. What about social workers?

[87:04]

They are not necessary in heaven. It's every man's world. No, in fact, we have to ask ourselves that question, because as long as I am not only you, I am myself, and I am the inner, the outer, and the all-mouse, well, Most eternally without too many evidences. That one should correspond there, especially with knowledge, mechanics, earth and earth. That's why we want to do that. And that's why we acknowledge that doesn't do good things for us. But that's not it, because heaven is the first love, the state of love, the glory of heaven. the wedding feast of the Lamb, then our future, it would make sense only if we had our house with the Lord. So, my dear friends, put there this evening, in this night, when you see the Holy One, you can celebrate the time of the death and resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ.

[88:13]

Take pride, take dream, put here and receive it from your heart. put in there the secret of your heart. The heart, that is your ignorance. That is the secret of your truth. Your heart, that is what you have raised your name to. And water, many waters will never fetch this love. It will never come without love. Love is one of them. Thank you, Lord. Thank you, Lord. Please, my dear friends, may we both walk in our own way. In this idea of the first blood, then our canons will be the sign that we are children of the first blood. And the Lord is coming, and He will give us, with the gift of His Son, Maranatha, only He will give us the gift of eternity.

[89:20]

The day is just around the corner, but forty years ago I got ordained free. It happened two hundred years ago. But he didn't. He [...] didn't. And perhaps in these changing days, it is good to take any opportunity that comes to pray for what to be done for each other.

[90:48]

And maybe what we need is one request. In the olden days, it would be a priest, a maid, a priest, a priest, the book of the Bible, the name of the church, the people of the Bible, and the name of the state of life. Well, what is that? Now I want to be better. that we know it's not the opposite of the teaching. When I was on stage standing there throughout these years, with a tremendous encouragement and joy to me, I was thinking of the thing of preaching and teaching

[91:56]

in the terms of what is called to be the power of God's people. This is really the meaning of this last psalm. And thank God for this word, that he is given, and he could be free, and all his children who portrays me, people and the world. But we are very small, we are twenty-five. I remember nearly a year ago today, when for the twelfth time, Bruno, lender of this job, began to dope my throat. Somebody once asked the famous composer Haydn, and I have spoken with him, and heard a bit of work, how he came then on to Samaritan when he composed, and he told a bit of story, and he answered the very thought of God.

[93:28]

make my home and people be happy. And that's why it's important, I think, for those our friends, the people, the church and the Holy Spirit in our hearts, that we would agree that this is true. The father of our God, Jesus Christ, is the father of children. I shall enter the beholding of heaven, to guide me to the joy of my life. Is your Father the way, the blessing, or my way? to renounce this world of the power of our body.

[94:31]

It means you'll have to offer. I still remember the day when Church, on the train of masterful thinking, told me in Dortmund that truth is really and truly unspeakable. that even if man, in his personal thought like a nymph, would say that truth does not exist, he is not existing in it. He proclaims the existing thing. So we are, anyway, grounded in our nature, in the unshakable truth of God. And that, too, is true because it is the joy of love of eternity.

[95:37]

You will have birth of eternity. The other function of the faith is to journey. Now if you consider today's gospel and we hear about William Carroll Green and the Republic of Chattagall. Then he realized all too well what a tremendous work and what a tremendous story it is to be called and function as the church and the very good work of the Chattagall. and not in the word of God. Do you notice it? Do you not feel it? Do you not have it? Even if it's in your own mind, every time you don't even know it's potential, even if it's purity.

[96:43]

The one who churches on it is the one who dies. We make that clear for ourselves to hear what the Word of the Lord is like to our world, and the ministry we will be doing, and in the life. What the Father would think it is, would be an instrument of this love, and that such a man as we, Not to have any other duty but to follow the Lord who has called you. To allow the Lord to watch over you. That's what God does. It's a simple pronouncing of God. He said, God is great, joy, and blessing.

[97:50]

He is my dear friend, to celebrate for your movement, to specify together, that we do what is wrong, that fear is welcome. Because it may be that you be beaten to the feet of Jesus Christ, let this love be in his stead. was in any one. Twice after we've broken, we've broken, to be of help to God. But what you've done is, the Father is telling you, that many of you may respect your God, and the kings do an excruciating of Christ's believing, belonging, power to celebrate Christ's death, to honor his death, and to begin the honor of life.

[99:10]

And the speech is a way and a way to those who stand at the back What a wonderful thing it is that in this way the King, on the covenant and on nature, of the revolving nation, the fact that it be the King, that he has not spoken fear, That is not to work on his own will and in his own natural pattern, but that he stands to speak the words that Christ has spoken, and to give his people and his children to those who approach the table of the Lord. That is really all. get in a real battle where we all are not the victim only of healthy emotions and feelings, but we approach Him with a sleeping head, Christ being our Lord,

[100:35]

We are recalculating in the beginning, in a way which can draw us into the order of human nature. And in this way, I would say, we're facing the influence of Christ's teaching, but we have to be just open-minded. I remember the days that I lived with Jesus on this dark English day. To follow the teaching of the world, to have the teaching then or later. I need to offer the sacrifice of Christ to get out of the painful. To recognize we are very weak in the days to come. and with you all be in Christ, and there we shall be, and we shall be in glory."

[101:43]

What did we realize? That the Son of God has become man, and that he has built the world by himself. on which indeed everything in the human being can go into the being of God, I mean it's only like that one that I don't see what there would be in this world that would be more present. It may be true that our In many ways, the church, by needing the country government of the world to take in our day the name of God, would not and do not care to give it back. The problem would be a good human of the world that they could have, that they could have.

[102:51]

But the very fact that the beginning is a racial encampment of mankind. We want our own organic values and the impact which we may have on the people's social order. But it is in this very professionalism and a very humble thing I will maintain as a matter of common this church of all the bad guys begins to be irreversible. The message of Christ is a great and deeply divisive person who is baptized, baptized where? In the church. He is called by the name of Christ, who entered the temple of Christ in the time evil and good and evil.

[103:54]

That is the great mystery of where it comes to the fact that we have to bear away with the evil. The man, I will say to you, my Lord, my Lord, we belong to you. For there is only this effect for you. And for what we are not living so. You need to be very loved by God. But if you are not in the heart of God, and you are a priest, you have to be the same commitment. One or the other would have, if not for some other word, like faith, feeling with joy. If somebody took one of the other of these loving works and built a statue of Satan, would that be part of the creed?

[105:01]

It would be part of the creed of the Father. In that situation, one would have one of the other. would have experienced wealth and freedom in his duty to his father for over a lifetime. . But we are together, and all that are connected with us, we are making each other, like the anthem of this country, of this country, and making it high in the sky, and we're waiting for the judgment. I read a book,

[106:03]

Victor E. Man's Search for Meaning, Introduction to Logotherapy. Anybody read it? That experience and thought, you know, that came out of this visit in Gethsemane and in other places to especially in this meeting with Thomas Merton, because there is a man who lives that interior life in a very intense and deep way, who at the same time is very open to the outside world. embraces it with a very vivid and loving interest, you know, with a redeeming love, really, approaches the great problems, you know, throughout the time, like the war in Vietnam, things like this.

[107:18]

and who, on the other hand, seems to be at the present time rather pessimistic about monasticism and about the chances of monasticism. He even goes so far as in his Easter message to say that he wouldn't easily advise a young man in our days to enter the monastery. I dare to protest. And I would say in some way that here one can see that I shall, I told him, I shall write it to him also again. Give it black and white, you know, because, you see, he knows one kind of monasticism, you know. And that is the Trappist monasticism, of course the very nature of Trappist monasticism and its idea of stability in the sense of local stability makes it practically impossible for him to see any other monasticism.

[108:36]

or to get any other experience. Now, as I say, thank God, the present regime is a little more easy and wants to give him the possibility to visit some things. That's, for example, Christ of the Desert now. The other question is what he will find there. You understand what I'm trying to say. Now, at least, I won't comment on that anymore. But that is, of course, the thing. The situation simply is this, that he doesn't, to my mind, he just doesn't get out of this kind of very, of course, in our modern times, very frequent and rather common

[109:41]

idea that contemplation means the exclusion, it means the vacuum around you. It means a vacuum around you. That is, of course, to my mind, that's the whole problem. Does it really do? Is contemplation, are we forced to conceive contemplation on these lines, in which, for example, also Plato realized it, tried to realize it, and then all the things that he said from Plato, that there's the soul and there's the body, and the soul is one thing, let's say a ghost, and then on the other hand is the body, and what is the body then? It's a prison. And then, of course, the idea is, if I get rid of them, of the present, as I say, if I eliminate the body, and then anything that belongs to the body, visible things, material things, all distracting, if I get rid of it, and if I collect myself then in the agme, the essence of the mind, the higher

[111:03]

untouched, immaterial, purely spiritual height of the mind, then this mind will, by the very force of this freedom, will develop into a fuller life. That's the supposition. And our human soul is really, in that way, spiritual, and therefore the thing is, it comes to its own and it arrives at its best if it is free from the body. Because the body only has greater origin and the originists, you know, who were mentioned Father James just mentioned that there were some monks, you know, at least in Palestine, who were Origenists. I don't exactly know in which sense, you know, that they were, but I mean, of course, Origen could consider that we are just, man is de facto, if I remember right, nothing but a fallen angel.

[112:08]

And the state, the indication of his being fallen, having fallen, is the body, the material thing. this material darkness. And of course, that is, if one looks at the document of the Second Vatican Council, if one looks at what is going on in the church, that is just the kind of thing, you know, that at this historical and at the same time eternal moment, the church wants to get out of it. How? not through simply rejecting the past, but a deeper concentration on the wholeness and integrity of the whole mystery of redemption. And I would like so much, and I think it is the God-wanted task of monasticism in our days, to get contemplation, and let us say concentration, And in that way, I'm not quite sure, you know, how much, I mean, Zen, Buddhism and so on will be ahead on a long run, but that's another question.

[113:19]

But the, you know, that wants to get out of it gets to the totality and to that God who is a yes and amen to the whole of this creation. It's a yes and amen. It is not a no. It's a no to sin, but not a no to anything that structurally and in that way positively belongs to this creation as foreseen on behalf of the word. It has meaning. Matter has meaning. And that also entails the whole message that comes so close to the truth through a man like Teilhard de Chardin. I don't say that he's a great philosopher. Maybe he's a great poet. But the man has a vision, and that vision is in the context of this, in one way, taking a deep breath. But what is this peace?

[114:23]

That peace is simply all-embracing. That peace is not a kind of attitude, I am peace, but you are not, you know. Peace is in my soul, but the body is a very disturbing element, something like that, you know. Then always this kind of censoring everything that is around us. We could not censor in that way anything in the name of peace, at least not what belongs, you know, to all the things that proceed from the word of God. They are stamped, they are sealed, you know, with a yes and amen. And that seal is the Holy Spirit, and the Holy Spirit simply is poured out and fills the whole world. The whole world. That are beautiful words of Pentecost. In that way, what Teilhard de Chardin tries to express, you know, is exactly in what we would call the Pentecostal spirit, you know.

[115:27]

So I would say what is needed today, of course, Thomas Merton is absolutely right, you know, in saying that, yes, now what is lacking in monasteries, and that way I agree with him totally, is that the young people, let's say the hippies, where there is such an evident thirst and such an evident striving and longing, you see, don't find the gurus. If they want gurus, that means men who are really experienced in the spiritual life. Thomas Mozart asked rightly, do they find them in the monasteries? Do they find them in our monastery? No, they don't. They have to go to a Indians, you know, and so on. I mean, nothing that I despise Indians in this world. They have done a great, you know, they have certainly done a great job.

[116:30]

And they are living, they are simply the product of a tremendous tradition, you see. And a tradition that takes in also the body, that's for sure. Yoga, you know, in that way, is an art, you know, which supposes... the knowledge of the interaction between the body and the soul, and considers that as a unity. So I would say, for heaven's sake, let us return, and you forgive me, I wrote all sorts of nice complimentary words this morning in the sermon. I wanted to kind of reinforce this teach, which I think is absolutely fundamental. I certainly realize that I haven't succeeded in bringing it really into the bloodstream of the whole, you know, the community.

[117:33]

He has a community, he has a whole, but we never give up hope. It's simply this comprehension that contemplation simply has its inner core and centre in the contemplation between the Father and the Son. That is the heart of the whole business. And this is, of course, what we call, that is the actualization of what we call the first law. That's the heart. And this Christ wants us to participate in. There's no doubt about it. That is the peace, I mean, that peace between father and son. And you see right away, as it was said this morning, peace in that sense is not simply a static affair, immovable, and simply without poles, without any polarity.

[118:38]

In other words, without any tension. That's not true. I mean tension in the deep sense of the word. No, the peace, the peace is the peace between father and son. That's the But this peace is a mutual beholding, it's a vision, it's contemplation. It's this loving sinking, as it were, into one another, but distinct persons. And so, as we would say in our way of expressing these things, face to face. a deep comprehension, an eternal comprehension. But of course this piece is essentially a we. This piece is not essentially an I. It's a we. And of course it is just this, we can see that maybe later when we compare these things to Victor Frankl and his search, man's search for meaning, which is such a beautiful approach, but it's Jewish.

[119:48]

Or Martin Buber, it's Jewish. That's the I. But of course it is Christianity that introduced, I'm gonna say, into the very center of the Godhead, The idea of the we, that's the Old Testament did not do. I am who I am. But of course, in the New Testament, it is said, and we shall come and we will abide, you know, with you. That's a completely new thing. In the Old Testament, one would say, I come and abide. In the New Testament, our Lord says, we shall come to divide. You see, that points to the inner center of contemplation, what contemplation for us as Christians is. It's simply being taken into that unity and that peace that our Lord has expressed in the 17th chapter of the Gospel of St.

[120:55]

John, which is the climax of this whole chapter. Revelation as a real, you know, thing that gets us into it, that high priestly prayer, that they may be one as you and I are one. You see, we cannot be one without entering into the we. We don't think of that enough. Therefore, I would say that right away in the very center of contemplation is this participation in that peace, you know, that Father and Son have with one another, and that is the Holy Spirit. But then, of course, we go further. We go further. Christian revelation goes further. The Son is sent, and he becomes man. So the word is incarnate.

[121:56]

Now, is that not a part of contemplation? Of course it is. Redemption is not just God leaving himself and becoming completely different and losing his own identity and becoming man. It's not. Everybody, every Christian, Leo the Great, you know, would realize this wouldn't help us at all. But what is the whole thing is real God and real man. Real God and real man. And therefore the world is made flesh, which to platonic ears, you know, doesn't sound well. But that is just the point, and that's the point for us as boxers, too. Our whole contemplation, the very life of contemplation, is a process of incarnation. And entering the monastery in that way does not mean that we exclude everything that is flesh and everything that is visible, and this entire material universe, not at all.

[123:08]

Especially it doesn't mean that we in ourselves try to introduce, and would be completely wrong, for example, to understand virginity in that sense, that we, as monks, you know, would decide our life consists in ignoring the body. trampling upon the body. Of course, many of these words sometimes seem to point into that direction. If they do, one can say, in the light of the Second Vatican Council, it just is not so. That is the broader view that the Church is acquiring, and therefore also for us, Again, it's an absolute part of the contemplative life that every monk in himself approaches a closer, deeper union between, let us put it this way, soul and body.

[124:13]

I would say in a much deeper sense between spirit, soul, and body, the three things. That is simply as the fact, but of course, this deeper union, you see, of course, not achieved in the way, especially if one speaks of the spirit as the centre of the whole business, in this way that one has to give in to tensions. That is simply Our experience, our person is not full. We didn't enter into every possible experience of the body and so on. Then it would be much better. We would close shop and all get married. But that is of course not, that is simply not the message of the messianic age. The spirit has to be the determining factor and the spirit in every Christian

[125:15]

of course, already produces this or should produce this, that. Now, to be married as if you were not married, to enjoy the goods of this world that you didn't enjoy, to be rich and always poor, as a man who has everything and still has nothing. See, that points you into the direction of the spirit, of the spirit. We are not, the Christians are not humanists, and certainly not in this kind of wobbly thing, you see, in which in the last analysis then the human person just kind of disappears like a drop in the material universe. That would be entering into the existential vacuum. That is not the meaning of the spirit. So therefore the spirit is a union, but of course it's a union. which is in that way transforming, let us say, how transforming?

[126:22]

Controlled. For example, if I just give one example, because in our body, for example, the most important thing is naturally is the face, isn't it? Now, so much depends on the face. Dostoevsky says, you know, here, and it's so right, You pass by a little child. You pass by spitefully, with a wrathful heart. You may not have noticed the child, but he has seen you and your face, ugly and profane. Absolutely true. You see, but the face is a marvellous example for the very fact, you know, that the spirit can express itself and can express in its own superiority, certainly in no way despising the face, which is bodily expression.

[127:28]

Therefore, we always say, and I think in this period of post-Vatican II, you know, especially that it doesn't make the man pious when he has always a sour face. That's not the sign of piety, at least not in that renewal to which we look forward. So I would say that, for example, if one speaks about the guru and about how to learn contemplation, the spiritual life, I would say that, for example, One thing, you see, that also, for example, a novice master and so on could take care of, may call the attention of a novice who is longing for the heights of the contemplative life, that he, for example, should start with this face. So then he should start. But if you look around, you don't always have a kind of

[128:29]

If your faith, you know, is an open expression of constant, of a constant, let us say, habitual know, what does it have to do with the God of Amen? But a faith can also be a complete yes. I don't think that when I say these things that I think I have accomplished it. That's a completely different story. But the fact that I have not, you know, should not prevent me to say these things, because I think those things are absolutely essential. And then, of course, we don't stay there. For example, attitude, you know. I came the other day, also on my trip, I came into a monastery, and they were, I must confess, they were the novices, you know, but that has no reflection on the present people, you know.

[129:34]

But, you know, they were singing, you see, and singing, and absolutely sitting this way, like this. See, how it was possible, it's a mystery to me. But in that way, completely neglecting the body, if that is the 20th century American or our future, you see, I have great misgivings. So therefore, we should simply realize, for example, attitude. is a matter of expression, is absolutely necessary. And cultivating it is necessary. I've very often in the past called your attention to the fact that in the Old Testament language, body, basar, basar, body, means where the spirit shines to it.

[130:42]

The spirit shines to it. Therefore, bassa in that way is in the Old Testament, it's not this kind of thing that you have to trample on, but bassa is like the bulb, you know, which is, and the light is inside, and the bulb contributes to give shape to the light, to make the light appear. Therefore, body is essentially a manifestation So therefore that belongs and we can never give it up in our monastic life. It's impossible. We shouldn't be stiff. We shouldn't do things just because they have to be done so. And we shouldn't behave at mass and this kind of thing. This is no expression of the flesh. Not to speak about prayers. But, and then there is the other thing, you see, there is the third dimension of the, and I think, for example, to get back to Gethsemane, I think for that reason, that, for example, that there is a church now, which is a manifestation in that way of the purity, as far as we can reach it, you know, of the spirit.

[132:09]

Wonderful step, you know, in the right direction. For that matter, too, I approve of debauch, you know, for example, as a human way of expressing reverence. But then there is the other thing, and that is, of course, then the third dimension of the contemplation. After the incarnation, then comes simply the effusion, I mean, of the spirit. And that spirit, that is the spirit of brotherhood. And therefore, that is facing from person to person, man to man, eye to eye. That's the other thing. And that is, of course, in us, in our life, that is part of our contemplation. Therefore, I'm leery. One says the monastic life starts with the idea of solitude. And I'm much more happy with Pacomius, you know, who says the monastic life starts with koinonia.

[133:18]

I would say that is, you know, to my mind, deeper. But, you know, then the koinonia is community life. And as community life, again, of course, it is then this community life, part of our contemplation. Part of our contemplation. And so in that way, that seems to me is the direction. But again, we have to, just as the idea of incarnation, let us say, applied to the unity and harmony between soul and body, requires a whole doctrine, requires a technique. Require is in itself an art. Expression for man is an art. It doesn't simply come by itself. It is an art. And the monastery is there to cultivate that art. And people in the world in that way could learn maybe a lot from monastic, let us say, monastic culture.

[134:24]

But on the other hand, that's not enough. It goes up to the relation between man and man, fraternal life, community life, an essential ingredient of contemplation. In the Christian context, it cannot be separate. And I think that was, for example, the drawback of, I mean, I speak not of a deep knowledge at all, but what one would call the 17th century French, sufficient spirituality, you see. That was this kind of spirituality, where the very word spirituality means withdraw into something that is removed from personal relation, from person to person. That is, of course, another field, but again it is a field which requires constant learning and constant art. So I would say, and to my mind is my deepest conviction, the guru, the one who is really a guru and could in that way contribute to the inner process of salvation after Christ has entered into it, after the Spirit has entered into it,

[135:49]

and therefore the cosmic dimension has been given, the community dimension has been given to us from the alpha to the omega, from the beginning to the end, from the we between father and son to the communion of saints, from alpha to the omega, the beginning to the end. The guru will that way, you know, and with this comprehensiveness, then, you know, leads and contributes what he can to these other people into that wholeness he really contributes to the redemption of the world. So there's a lot to learn, but it's a wonderful task. To my mind, the future of monasticism depends on it. Are we set? Are we able to make this inner decision in this tremendous comprehensiveness to work our salvation? Yes, amen.

[136:51]

Good. ...of yesterday with this kind of problem about the inner structure and the nature of the monastic community. Is it first of all a community or is it an organization or living together of solitaries? And that is one of the important questions, of course, that we ought to have to face in these days. I had a talk then with Father Chrysogonus, and Father Chrysogonus is, I must confess, a very wonderful man. He's a convert and he has this whole freshness and enthusiasm of approach. I hope it will come here to pay a visit.

[137:58]

He is in charge of the chant, you know, the kind of liturgical reform, you know, so he's all wrapped up in this work, naturally. They kind of go and work day by day, and he has a difficult time keeping up with the course of the ecclesiastical year. So we had many talks together during these days. I stayed there and he is a very communicative man. He loves to talk about the talks of God. He is communication in person. But on the other hand, of course, he has the strictness of his rule, which he respects and which he lives up to, and at times under great sacrifices.

[139:02]

confessed to me that in 1951, I gave the retreat there, that he had a tremendous desire, longing to have a talk, a long talk. But then he thought he was so looking forward to a talk that it would be better to give it up. So he gave it up. So we never met. I mean, not kind of face to face, you know. He was then sent to Rome, and he studied there very long, and then he has specialized on the liturgy. And now in these last years, then he became very old in Rome. He met then Father Veilleux. What's his first name? Armand. Armand Veilleux. the man who wrote the thesis about Pacomius and the Pacomian monasticism, and especially the Pacomian liturgy. And he was kind enough when I explained to him our great desire that we would like to know more about it, especially also in connection with our own, that we have been

[140:15]

studying, reading Pacomius and so on, and he had the kindness to send me a copy of this thesis, you know, which is a very precious thing, and he sent it here by mail, just arrived the other day. And I think it will help us a great deal. It will, in all probability, it will be published by the Studia Ansemiana, at least we hope. He had offered it to Louvain, but the Jesuit editor of the, I don't know what it is in Louvain, that publishes those theses, said he could publish it there only on the condition that he left out all theological thinking, that it was purely, let's say, photographic historical And so he didn't accept that.

[141:17]

And so we hope and pray that the studio in Indiana will be able to publish it. But I only wanted to mention it here in this connection just to give you one idea, which I think is important in our own research, trying also to define ourselves, and that is a certain correction which Father Armand thinks that should be made in the usual concept of the development of monasticism. And he strongly defends the thesis that monasticism did not really originate, and that we could not say that the The cradle of monasticism is the Egyptian desert, the solitude. But that's the cradle of monasticism.

[142:19]

First of all is this, what he says, is that one cannot, absolutely one cannot say that monasticism originated in Egypt, that de facto the sources show clearly that monasticism is a phenomenon which at a certain point simply sprung up individually and independently in various regions of the church, in the East and in the West, in various cities and all kinds of Christian communities. So it's a much larger phenomenon. Of course, we always knew, We made this distinction, then one can see how difficult it is in historical things to be guided by, let us say, preconceived concepts. We made the distinction always between the asceticists and the ascetics and the monks.

[143:22]

And of course, that is a thing which which Per Armand questions very much. He says, historically it's clear that monasticism originated or came and grew out of this asceticism. And that this asceticism, that's then the next step, was really, also in its origins, was community, communal, and not individual. One thing, for example, which seems to be clear, and we knew that always, that, for example, concerns the nuns, the sisters, the women. We know, of course, St. Athanasius, who kind of drew out some canons for the life of the consecrated virgins, And of course, with ladies, it's so that they simply, you know, for them, the form, as I say, the only possible form of such a life is community life.

[144:30]

So we know that they always lived in community, in connection with the, say, the church, the bishop's church, and so on. But that evidently is also the case concerning the ascetics, the male ascetics. also in the context of the Christian centers, which were really small towns where these groups then formed. And then, of course, he refers to Pacomius. Pacomius then has the, let's say, this way, you see, that he distinguishes two roots of monasticism. the one, these ascetics who live as groups in the bond of charity and as a kind of authentic or more intensive group. picture or continuation of what we call the apostolic church, the apostolic community in Jerusalem as it is described in the second and the fourth chapter of the Acts of the Apostles.

[145:46]

They had all things in common and all this and all that. And then the other roots, that of the didaskalio. Now we know, of course, that Alexandria had a important didaskalion, a school. The essential thing in a school is that it isn't for good. A school is in itself is temporary. And it is defined by the master-disciple relation. So it is a place of learning. therefore being informed. And that, of course, was very evident. I mean, Alexandria, Origenes, or Clement of Alexandria, were such masters who had then these groups of disciples around them.

[146:48]

And the contention of Père Armand is that that had a great influence, indeed, also on Egyptian, especially on Egyptian monasticism. And therefore, the origin of Egyptian monasticism was the father-son relationship. The experienced man of God and groups of disciples, or one or the other disciple, would join these masters, but naturally for time, not for good, but as long as they could learn. from the master until they were able to carry on on their own, become Abba or fathers themselves. And these, you know, various groups, you know, very small groups of ascetics living in little, very small little colonies. And that has one root also, especially of Egyptian monasticism.

[147:50]

But at the same time, there is evidently in other form, in which then various groups like this formed more comprehensive or larger colonies. And these larger colonies were then grouped not around one father, but around a church in which they came together for the common celebration of the Eucharist. And that this, too, then was the origin, let us say, of another concept. One could say that in this context here, the church is the center. And therefore, this kind of community has then, from the beginning, what one could call a more ecclesial character. And then comes Pacromius, and then with Pacromius, Now, you know very well, I mean, he's usually, the usual picture of Pacomius is that, you know, that he was a soldier.

[148:58]

And then as a soldier, what he did, you know, was organizing and organizing in big communities and trying to get to keep these communities together by a rather rigid and harsh regime. But that is very much contradicted, and it's true. You know, if one reads texts like that last will and testament of Osiesius, one of the disciples of Pacomius, it's absolutely clear that it isn't a matter of discipline. It isn't a matter of military form. But it is essentially, and that's what Father Armand tries to point out, Very clearly, that's essentially the idea of service. I would say that, you know, in his mind, what Pacomius really was trying to do, first of all, his monastic experience or his initial vision grew out of his baptism and of the experience of being incorporated into a living Christian community.

[150:13]

And that is that vision, you know, that all the dew of heaven collected over him, that's the dream he had, and said this is of course a reflection of baptism, baptismal water of the Holy Spirit, and that this dew of heaven that collected over him then, through him and in his hands was changed into honey. That means into food. What purges, purifies the individual then becomes honey, that means food. And this food then, this honey, comes out of his hands and from there it covers the whole soil around him, the ground around him. And the ground, that is the fraternal community. That is the ecclesia, that is the terra. And this community, therefore, receives this message of service and lives according to service.

[151:25]

So that, for example, the dominating idea also for these various homes, various places, remember, each one, each group has a house by itself. and their works, but this work was gathered together by every house serving the other. So it was a mutual service in which these various groups were organized. So the idea, first it is not the idea, one could say, of a father as the origin of the group. And it is not the, but it is the idea of fraternity as such. The fraternity as such is, as I say, the inner, what makes the inner meaning of the group. And this fraternity as such is and lives a life of mutual service. And therefore, as Pacomius puts it, you know, with this explicitly, with this...

[152:30]

term, it is laboring for one another. What we know, of course, is called carrying one another's burden. That is the real, let us say, purpose, and we are going to say the originality and the law, the inner law and character of this Pakomian community. And that out of this idea, then also then develops, later on develops the service, the praises of God, I mean, the Opus Dei, and the character of the Opus Dei in the Pakomian community. But that may be another. I just wanted to put this, you know, because it really meets some thoughts. I just, by chance, during these last, especially in the course of this last year too, it became more and more I had this instinctive, this feeling that monasticism really has a broader basis

[153:46]

what we may call an ecclesial basis. And that's, you know, there's this one word in Holy Scripture in the Psalm that always is Psalm, I think in our counting it's 31. The other 32, where this word comes, you know, you have created their hearts singilati, singilati. Now, the usual translation of that verse, which I think had a great influence, you know, also on the themes. I mean, I say that just at the moment as a hypothesis, also on the wording of these two places, especially chapter four, of the community of the apostles as one heart. They were of one heart.

[154:50]

The idea in the verse, in the sound verse, in the Greek, first of all, one thing is important, lip or heart is in the original Hebrew text, not approval, but the singular. And on the other hand, I think it's important that for what we translate in Latin, I mean with Sinjilatim, is in Hebrew given by the word achat. And achat, of course, means oneness. And I read it, I'm not finished with it, you know, yet. But translations, you know, for example, we have a Hebrew, what is it, Psalter, which is under, you know, as the word-by-word translation, for one who isn't good in Hebrew, you know, it's a great hymn, where this Ahatz then is translated as together.

[155:53]

In another translation, Hebrew translation, we have God created together. their heart and then the heart of all for one another, for one another. However one may translate it, the decisive thought is not that God has created each man's heart. That is a kind of individualistic translation. Each man's heart all by itself. Everyone's heart God has created. The original message seems to me is the oneness, that the heart is really the oneness. The heart, our heart, is created for togetherness, for oneness. And that, maybe that is really at the, I would say, at the root, so that the messianic time is the fulfillment of just this.

[157:00]

And then the one heart, you know, as the... as the fulfillment of this prophecy in the New Testament. And from there, that may be the word monarchos, too. And that is also a remark that I just discovered in a book where I didn't expect it at all, you know, in the big work of Professor Binswanger or Heidelberg about anthropology. where he distinguishes between monos and as one, and the singularity or isolation, one can say, between unity and solitude. A soul are two different words. And of course, we know that St.

[158:03]

Augustine, when he when he installed his monastery, what's called monastery, therefore with the thing monos, the word monos in it, meant of course and based it on the unity of all our hearts in the one Christ, which is then the essence of the ecclesial community. So these are just some thoughts which I think would be fruitful for us. and the other two, William Schneider, two who, from St. John the 23rd Seminary, received holy orders and are ordained priests this Saturday. And I wanted to ask you, do you think that all have put their names on these cards?

[159:10]

Otherwise, maybe if you remember that you have not, I'll leave them here maybe after the, at the end, you may write your names on it. That I find a little hard to understand, you know, and then to say You know, you're not an intellectual community. It takes a lot to get your intellectual pursuits in what time you have in this country.

[160:14]

And so that, I find, is kind of hard. And then, as far as the notion goes, a lot of us know. I mean, the first two people in the community don't know. And we would be glad if, you know, because I think that the monk and the Bible, you know, go together. And that was kind of the idea in sending them away. And by gosh, if I thought that, look, it was an impediment, or that the work environment wasn't an impediment for teaching and sharing with the community, I would be glad to have met you all. and uh because there's some you know different all the ones that you know for some reason rather excuse so that does happen no it shouldn't be different because if i don't know sometimes what somebody else said don't do it but i just give it to you it's very difficult to you know

[161:18]

Yeah, but what? Yeah. No, I mean, people are just, yeah, what was the problem? No, but I really don't think it's because, what is it? Yeah, I think the trouble is you don't face that. But it doesn't look good. I don't want to sit here in his device, because I think it's something with my spiritual director, which went far less than I expected. Well, I mean, as I understand it, I mean, Brother Father had the heart attack. And I don't think Brother Father's spiritual director. I don't know who he is. Well, you do. No, and he doesn't have that much contact. Well, Brother John, if that wasn't his, that's... Yeah, but... And then the other thing is to me, you know, I think it's good when you talk about young people and so on, you know, and I think it just seems to me that that could be a real illusion, you know, and that if what we, you know, I mean, for instance, you mentioned that the young people in Cornell would like to have a priest and so on, you know, but I mean, I may be all wet or something, you know, but just seeing you, you know,

[162:24]

And also having contact with young people, you know. I just don't think you're like young people. Well, I think that on a level, it's talking. You're all right. And you have a nice personality and so on. But when it goes on, the depth, I mean, what people are looking for, what younger people are looking for, they're these people that are committed to something. And as I see it, you're just all over the line. And I mean, we talked about, yesterday, we talked about the monastic wife and so on being a commitment. And it's like a wife, being married to a wife, and the care of the children, and the responsibility that taught him. And I just don't see that. And I think that people... today to get married and so on, I think that's what they don't worry. Priests are people that are committed now. And that's the thing, you know. And I just don't know I mean, I've got great doubts about this thing at St. Bernard. I mean, when you get in there with all these young kids.

[163:27]

I mean, I was a seminarian myself, and I was the class prefect, and so I've been here for a couple of years. And boy, I mean, I've seen some of the teachers and these students. And if you don't work on either level, And so on. And the level of the spirit and so on, they just go all over you. And that's the thing. It's very difficult, you see. I mean, it's all right to say, I mean, now, thank you and so on, you see. But it's very difficult to have any kind of, I mean, it's just a mind. Well, I don't want that. It's just too late now. I don't want this to happen. I don't agree with you on one thing, because I have asked young people, I have been asked by people to help young people.

[164:28]

So your opinion is one, and their opinion is another. And perhaps it's because you, you know, I just don't know why. I don't know. I just think I'm not in Dallas. It was next to mine, you know? I couldn't change for many years. And you're talking about spiritual love. Now, I tried to deal with people of spiritual love. I converted people who had been in church for many years. I didn't even know them. And I made it wrong, but other people were not capable of it. So I have to accept everything right from here. Yeah. The other thing is, you see, that was the thing we're trying to focus on. The question tonight is, what are we looking for when we vote on somebody for solemn profession? Now, in thinking about these things, I must say it's always one of the most critical and the most thoughtful of things, you know, to make a decision like that and in former years has caused personally for me also many anxieties.

[165:45]

Tonight I will just kind of try to explain or just to touch on the various factors in what are we looking for in the field of grace, what are we looking for in the field of nature. Naturally, what are we looking for in somebody who makes solemn profession here at Mount Savior depends to a great extent, decisive extent, on the place, the character of the place. And we all remember that, that Montsevier has been founded to live the monastic life according to the basic ideas of Saint Benedict. And their first idea is that the monastery is a school of the divine service. And therefore, it is geared, first of all, to learn how to serve God various ways, the art of the spiritual life, especially.

[166:55]

Therefore, it is not geared to any specific work, which would then determine the life of the monk and also make certain demands on him without which he could not, for example, of an intellectual kind, you know, without which the candidate should not, and the monk would just not have its place in a monastery, for example, that runs a school. One really has to have at least the general inclination to be a teacher, become a teacher, and therefore one also has to have the intellectual qualifications which make that possible. So in order to enter a place like ours where the, let us say, the service of the Lord, the abode, is thee, thee,

[168:05]

one, it seems to me, basic supernatural disposition is required. And that is that the one who offers himself for this life and enters and wants to enter such a covenant, solid profession, that he is, how can one explain it now, that he is hit somehow by that specific love of Christ, which is love for love's sake. Somehow, and that is, let us say, the inner center, the heart of the vocation, which makes it from this inner center of the legitimate of valence. He has to have found the pearl of great price, the kingdom, in such a way that he is ready to leave everything, and to follow Christ. Therefore, in the power of this, one could call it basically really, if I say love for love's sake, I mean what we would call contemplative love.

[169:22]

It is not an ambition. It is not a purpose. It's not a practical goal, which kind of attract me and determine me. But it is really, first of all, one can say first and last, this law for love's sake. That is, of course, an act of inner freedom. That's what we call contemplative. It stands in itself. And therefore, it moves us in a legitimate way to leave everything and to follow Christ. That means to enter into that inner living union with him. In order to do this, leave everything, one has to be in the power, I say again, in the power of this law, and not for any other reason. One has to be what one calls unhooked, basically unhooked. We call it sometimes renunciation. The enclosure, as such, marks simply a withdrawal from slavery, which means the service of secondary goals within the realm of this world.

[170:38]

And it gives and marks the enclosure the freedom to serve God with one's whole heart, one's whole being or life, and with all one has. That seems to me is the inner heart of it. And therefore all our, let us say, our own questions too, must, I think, concentrate first on this spot. Do we have any sign, any assurance of some kind that this inner fire is there, that spark? It doesn't have to be, as you all understand, it doesn't have to be perfect and it doesn't have actually to penetrate the entire man. That is simply then a matter of development of the act and the process of serving sense. That is why we have then a practice in the school, perfection is not supposed in the school.

[171:46]

where we in the school then lead or educate or get, bring out this inner centre as the factor that in the end dominates all our actions and all circles and realms of our being. Now this inner Surrender with one's whole heart, that of course includes first of all the formal glorification of God through prayer. The zeal for the divine office, the zeal for the house of God has eaten me out. That certainly is one aspect of it. And that is, as we know from St. Benedict, something we should look for immediately right when the candidate comes. Of course, especially in before then solemn profession. All that is within me, praise his holy name.

[172:52]

All that is within me, praise his holy name. To that, of course, also belongs then naturally the love for the world. He licks you because that is evidently directed to my heart. That's directed God's love speaking through his word to my heart. So that inner love, this inner sanctuary has to be there. And it has to be, as you may see, a positive one. cannot enter and is not there. One simply leaves the world for any kind of negative reasons. Out of inferiority complexes or out of hostilities or whatever it is. Then, of course, out of that follows with one's whole life the offering of one's whole being.

[173:54]

through what the other day, but Nicholas mentioned that word, which is, I think, a very good word, which Bultmann calls basic obedience. And this kind of basic obedience, again, is, of course, one of the basic, I mean, the essential disposition of the monk, basic obedience. I mean, obedience in that general, in a sense, you know, readiness to change. Readiness to learn, to be taught. Readiness to follow examples. And of course, for the monk especially, out of that inner attitude and conviction that one, through one's dedication, through one's gift of oneself, one does not own one's own will. Nor does one own one's body. These two things give them to the obedience a special kind of character and a special way of realization in relation to the superior father of the monastery, in relation to the brothers, and one's body in the form of virginity and in the form of manual labor.

[175:19]

Then is the third, follows. This is the, that one serves God with all one has. That's a positive way of wording to say what we call poverty. Poverty is a way to tear down all divisions. Ownership always builds up fences. Poverty tears down all divisions. The formula of poverty is that everything should be common to all. So it should, therefore, poverty really, interiorly, be a sharing. A sharing is both. And, of course, the framework of the holy rule in the way of stability. which is really one definite final giving of oneself to one's brothers.

[176:30]

So these would be, let us say, the inner seems to be kind of spiritual dispositions, as we call it, and that the inner spiritual, say, tendency and desire, inclination, direction, Of course, the signs for that must be evident, that this will is there. But of course, you can right away see that this kind of supernatural disposition or power supposes a natural disposition. The basic law of which I spoke in the beginning Yeah, one must ask oneself if it does not demand a certain, in the individual, a certain basic, let us say, wholeness. Because this love has to be the uniting point of the entire personality.

[177:38]

Therefore, for example, a schizophrenic would not be able, you know, to put that into practice. what we say a split personality could not do it. It's thought, you know, but it's simply not the natural disposition. It's not there. There must be in the one, you know, in whom this kind of, I would call, love for love's sake, you know, is alive, there must be a certain inner, not so natural, primary and positive openness. What we call, he must be an homme ouvert, not an homme clos, not a man, a human person that is shut up in itself. It has to be able in that way to, from this inner wholeness, follows naturally also the sharing.

[178:41]

There has to be, one could say, also a certain natural sense of wonder, a certain capability of enthusiasm, a certain zest to live and to let live, a tendency to isolation. would, to my mind, prevent such, as I say, contemplative love really to unfold, especially if this tendency to isolation simply comes from an inner kind of distortion of the personality, a withdrawal in that way. as a negative withdrawal is not compatible with this basic law. If someone, that is our great problem so often, the so-called contemplative lie, people leaving the world, what is the motive?

[179:47]

And our great difficulty here, practical difficulty, of course, is that we don't know the people who come. Now we make more and more also in the way in which we accept people, we become a little more, how would I say, cautious, and we invite people to be here for a time, and so on, so too slowly is the only way in which we could really ascertain if this basic inner, one can say contemplative heart in the person is there or is not. then also there must be, because this contemplative love, this love for love's sake, one can call it the love of union, There's a lot, naturally, first of all, flowers in the, we said before, in the glorification of God and in the Lectio Divina.

[180:51]

So that supposes, I think on a natural level, at least a certain possibility for, let's say, for spiritual things. A monk is a prophet. As Holy Scripture says, the law was given to the priests, and the counsel was given to the sages, and the word was given to the prophet. The monk is a prophet. He is hit by the word. Of course, that also supposes certain, I think, natural dispositions, especially if an entire life, let us say, let us say a prophetical life, you know, be based on us. There must be some promise of continuity. And that is, for example, a certain inner, also, for example, the sage and the council.

[181:59]

Also that belongs really as an essential part to the life of the monk. But without a certain also natural, let us say, interest or delight, you know, in the world and in God's ways, for example, in history, a certain mental alertness, a certain curiosity, a certain inner vitality that moves the monk from within, see, in this line, I think is necessary. You don't have in any vocation, anyone who makes a profession look, you know, further knows if he gives the promise to become a scholar, that's not necessary. But on the other hand, I would say a vocation to a man's saviour, too, now, in a certain way, somebody who in that way dedicates himself to...

[183:05]

theology and so on, certainly fits completely into the framework. Provided he does not make this the rule of his life in such a way that it simply makes the monastic life and its totality impossible. This is the balance we constantly try to work on. Then there is the A disposition is needed, for example, because our life within the framework, you know, of stability and that kind of poverty that we just alluded to before, I mean, the poverty of sharing, is, of course, now community life now. It supposes in the one who is taken into it a certain, there has to be a certain promise, let us say, of solidity, of loyalty.

[184:12]

Possible. A man who is by nature a drifter, what we call a drifter, just can never make it. We look in our, in those whom we admit to profession, we look, you know, is there a certain, is he a homo creatus? Is he a man of peace? And I would say in that comprehensive sense of the word, but he is not constantly meeting the brick walls of his own prejudices or preferences. For example, that one would be in a defensive position against nature, against this, against that. but a certain inner broadness must be there, because our stability includes the cosmos, it includes nature, and continuity and perseverance.

[185:41]

is needed. Of course, for that you see right away what we have to look for certainly is what we call today a certain maturity. That is one of our greatest problems, to to let us say solemn profession take place then when certain this maturity is reached in such a degree at least that it gives the promise of continuity. In order to have that, there's also needed a certain what we may call a natural depth. A man who is by nature superficial could not, let us say, could not possibly let his roots sink in. And that is of course one of the essential dimensions of our idea of perfection.

[186:46]

Perfection is a depth dimension. Perfection is not only to reach a record of some kind, but it is depth and continuity and wholeness. Therefore, one could say, in some way, the candidate we look for, and also the one whom we admit to our profession, a certain roundness is necessary. Therefore, it's always difficult if we meet, let's say, the porcupine type. or the critical type, or the scoffer, the disillusioned one. We look for balance and we look for that broadness and elasticity that promises perseverance, patience. If these things are not there, now they are always there in a certain way in every human being, but I mean there are of course shades and the way in which individual character is built.

[188:02]

I would say not everybody, we don't want and we don't expect perfection of the want. whom we admit to some profession, but there must be certainly signs that assure us of the inner serious willingness to change. If somebody thinks he has it all and he doesn't need any change, that, of course, may hinder the entire. So if somebody promises in some profession conversion of morals, he can't do that if he is not interiorly free enough for, one can say in some way, unlimited change. because one can never in these things gauge where is the end. It's in that way an unlimited process.

[189:05]

So you can see there right away that there is certainly necessary this inner quietness. If somebody is by nature overcharged, you know, what we may call that way, is restless, you know, is what we call very tense. That is, of course, always a very... difficult thing and probably in most cases impossible thing because we always have made the experience that with this kind of character, what we may call overcharged or restless or tense, life itself just intensifies the symptoms and does not really help. Because in summary one can say the basis for our kind of life simply in that case is too small. Therefore a person like that needs change and needs, you know, to various tasks, you know, and something that feeds his imagination and that gives him a fulfillment here and gives him a fulfillment there and so on.

[190:24]

But our life, of course, is different. We need and ask of those who make solemn profession that certain inner balance, certain inner give elasticity, the possibility of give and take. And I would say basically what we have to look for is that inner willingness to change. Or we may call it also humility. pride in that way, of course, builds up walls and diminish the possibility of growth and of continuity and stability in the monastic line. Of course, the other and other Dimension, I must confess, I mean, you all know that we all, I think we all more or less set boats, but the whole field, of course, of mental health, you know.

[191:27]

has entered the whole, let us say, the field of natural science. And of course, we certainly have made much progress in that direction. Still, it is of course difficult there. to section or any kind of real limits or a real, let us say, infallible science. Because there are so many, of course, where it's a case of evidence, schizophrenia or something like that. Now that's simply a sick person and that is not possible. But you know very well, we all know from our own experience As far as, for example, a thing like what we call paranoia is concerned, or in English, I don't know what it is, deafness or something like that, you know. There is, of course, you know, that is very difficult there, you know, to say, you know, where does the sickness begin, which is incurable, you know.

[192:41]

And where can even also such a person, through his integration into the monastic life, and even though he might be a burden, where can he still then, with the help of the community, really live this life of love for love's sake that I just alluded to. There too, the best sign, I think also, that there is, you know, a certain level of mental health, you know, there too, is the eagerness to learn and the readiness and willingness to change. So these are just some ideas, you know, about it that I wanted to put together a little this afternoon. One could, of course, also add still a third little chapter to our considerations, and that is that, of course, what seals, let us say, the fate of a profession or so on,

[193:52]

not only the signs on the part or the demands to the one who makes profession, but it is necessary to be in a position to judge. And we all know that, of course, for that is demanded on the supernatural level the gift of discernment of spirits. And this gift of discernment of spirits in such a case is demanded from the superior and from the members of the chapter. Now we all know this discernment of spirits is a charism, you know, it belongs into the field, what we call the The sage, you know, the council, you know, and so on. It demands, therefore, that objectivity and that balance. It demands a constant inner dealing with God as the truth. I would say a confrontation with God as the truth.

[194:54]

which then, you know, would enable us and sharpen us to supernaturally the sense of what is genuine, really supernatural, sincere in evocation. That are things that are questions that are directed to us. And then, of course, the other thing that is needed in us goes into this act of discernment of spirits because it isn't only, let us say, a cold judgment. As a charism, it couldn't be. But it is naturally, it is, of course, an expression of law. Discernment of spirits is not possible without law. Only the spirit in that way could, in a way of sympathy, ascertain the spirit in the other one. Therefore the demand made on all of us that we have to be free in such a judgment from personal likes and dislikes

[196:05]

from secondary considerations, usefulness or not usefulness of the person in question. We have to be free, you know, at least aware and take into account a certain natural diffidence that may be part of our own equipment that we bring with us into this judgment. So we also have to be free from a wrong kind of perfectionism and legalism. We make the discernment of the spirits. And therefore it is necessary that such a decision is really, one can say, just immersed and bathed in prayer. But at the same time also, absolutely, that is part of the sage and the specific wisdom of the council, it has to be also that this judgement come about with all our gifts, that means also with natural gifts.

[197:26]

We have to, in order to make a judgement, in order to make a decision, We have to get, as the school says, all the material, at least that what we can reach. And therefore we have to put into, to work, you know, in this experience of the past. We have learned by wrong decisions in the past. And these experiences have to be put into act, you know, have to be put to work in a new decision. We have to get the facts as far as they are accessible to us. Facts on mental health and all these things have to be taken into consideration. In last analysis, of course, the judgment as such, these things are the material, but the real former, the soul of the judgment, is the Holy Spirit whom we invoke to give us his light, his wisdom.

[198:29]

Good. Now, have we still some time to... That's a use of it. I don't know what to ask. I don't know what to ask. I don't know what to ask. I know you were saying that in some way, one would really ask, and I don't know, perhaps, that is only taking people in who really have those, it's a, you know, zeal for the work of God and obedience and humility.

[199:37]

If we only could close people in, that may be the renewal of the monastic life. But somehow, I think they are important in the sense that people show a tendency toward being a leader, a pastor, a boss, a minister of work. Not that they're the perfection of them, but as you said, an invisible light that they're ashamed of. Especially seeing also when the person thinks they need the persons in the house to respond to that. Perhaps in the past, you know, I mean, thinking back, we have neglected a real certain extent the probe, you know, and that's for us as modern man, it's always a difficult thing. I don't know how they did it in the past, you know, but they certainly were kind of tough, you know, but for us, it's such a delicate situation, but it sometimes causes headaches.

[200:48]

Yes. Yes. before they get in. And they're not going to be knocking all the time. And when they get in, they don't work. Yes, that's of course, it's one of, yeah. But you know, yeah, what's interesting, I mean, you can see, you know, the Egyptian temperament may be different from the American temperament. Yeah, sorry. You know, if you start here with the Egyptian, then you would probably draw nobody, you know, to the plastic lab. I mean, it's just a problem. I don't know how to solve it. But in some way, it's kind of, yeah, it's different.

[201:55]

Sometimes maybe we do a little coddling and say, I don't know if that's right. you know, yourself. The time I thought, it was afterwards, you stopped at the time the poor person got up and I was handing him these, because, you know, I was making satisfaction, like a dog bear, and it was quite bearish, you know. And... I gave a terrible picture of our task. No, I mean, the last thing was to help you get yourself out of your knees, and you made some minor little big, you know, effect. And this, what happened, the last time I put it down, The poor man didn't know what to do. He said, where are you sitting there? And I was quite embarrassed, because it's kind of something. And then I grew up again. I did a little passion. It was really terrible. It just gets chipped into my mind. No, that's the problem.

[202:57]

You point out the problem. You see, what is in Egypt may be good, you know, is not good in our context. I mean, because if you insult a person's personality, you have to be good. which brings the little talk, you know, always may God give it, you know, the right way and also the right equal and understanding on your part. We have in these last days the Divine Providence has put before

[204:02]

Our eyes, the theme of the Sunday, a beautiful canticle of love of the First Episcopal Corinthians. And on Monday, we had a little exchange on it, fruitful and beautiful. On Tuesday, yesterday, we had Father Fitzpatrick who gave us that precious word of thanks. As you know, Father Fitzpatrick had ample opportunity to watch us during the month of his stay here with us. So his witness, I think, has a real value. It shows us that one needs perhaps a certain distance to appreciate what may escape those who are immediately involved in the day by day struggle here in the community.

[205:23]

It is of course good if we shrink away from such a complimentary statement as however Fitzpatrick made because one feels of naturally to speak in the words of the rule people fearing the Lord are not puffed up on account of their good works but judging that they can do no good of themselves and that all comes from God, they magnify the Lord's work in them, using the word of the prophet, not unto us, O Lord, not unto us, but unto thy name give glory. But on the other hand, it would not be good, I think, if we would

[206:28]

The saint disagreed with Father's witness because of the low opinion we have of our brothers. Just the other day, I happened to come across a story from the Talmud, which is at Rem, I think. It tells us of Rabbi Jokanan, who said to his disciples, now think which would be the best way to hold on to. And the first said, a good, kind eye. The second, a good friend. The third, a good neighbor. The fourth, foresight. the fifth, an honest mind.

[207:30]

Rabbi Jokernan said, I give preference to the first because in his words all the others are contained. Then he continued and said, now let us think what is the bad way one should keep away from. And the first said, an evil eye. The second, an evil companion. And the third, an evil neighbor. And the fourth, to borrow and not to pay back. The fifth, a dishonest mind. And Rabbi Jokernan said, I give preference to the first. Because in his words, everything else is contained. Let us then, dear brothers, with a good and kind eye, look at our community from within, from without, in the light of St.

[208:42]

Paul's Canticle of Love. St. Augustine, as you know, used to address his congregation as Caritas Vistra, your charity. I don't think that this was just a polite phrase, but I'm sure it took a lot of charity to discover charity underneath the everyday picture of Tagaste's charity. Saint Augustine looked at his people with the kind, good eyes of faith, and he discovered beneath the surface in his own ecclesia, the soul of the church, I mean the Holy Spirit, who alone can bring about this identity between community and charity.

[209:43]

Identity between community and charity. If one reads through Saint Benedict's rule, or cenobites, then one sees immediately what his purpose was in writing this rule. As a spiritual man, homo spiritualis, he composed it with the one idea in mind to establish a spiritual community. The rule, it seems to me, was meant to be a kind of guideline or a help to give room to the spirit or to give to the structure of the community as well as to its various functions the stand of the spirit. The structure every community needs a head.

[210:51]

But the monastery has a father because it is a community in the spirit, in the spirit of adoption of songs, whereby we cry, Abba, Father. The relation of the monks to the head is one of faith, a spiritual relation. He's believed to be the representative of Christ. The abbot is also called teacher, called shepherd. All these are technical spiritual terms, didaskalos. And in the chapter on how to elect the abbot, he should have the qualities of a homo spiritualis. That means possess the treasure of knowledge, whence to bring forth good things, things new and old.

[211:55]

He should set mercy before justice. He should hate evil, but love the brethren. He should be discreet in administering correction. He should always distrust his own fealty. He should rather tend to be loved than feared and temper all things that the strong have something to long after. The weak may not draw back in a long. And he should do all things in the fear of God. And he should listen as a spiritual man to the spirit speaking the members of his own community. The assembly called by him is a manifestation of the spirit who may reveal what is better to the youngest.

[213:02]

Of course, to be a spiritual assembly, the monks must have an attitude which allows the spirit to be present. I mean an attitude of deference, humility, without defending their opinions obstinately. Their mutual relation should be based on the good zeal, another gift of the spirit, with all the characteristics of the spirit, in honor preferring one another instead of rivaling with one another, bearing with patience one another's infirmities, let them by in paying obedience one to another, let nobody follow what is good for him but rather what is good for another,

[214:06]

all qualities, gifts of the spirit. And then the daily life itself is, under the guidance of the rule, transformed through the power of the spirit. If you take chapter four, the instruments of good words, ending the sentence, Behold, these are the tools of the spiritual craft to be employed unceasingly by day and night. Take chapter 5, obedience, yes, but obedience in the spirit with the love of Christ as the motivating force practice with that promptness which the spirit inspires, who does not suffer procrastination, and animated by that goodwill in the depth of the heart, which is killed by murmuring, this great enemy of the spirit.

[215:26]

then I should refer especially to the chapter on humility. Humility is called the forerunner of charity. The first Pneumatophorus, John the Baptist, was in that way truly a forerunner, leading to that love of Christ which the Lord will deign to show forth as Saint Benny says, by the power of the Spirit in his workmen, now cleansed from vice and from sin. Now just as the instruments of good works and the following chapters on obedience, silence, humility, put the daily actions of the monks under the actual domination of the Holy Spirit, So is the divine office then the spiritual crown of the community life?

[216:34]

Here the community exists, really formaliter, explicitly in the spirit, who is the spirit of the glorification of the Father through Christ. So the very assembling of the monks for public prayers in itself a manifestation of the Spirit. The two or three are gathered together in my name, the I am in the midst of. The very order of the hours constitute a spiritual order, transforming time. In Mani Busturi's Tempur-Ameya, And your hands, O Lord, are my times. And that means, of course, that in the power of the Spirit, the kingdom is present.

[217:39]

There I am in the midst of it. That is the formula of the presence of the kingdom of God among us. Presence and the chapter 19, as you where no emphasizes just this specific presence in the community prayer of the church, of the commune. And in chapter 20, again, you know, absolutely, one can say authentically in the spirit, not the much speaking, but the purity of heart and the tears of compunction. These characteristics, especially then, of silent prayer, mental prayer, spiritual prayer, prayer truly in the spirit. Then you know all the following chapters. We can't go the whole of the rule, but there's the practical daily life in its various phases and aspects.

[218:43]

There comes... sleep, discipline, penance, or correction of faults, the celera, all the various officials, all the various functions of life, community life, under the aspect of the spirit. So ordained that each one of the rule, I would say, has this meaning to Bring to throw into every one of these actions, not only the light, but also the power of the spirit. Sell, business, yes, but a little less. Everywhere, give room to the spirit, room to the spirit. Don't let the law proper to me, natural law proper to me, as to the action or to the object, take over and take the room away, eliminate the spirit.

[219:53]

Now if we look in this light on our own life here, and if we look at it with a kind and good eye, then we can say, I think, full sincerity and truth that indeed we have many, many blessings in our community life, blessings of the Spirit. It is true that, for example, the whole function of the Father in relation to the And this specific point of our development is nowadays a special situation. But I think if we look at it again, you know, with a positive, not with a destructive eye, not with an evil eye, but the good eye, I think, again, we have many things there to be so happy about and so deeply, really grateful

[221:01]

to the Father of all lights. I think it is not and cannot be turned into a kind of reproach, the community that we entered into this whole phase where we want deliberately and under the leadership of the Spirit, that means in a peaceful and organic way, make this transition. of the community from the first to the second generation. And I think the way we do it now, everything human is also, of course, limited by human imperfections. That is evident. But if we look at the deeper intention of things and also the concrete why, in which we try to carry it out, I think we can be very grateful to the Holy Spirit.

[222:05]

At least I, I must say, I am. I wanted to express that publicly. You know, of course, how I feel about it. But in this whole a period in which we want to give room for experience to younger members of the community. I think we are very blessed, and I think it is working out well. I wanted to say a special word of thanks to Father Martin. I think you all realize that. that here really that the way in which Father Martin gives himself to the community and to this challenge that has been really thrown into his lap is a great and beautiful thing for which we are deeply grateful.

[223:15]

I remind, remember, Father John, in this context, the way in which he throws himself into it, tries to help in that whole realm of the concrete relations among brothers. Then we have that great happiness also of, at least during the beginning of this Lenten season, Father Gregory here with us, such an unforeseen blessing. For me personally, again, great, great joy. The older one gets, I think the more the possibility of really rejoicing in one another increases. There is the community.

[224:20]

The community has been faced in these last months with many disappointments. But if one looks at the way in which the community reacts, the way in which people draw more closely together, the readiness to help one another, to me one of the most consoling and really inspiring aspects of the notes and the schedules that you gave us. for your Lenten resolutions is just this, to see the consideration with which one specifically, not only in general terms, but specifically thinks about other brothers and how to help them with this or that, to make the burden easier, to encourage.

[225:31]

Nothing is as encouraging in the work than the one who heals, the helper that makes really the joy of it. So the way in which people also in their thinking, their prayers, their resolutions, standing before God for these and these specific intentions of the community, spending time of prayer every day for the needs of the brothers who have difficulties and suffer in the community. All that is just one great manifestation of charity and of a charity with which the community is really and truly identical. Reading these notes simply means to read the notes of Caritas Vestra, and that is in itself a wonderful thing.

[226:38]

Naturally, it takes, and I want to repeat that again, it takes a kind and good eye, because the evil eye, of course, may destroy things. If a community is hit by many disappointments and difficult situations, the devils are, of course, ready to sharpen the eye and to make then the community responsible. Say, now, why is it we lose this one, we lose that one? Why is it? Community doesn't seem to attract them. That, I think, is a dangerous procedure. It's not the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit penetrates through the surface, and the Holy Spirit also, at the right places and the right time, simply believes, believes in charity, and is not driven out by some kind of merely, I'm going to say, human panic.

[227:58]

So in that way, I think we are very blessed. If one looks at the other relations of the community, classes that we attend, discussions that are going on, there's the work of the daily work of the various officials. How much mutual help is derived only from that very fact. How happy we must be and how grateful we must be to live as Cenobites, to live as members of the community. Then simply these various blessings that various people are able to give because they have these talents in them, It's not limited in the four walls of the hermitage, not the post-hermitage, but it's shared, it's shared.

[229:08]

And by sharing, it becomes really rich. It turns a corona benignitatis for all. Everyone in that way is a helper and not a thorn For example, the whole field now of the prayer line of the community. We want to make that a special kind of objective for this Lenten season. We have begun this reordering, restructuring of the divine office. We all feel, again, by the very process of doing it, and of doing it as a community. We absolutely grow into it in a completely new way.

[230:11]

It becomes in a new way ours. And if it were by the fact, you know, that now we, our own brothers, do it in a musical way, countless things. ordering, structuring, devising, revising the rubrics and forms of divine art, ceremonies, all these things. So everything here is a service. And just in this attempt of building up the community prayer,

[231:02]

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