July Archives

• July 28, 2011

  “Maybe it's just a temperamental quirk of mine”, he started – rather hesitantly . . . “but, at the beginning of a session, I do have a need to be asked: 'How are you doing?.'” Brother Stanislaus is a Junior monk, and for three years, I am responsible for accompanying him through the Juniorate formation program which involves us meeting for an hour every two weeks to talk about his experience of the monastic life. He had introduced the above statement with the words: “If I am going to confide in you on a deep level, there is one or two observations concerning your personal style that I need to talk to you about.” I immediately had a sinking feeling. I have never regarded myself as a person with any outstanding charism for spiritual direction or monastic formation. I agreed to be Junior Director in obedience to Dom Brendan, my abbot, and I do the best I can. So, when I hear a Junior suggest there are one or two points on which I might still improve, I immediately run off in my mind about eleven or twelve points. But Stanislaus' comment hit me broadside. It had never once occurred to me that there might be anything in the least irregular about my manner of beginning our bi-weekly sessions. We sit. I wait a moment. And then I offer a simple prayer to Jesus that he may receive us both into his presence and that he may guide our sharing for our benefit and his glory. I'm rather pleased about this little exercise. We say together, “Amen.”, and then to make clear that this time is for him and not me, I provide just a little space of silence after the prayer that he may begin or reflect a moment about anything at all he might like to share. I will admit, I have often observed at these moments that, instead of speaking, or reflecting, he fixes his eyes on me rather intently, with what could be read as an expression of mild annoyance, but, a moment later, he is talking and so, I never give the moment much thought. But of course! A light has come on. That tense moment we've been repeating for months now – he is simply waiting for me to say: “How are you doing?” This sinking feeling – it's not just my stomach moving . . . I am sinking. Yes, the moment he speaks, I am, myself, descending into a deeper part of my soul. I have an intuition this deep soul is where old people go during those long evenings they spend sitting on an open porch and don't talk. It is the place we confront the truth about ourselves, and discover that Truth will make us free. But first, we die. Seeing Truth, we die, and trusting Him, we rise again. What does that mean? It's nothing very dramatic. Now, Stanislaus and I sit down to begin a session. I pray, we both look at each other a moment; I say: “How are you doing?”, we both turn red in the face, (him too!), and we chuckle.
  
  

  Father Raphael

• July 25, 2011

  I am awake. It's a little after two in the morning. I am lying here on my bed in the darkness a full hour before the 3:15 a.m. bell for rising - and I am awake. Why am I awake? I was languidly, blissfully asleep only a minute ago. I can still savor the heaviness of my limbs weighting the bed; still recall how, only a moment ago, my mind was darkened and I wasn't thinking about anything. Now I'm awake and my mind is roaming. Good Lord, I'm thinking about all sorts of things. They say this happens as you get older: you wake up repeatedly during the night for no reason. Splendid. Does a married man wake up at two in the morning and lie there, with a woman next to him and spend interminable minutes thinking useless thoughts like I am now? Is the woman next to him asleep? Could she be awake too and pretending to sleep because she knows he is awake and, trusting the moment, has no incentive to try to fix it. Does it happen on some nights that a married man and woman lie next to one another in bed each aware the other is awake; each reposing in the original solitude by which they were married before they were born? At about two-twenty in the morning, it occurs to me that we might all be a lot more like each other than we suppose or want to admit. Maybe, as Christian revelation has it, we are all one. At two thirty I am imagining the whole family of believers as one body, the body of Jesus, lying on a cold stone slab. We believe a man has been raised from the dead. We believe we are his body. Of course – tonight is the night. It's about twenty to three and my faith is suddenly stirred, making me truly awake. This night I have awakened to – it is the night of the resurrection. The darkness of this night is luminous for all who believe. But it could happen at any moment, and so I inquire of myself with some urgency: What does the resurrection of Jesus mean for me? For my understanding of life? Of God, and of myself? These questions yield no immediate answers; the silence in the room now more pronounced than before. My mind is blank; my heart is singing. It's nearly three o'clock now, and I no longer have any desire to go back to sleep. It's good to be here. Yeah, and so . . . I'll just wait.
  
  

  Father Raphael

• July 22, 2011

  Aunt Sarah hasn't spoken to any of her sisters for more than five months now. Not a word. This has never happened before in the seventy – plus years these four sisters have known one another. Their mother, my grandmother, was a scary lady when they were growing up. She would shout. She would throw things. The girls learned to stick together, look out for, and protect each other. That bond held till five months ago, and then it broke and a terrible silence filled the crack. My mother is one of the three sisters at the receiving end of the silence and, at age seventy five, she is finding it painful. I don't know many of the details of the situation - something related to the family business; an insult real or perceived; a deep hurt, nursed for months, maybe years. Finally, the wound broke open and now is bleeding in plain sight of everyone. This is hard from mom. What can I do to help? It's an odd thought, but I have said to myself recently, “I can trump Sarah's silence.” Sarah's not the expert in silence here, after all. That would be me. I'm the Trappist monk. I know a thing or two about silence – and I'm good at it. I know how to make silence last; how to develop its inner potential and render it truthfully. I know where silence comes from. I know it's author. He is Love. The truth is, Sarah's silence is bigger than she supposes. And gentler. Ultimately, no anguished, fitful, human imposition of silence can make a dent in the silence that is the womb from which God's intimate thoughts were drawn and from which was formed the shape of all living things. The silence of God has not been eclipsed. It persists; it pervades all things; it grows and makes everything still. It embraces all humanly made silences and changes their meaning. God's silence says to Sarah's: “Mine is enough.”
  
  

  Father Raphael

• July 19, 2011

  “Aedan”, (given the Irish pronunciation, “Eden”), will be his new name. James was clothed as a novice on Sunday morning and was given a new name in keeping with a tradition that goes back centuries. He is really excited about wearing a monk's habit. The habit is pure white, the scapular laying over the brilliant white robe and the belt itself a simple white band tied around the waist. There is a radiance, but I can't tell if it's coming from the stark white habit or from Aedan. From the age of fifteen when he read a fantasy novel about a good monk whose simple virtue triumphed over a world of woe, Aedan has imagined himself pursuing the life of a monk. I believe that being clothed as a Trappist novice is for him a defining moment; the affirmation of perhaps the noblest impulse ever conceived in his heart: to know Truth and to make of one's life a testimony to that abiding and splendid Truth. The decision he has made will not go unnoticed. Having assumed canonical status as a novice, his name will be registered as a member of the order in Rome. Being clothed as a religious, his brothers will perceive and relate to him in a new way. The evil one likewise has taken note of Sunday's ceremony. He is not pleased and will be by for a visit. Aedan has no illusions about this last point and is prepared to engage with what St. Benedict calls the hardships of monastic life. The hardest thing about monastic life, of course, is the struggle with oneself. There is something thrilling about seeing a young man engage this battle dressed in a pure white robe and with a radiant smile on his face. God bless our brother Aedan!
  
  

  Father Raphael

• July 16, 2011

  “All the things I was most afraid of as a young monk - never happened!”  Today, on the Feast of St. Benedict, the Father of Western monasticism, I'm remembering monks I have known. These words were spoken by Brother Charles. He was probably 89 years old at the time; the monk responsible for doing the laundry at Gethsemani Abbey, back in 1987 when I visited there for the first time as a junior monk. He spoke to me in a confidential tone; his voice hushed with astonishment as if hearing the words for the first time himself, and yet, I had the impression they were spoken for me alone. I'll never forget the transparent quality of his gaze as the words formed on his lips; the eyes looking more inward than outward. I realized he was testifying to some unspeakably mysterious transformation he had undergone in the monastery. Brother Charles wasn't afraid anymore. He was telling the truth. I still marvel at it. To be no longer afraid! How Love must have enlarged his heart! At age 89, it was bigger than all his fears; so big he could look down at these fears with the benevolent understanding of a mother watching over a gaggle of unruly children. How big must a heart be that isn't afraid anymore? We talk about “globalization” as if a new religion had begun; a religion whose adherents are obligated to worship in awe the expansive hugeness of the globe on which we live. One follower of St. Benedict, surrendering him or herself to conversion in the “school of love” can grow a heart like a globe. How? I don't know. How did Benedict, a one-time hermit, gather to himself a community perpetuated over fourteen centuries and across the whole world? I met a monk doing laundry whose heart had grown so big, it swallowed up all his fear. On this Feast of St. Benedict, I want to say to the world: “Before I kneel in homage and do obeisance to your greatness of your “globe”, take a look at the heart of this humble monk who fears nothing and you tell me which is the bigger globe?”
  
  

  Father Raphael

• July 11, 2011

  One day, a very long time ago, in the monastery where St. Benedict was abbot, the brothers were building on an addition to the monastery, and accidentally dug up a little bronze idol—one of those little "false gods" that look so cute to us today, like little dolls. Not knowing what to do with the thing, and anxious to get back to work, they set it on a shelf in the monastery kitchen. A few minutes later, they were horrified to see the kitchen completely engulfed in flames. Grabbing buckets, the terrified brothers began hurling oceans of water on the fire which only grew, and spread, and seemed to roar, and twist in it's fury, and grow hotter and hotter, until the brothers finally completely lost their wits and began running in circles shrieking and crying out in desperation. St. Benedict heard the shouting and rushed to the kitchen. The scene he discovered when he got there was about the strangest thing he had ever seen in his life. The kitchen was not on fire. There was no fire. The kitchen was intact, by all appearances the same as the last time he'd seen it—there wasn't so much as a flickering flame in sight;only a dozen or so brothers shouting "Fire! Fire!", yelping and screaming and tripping over each other; hurling water against the walls and at each other; very nearly drowning themselves in their confusion; quite out of their wits—and no fire. It seems that nasty little idol wasn't actually a fire-starter – only a hallucinogenic. Today is the Feast of our holy Father St. Benedict. The story makes me think: I wonder how many stories in the paper and on the nightly news, how many pieces of "breaking news" we come across today, are actually just "kitchen fires"? How many contemporary controversies, crises, and fiery debates are really just frightened and confused people throwing buckets of water at the walls and at each other, tripping over themselves trying to put out a fire that, maybe, just maybe, isn't even there?
  
  

  Father Raphael

• July 8, 2011

  With the monks in choir this morning I'm singing the psalm verse: “deep calls unto deep”. What does that mean? “Whoah”, a voice in me says, “Best not to get too close to those words. There are depths in you that are infinite! Your infinity makes you susceptible to His call from whose infinite depths you were dropped fifty four years ago like a hailstone from the sky into a bed of grass. What can awaken a hailstone to the infinity he harbors inside? Cancer did it for me. Cancer is doing it now for Fran, who has been doing so well for years, and five days ago, had bad test results; the cancer finding it's voice again, stirring, speaking her name; “deep calling to deep”. Yesterday, I got the news. It's weird for a cancer survivor to process news like this. There has always been a curious bond between Fran and I, felt the first time she wrote to me when she was diagnosed eleven years ago. I survived. She knew my story. I can never forget the story; never forget that word Teratocarcinoma, (that ridiculous word!) “Terry the big black dog.” is what I called my cancer. The only thing stranger than having that big black dog walk up out of nowhere and take a bite out of you, is to then see him withdraw as if distracted and lumber off down the street, leaving you standing there looking a little stupidly into the face of a future you already said good-bye to. Me and the future, suddenly intimate again – deep calling to deep. I was spared and, somehow, unable to move from that spot where the dog left me; grateful beyond words, motionless, realizing for the first time how wondrously strange it is to exist and be human. I'm still standing there almost thirty years later, having joined a religious order whose Constitution boldly declares itself “an institute wholly ordered to contemplation”. I survived cancer to become someone committed to living a quiet wakefulness to He who IS, and came to realize this IS, quite simply, the life of blessedness enjoyed by the saints. And so I live and will die at the edge of the deep. Fran is standing here too. Her husband, her two beloved children, hardly old enough to understand what is happening, my sister, her longtime friend, they were all standing there with me this morning as I and the monks prayed: “Deep calls unto deep.”
  
  

  Father Raphael

• July 5, 2011

  So, here's the task at hand: I am to provide our dear Fr. Bernard with a little company and brotherly kindness for a little while as I do each Sunday night by reading to him. Vespers is over – it's time. Go. First, I select a reading. Not a lot of time, so I snatch a copy of Guideposts magazine. Five minutes later I'm in Fr. Bernard's room – and he's not there. Must be in church. He'll need the motorized wheel chair to get back to his room. I'll drive it myself, which I don't mind. It's fun. Two minutes after six, I'm rolling into church in a motorized wheelchair and Fr. Bernard is in church too. I find this encouraging, except – he's asleep. “Fr. Bernard, do you want me to read to you?” “No”. “ . . . . You don't?” “My niece is here.” Looking around: “Where is your niece?” “The Guest house dining room. I should probably drop by and see her.” “Yeah – uh, o.k., I'll take you there.” Now this could be tricky. The main elevator is being replaced, so I have to get Fr. Bernard into the wheelchair and navigate him to a service elevator clear at the other end of the monastery. No problem. He seems to know how to drive this thing. Whoah – almost took out Brother Giles. I'll drive. Walking beside the chair, I steer and we wind our way through narrow corridors to the elevator, go to the basement, squeeze through the guest house kitchen and, at length, arrive at the dining room where two complete strangers chatting over coffee stop and look at us with expressions that seem to say: “Will you be leaving soon?” Excuse us. Down the hall, I encounter Fr. Jonah, the guest master. I tell him: “Fr. Bernard says his niece is here.” “Oh, he always says his niece is here.” Turns out his niece lives in Chicago where she's watching t.v. about now. Anyway, there's a ten year old girl and her father standing next to Jonah and, gesturing to the wheelchair, I say to the little girl: “You want a have some fun, you should take a spin in this little hot rod.” Watching her suddenly dissolve into a fit of giggles, I think I just figured out the purpose of that long and arduous trip through the basement. At quarter to seven, we're back in the sun room of the infirmary, having lost half an hour before we've begun to read anything. I read him a story about a new website that networks urgent prayer requests to thousands of people. He has no idea what I'm talking about. He says: “I should probably drop by and say good bye to my niece before she leaves.” Somewhere in the world tonight, important things are getting done. Not here. Why do I feel as if my life is charmed; as if a fullness of life was being poured into me from moment to moment, that no earthly measure of success can account for? Fr. Bernard looks happy and ready for bed. I give him a blessing and, as I'm preparing to walk away, he takes my hand between his two hands and presses it to his lips. And so is concluded our hour long partnership in this conspiracy called “wasting time with God.”

  
  

  Father Raphael