ST JOSEPH'S ABBEY, SPENCER MA

  Mary set out in those days and traveled to the hill country in haste to a town of Judah, where she entered the house of Zechariah and greeted Elizabeth.  When Elizabeth heard Mary’s greeting, the infant leaped in her womb, and Elizabeth, filled with the Holy Spirit .  Luke 1 Mary set out and traveled to the hill country in haste to a town of Judah, the distance is about a four-day journey on foot. Mary is in haste out of joy and wonder. It is a joy and wonder that will issue in praise of the dawn of universal salvation. And when the child in Mary's womb comes near to the infant John in Elizabeth's womb, Elizabeth cries out in praise and prophecy, “Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb.” Mary has set out and traveled in haste, all because love and joy have put a liveliness in her step.  This phrase that describes how Mary goes to visit Elizabeth is the very phrase used by Saint Benedict in chapter 43 of his Rule to describe how a monk on...

For God to be Trinity means that God explodes with delight from within.  Such delight requires mutuality of persons, for it is delight at knowing and being known, delight at belonging to Another, delight at the inability of having one’s own existence apart from that Other, delight in never for all eternity having been absent from the life of the beloved Other, delight that celebrates its freedom in a playful, unstoppable dance that has as stage the whole enraptured cosmos and that thrills in abiding with the blessed Two who are Persons other than Oneself.  This explosive, world-creating energy of delight wells up from the bosom of the Blessed Trinity.  What is good is “diffusive of itself”, says St. Thomas. God is too good, and therefore too “diffusive” of himself—too exuberant and squandering of his Being—to keep his secret delight to himself. The action of a divine self-outpouring is a central biblical category already at work from the first verses of Genesis: “In the b...

  Today we remember Saint Philip Neri, an ardent lover of the Lord and a man of great joy and cheerfulness.  Known for his playful wit, he once remarked, "A joyful heart is more easily made perfect than a downcast one." We love the story of an overwrought Roman  fashionista  who once came to Saint Philip seeking counsel. She told him of scruples over her vanity -  she was fond of wearing the high-heeled shoes that were all the rage. Philip told her his only fear was that she might fall over.  Pierre Teilhard de Chardin once  said that “j oy is the infallible sign of the presence of God.”  Joy is the fruit of real confidence in God's ineffable mercy .  This is our joy as monks - we see over and over again our fumbling and sinfulness and learn to rejoice because Christ's mercy is always available to us. Saint Philip Neri , Carlo Dolci, Italian, 1645 or 1646, oil on canvas, 17 1/4 × 14 1/4 in. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. Used with permission...

From the rising of the sun to its setting, the name of the Lord is to be praised!  We chant these words each morning. It is our privilege to spend our day praying and working and doing all things that the Lord's name may be praised. The monastery is an expression of the mystery of the Church, where nothing is preferred to the praise of the Father's glory. Every effort is made to ensure that the common life in its entirety conforms to the Gospel, which is the supreme law. In this way, the community will not be lacking in any spiritual gift. The monks strive to remain in harmony with all the people of God and share their active desire for the unity of all Christians. By fidelity to their monastic way of life, which has its own hidden mode of apostolic fruitfulness, monks perform a service for God's people and the whole human race. Each community of the Order and all the monks are dedicated to the Blessed Virgin Mary, Mother, and Symbol of the Church in the order of faith, lov...

  On this great feast of Pentecost, I feel sympathy for the devout Jews staying in Jerusalem, who witnessed the proclamation of the mighty works of God by the disciples. But like those bystanders, I am a little puzzled about what is going on? Are these people drunk? Are they religious fanatics? What is the source of their boldness? The simple answer is the Holy Spirit. But to recapture the experience of the Spirit by Our Lady and the disciples is difficult since we are so far removed from the event. But I think we can assume one thing: their experience was consistent with the experience of the People of God at other moments in salvation history. And to show that I will take two elements from the first reading.  The first element is wind. The Spirit blows where he wills, but always to manifest the mighty deeds of God. This was the experience of God’s people at the crossing of the Red Sea. The Lord drove back the sea with a strong east wind and the Israelites passed through dry-...

Today we celebrate Blessed Franz Jägerstätter who refused to serve in the German Wehrmacht. He was convinced that as a devout Catholic he could not engage in active military service. His was one of the most prominent acts of resistance by an ordinary Austrian during World War II. In addition, Jägerstätter denounced Wehrmacht war crimes on the Eastern front, long before anyone publicly dared any critique of what became known as the Holocaust.   Franz Jägerstätter was imprisoned and beheaded by the Nazis on this day in 1943.  He is the patron saint of conscientious objectors. On a recent Sunday afternoon, we watched Terrence Malick's very moving film about Franz Jägerstätter. 

  Why is the world so messed up? I asked God, So much anger, violence, poverty, And everywhere I look I see fear and doubt and loneliness. Where in all this sadness, Is your light - Your grace- Your touch? Take your boots off, said God. Lines from "Soul Whispers" by Edwina Gateley. Image by Brother Brian.

Come, Creator Spirit, visit the minds of your children, and fill the hearts you have made, with heavenly grace. You are called the Comforter, the gift of God most high, living spring, and fire, love, and spiritual anointing.  You are sevenfold in your gifts, the finger of God’s right hand; you are the Father’s  true promise, endowing our tongues with speech.  Enkindle your light in our senses, infuse your life in our hearts; strengthen our bodies’ weakness by your never failing might. Drive far away our foe, and grant peace without end, that with you to lead us on, we may escape all harm.  Grant us, through you, to know the Father, also the Son; may we ever believe in you, the Spirit of them both. Amen. In preparation for the great Solemnity of Pentecost, we pray our novena to the Holy Spirit. And each evening at Vespers, we chant this ancient Latin hymn. We share a fine translation completed by one of the monks.

  John’s Gospel is believed to have been written for the church of Ephesus at the end of 1st century; it addresses an emerging Christian community in transition, adjusting to their separation from Judaism; many or all of these early Christians have in fact been expelled from the synagogue. Certainly, they are disoriented. And so appropriately John writes a highly symbolic text, which invites them to a radical reorientation. I suspect it may have been intended as a consolation for them, a reminder that as Christians they and we belong to a different reality, a new world that is hidden under the outer reality of things. “If the world hates you,” says Jesus. “Know that it has hated me before it hated you. Been there. It’s not where you belong anyway.” John’s language is one of radical relationality. “ I am in my Father, and you are in me .” And this morning as he prays for us to his Father, “ I have given them your word; and the world has hated them, because they are not of the worl...

At his Ascension, Jesus is presented to the Father whose throne he has been destined to share as an equal. The Father has glorified with himself the same Christ who is his own Son. And the Son of Man is glorified with the glory which he had before the world began. Heaven rejoices at having restored to it the Truth sprung from the earth. Jesus’ Ascension to the right hand of the Father is indeed the crown and consummation of all the other festivities and brings to a happy completion the journey of the Son of God. Text adapted from words of Saint Bernard of Clairvaux.

They said, "Men of Galilee, why are you standing there looking at the sky? This Jesus who has been taken up from you into heaven will return in the same way as you have seen him going into heaven." Since Easter, we have been accompanied by the bodily presence of the Resurrected Lord. We have been present with Mary Magdalen when she went in the early morning to the tomb, and when he later appeared to her as she wept, we have been alongside Peter and John as they ran to the empty tomb and examined the burial cloths, we have walked with Lord on the way to Emmaus, and listened as he opened the mysteries of the Scriptures, we have seen him appear through closed doors, reveal himself in the breaking of bread, expose his wounded side to the doubtful Thomas, and so on. In all this we have looked on as this rhythm of manifestation and concealment, hiddenness and appearance unfolded; unpredictable, yet executed in astonishing, absolute, and sovereign freedom. Today we see the risen C...

  As we celebrate the Ascension of the Lord, we are reminded again that our faith is a dark mystery. If Jesus reminds us “It is better for you that I go,” it is because his absence will allow a fuller, richer, more mysterious experience of his presence through the Holy Spirit.  Imagine someone you love and really care for insisting,  “It is better for you that I go.” How can this be?  With the disciples, we gaze upwards in wonder at the wounded and resurrected Jesus who  promises, “Fear not. I am with you always.”   Ascension in an Initial V Niccolò di Ser Sozzo (Sienese, active 1348– died 1363) The Metropolitan Museum of Art. Used with permission.

It is for others to serve God, it for you to cling to him; it is for others to believe in God, know him, love him and revere him; it is for you to taste him, understand him, know him well, enjoy him.  With these words, our Cistercian Father, William of St. Thierry, reminds us of our call to deep familiarity with God in contemplation. Photograph by Brother Brian.

Every year during Eastertide, we listen to excerpts from the Last Supper Discourse, about four chapters long in the second half of the Gospel of John. Sections like today's Gospel: “ Remain in my love.  If you keep my commandments, you will remain in my love,  just as I have kept my Father’s commandments  and remain in his love... You are my friends if you do what I command you.  I no longer call you slaves,  because a slave does not know what his master is doing.  I have called you friends  because I have told you everything I have heard from my Father.  It was not you who chose me, but I who chose you  and appointed you to go and bear fruit that will remain,  so that whatever you ask the Father in my name he may give you.  This I command you: love one another . ” Jesus draws us into the very heart of his relationship with his Father. I listen, but I lose my bearings. There is surely a beauty to the language but also a circularity....

In March of 1996,  Dom Christian de Chergé  and six monks from the Abbey of Tibhirine in Algeria were kidnapped and found dead two months later.  This morning we celebrate our  Blessed Cistercian brothers.  We are at once humbled and inspired by the passion of their perseverance, the passion of their self-offering. But let us be clear. Even as he anticipated the possibility of his own death, Dom Christian feared that his dear Muslim friends would be blamed for his murder. He absolutely did not want this. The only grace he eagerly awaited was at last  in heaven   to see, as God sees – to see the children of Islam all shining with the glory of Christ, all differences at last brought into communion and divine likeness by the joyful Gift of the Spirit.  As each morning we receive Holy Communion, we pray for this same compassionate communion among all people, that the differences we so often cherish may be erased by a love beyond understanding. For our...

The love Jesus expects of us seems to be truly unmanageable. “ This is my commandment,” he says, “love one another as I love you. ”  How can I possibly love like that? The seeming impossibility, the unmanageability of loving as God loves is exactly the point. We cannot possibly do it. Only the overshadowing of God’s Spirit can transform and stretch our hearts wide open. Unfortunately, I too often resist the Spirit’s stretch. Photograph by Brother Brian. Meditation by one of the monks.

Re member, O most gracious Virgin Mary,  that never was it known in any age that anyone who fled to your protection,  implored your help, or sought your powerful intercession,  was ever left unaided.  Inspired with this same childlike confidence,  I fly to you, O Virgin of virgins, my Mother.  To you I come, before you, I stand, sinful and sorrowful.  O Mother of the Word made flesh,  despise not my petitions,  but in your mercy, hear and answer me.  Amen. In May Mary's month and in every month this ancient prayer to Mary called the  Memorare  is a great consolation. Mary is our protector and a model for all our efforts at prayer and faithfulness. Our  Constitutions  remind us, " By fidelity to their monastic way of life, which has its own hidden mode of apostolic fruitfulness, monks perform a service for God's people and the whole human race. Each community of the Order and all the monks are dedicated to the Blessed ...

One of the spectacular ornaments of the Jerusalem Temple was a golden vine with clusters of grapes as tall as a man. The vine, the vineyard, was a favorite symbol in the Jewish Scriptures representing Israel. It was a symbol that would have an immediate and obvious meaning to those who first heard today’s Gospel, and it would color how they heard Jesus’ claim to be the true vine—they could easily take it as implying that Israel is a false vine, as Jeremiah once prophesized: “I planted you as a fruitful vine, entirely genuine (true). How have you become a wild vine, turned to bitterness?” But whatever indirect polemicizing against the Synagogue the evangelist may intend, the reality Jesus is describing by using the imagery of vine and branches, and mentioning his Father to justify his claim, is that he is the source of real life to his disciples, a life that can come only from above and from the Father. When John uses the word “true” or “real” here, it is not in contrast to “false” ...