As the Feast Day of Saint Benedict draws near, let me say something about monastic life which has relevance for our busy lives! It emphasizes community and hospitality. Before I share these thoughts, let me offer a quick snapshot into my memory box of the first time I walked on the hilltop.

In 2005, Brother Francis Weigand, brother of Bishop William Weigand, picked me up from PDX airport for my in-person interview at Mount Angel. It was my first time meeting a monk. He was in his civilian clothes. He showed great hospitality toward me, taking me out to eat at a restaurant and then helping me to my room. I remember coming onto the property for the first time. I was enchanted by its beauty and the immense silence of the place.

Thinking back on that first ascent, the sentiments of my heart find fitting expression in Abbot Jeremy’s small book, A Monk’s Alphabet. Here, he speaks of his ascent of Mount Angel. He said,

My monastery is on a hill. This makes quite a difference. All of us who live on the hill have come up and down it many times; but every ascent of the hill recalls, on a sliding scale between subconscious and conscious, the first time this upward climb was ever made. That first time was filled with a dizzying range of emotions, for a person comes to live on this hill in order to seek God and is inevitably and all at once excited by the adventure, ready for dedication, and afraid that his strength may not match the hope.

I love the place more and more because progressively its features and details are gathered in my story. This love stirs in me with every ascent or descent of the hill.

I had just returned from my pilgrimage to Međugorje and Rome. An image of Our Lady of Međugorje greeted me at the front door of the room where I was staying in Aquinas Hall. I felt her loving and calm presence that first evening.

I strolled the property that night and had locked myself out of the room. I searched out for a monk. I found Brother Ralph Recker, OSB who hastened to my aid and got a key to let me back in.

As the first evening passed, I was startled and woken by the bells that rang right outside my room shortly after 5am that morning. I jumped out of bed and was fully awake. As I laid back in my bed, I could hear the voices of the monks in faint distance, chanting in the abbey Church, a stones throw away from my window. They were praying the Divine Office.

Reflecting back on this experience, the words of Joan Chittister, OSB strike a chord within me. In her reflection on bells she eloquently states:

We don’t ring bells because monastics can’t tell time. We ring them because we are prone to being swept away from the center of life by all its tempest and trivia as is anyone else in the modern world … Our bells … are there to wrench our attention back to what is really important in life: The memory of God in our midst. The memory of the purpose of life. The memory that time is moving on and so must we.

Through my years, I have come to appreciate that monastic life is a treasure for the world! Monasteries are beacons of light. They are a wellspring where many can drink: Christians, non-christians, and seekers of truth.

Pope Saint John Paul II emphasized this when he said,

In the heart of the Church … monasteries have been and continue to be eloquent signs of communion, welcoming abodes for those seeking God and the things of the spirit, schools of faith and true places of study, dialogue and culture for the building up of the life of the Church and of the earthly city itself, in expectation of the heavenly city.

Monastic communities believe in stability. Through stability they live honestly and charitably with each other. They forge a deep sense of welcome! The visitor is not an image of Christ. The visitor is Christ himself. I have been a recipient of such hospitality.

If you have never visited a monastic community before, I invite you to do so. It is the frontier of Christianity, the witness of Christ in the heart of a community.