Monks Who Eat Cheerios and Go to the Zoo

A wise man once said, “Either you’ll keep going deeper in faith or you’ll give up.” I’ve often found myself at this latter point. I remember thinking as a new Christian some 6 years ago, “This shouldn’t be this hard.” I read book after book and listened to sermon after sermon trying to figure this God out. I had perfectly planned out “quiet times” where I was anything but quiet; I believed God only heard the prayers of those eloquently worded. I strived to always say and do the “right” thing. Looking back now, it’s quite obvious why I found faith to be so difficult—I was trying to do so much in my own strength to impress this God who resided far, far away, instead of simply acknowledging the God all around, and even within me. I was doing and not being.

Along with this legalistic view of spirituality, I also had a very dichotomic perspective: some things were spiritual, and some were not. Churches often tells us there are certain things that are “holy”—reading the Bible, praying, tithing—but we forget the not so obviously (though they should be) spiritual things like loving, silence, community, and nature. I use to look for God in worship services and Bible studies, and often came home empty-handed. I’m now learning to look for Him in the everyday because that’s where He is. God doesn’t need pews or stained glass windows to exist; He certainly does reside in these places, but He’s a lot bigger than that, a lot bigger than I’m confident I’ll ever be able to comprehend.

God is found in the everyday and I’ve never seen this more demonstrated than at a recent trip to St. Leo’s Abbey. I was able to start 2010 exceptionally and spend a day there with Dr. Cotton, Anna, Professor Corrigan, and Ky Prevette. Monks, who I once considered hyper spiritual, do a lot of ordinary, day-to-day things like eat breakfast (whether it be Cheerios or Flan), wash dishes, work, and of course, pray. We shared breakfast with Brother James, who has been a monk for 72 years, and talked about the monastery and changes that have occurred over the years, orange trees, new roads being built, and even his trip to the zoo—it’s all spiritual: I’m convinced.
--Jennica Durbin

In Quietness and Confidence

Saturday five of us from SEU rode together in our old van up to St. Leo’s Abbey for a mini-retreat day. We shared silence, prayed, and walked a lot.

I love roaming the grounds at the abbey, and I’m always delighted to see ducks and birds. (I’m a city girl by birth and zip code, so animals up close and personal have a special fascination for me.) Saturday I got a special treat when I came across two small raccoons walking ever so carefully through some bushes and across a low wall. I followed them as they drank water from a puddle and climbed a palm tree to munch on berries. (I had never even noticed that palm trees have berries—lots of them—wow!) The coons stopped to watch me from time to time as I whispered gentle assurances. Eventually it occurred to me they weren’t afraid of my presence; they were calm and confident (and mildly curious). Perhaps because they are so young they don’t know any better than to parade around in broad daylight, but maybe, just maybe, in that sacred space they are able to live their life like we prayed at the abbey to live ours—without drama or hype but moving in God’s grace with quietness and confidence.
--Anna

Scott Cairns, "Advent"

Here is the poem by Scott Cairns that I mentioned in my previous post. That post was already too long even without the poem, but the poem seemed too significant and spiritual to leave out altogether.

"Advent"

Well, it was beginning to look a lot like Christmas—everywhere, children eyeing the bright lights and colorful goods, traffic a good deal worse than usual, and most adults in view looking a little puzzled, blinking their eyes against the assault of stammering bulbs and public displays of goodwill. We were all embarrassed, frankly, the haves and the have-nots—all of us aware something had gone far wrong with an entire season, something had eluded us. And, well, it was strenuous, trying to recall what it was that had charmed us so, back when we were much smaller and more oblivious than not concerning the weather, mass marketing, the insufficiently hidden faces behind those white beards and other jolly gear. And there was something else: a general diminishment whose symptoms included the Xs in Xmas, shortened tempers, and the aggressive abandon with which most celebrants seemed to push their shiny cars about. All of this seemed to accumulate like wet snow, or like the fog which our habitual inversion tried to choke us, or to blank us out altogether, so that, of a given night, all that appeared over the mess we had made of the season was what might be described as a nearly obscured radiance, just visible through the gauze, either the moon disguised by a winter veil, or some lost star—isolated, distant, sadly dismissing of us, and all our expertly managed scene.