Period December 2002 – February 2003 Issue 4/2002

Chapter meetings are held at St. Joseph’s Convent, 16 York Street, South Perth. Meetings are held each 3^{rd. Sunday, commencing at 2.00pm sharp.}

December - There will be no regular Chapter meeting this month. As usual we will have instead our annual Christmas social gathering which will be held this year on Sunday 15 December, - 27 Irwin Street, East Fremantle commencing – 11.00am. This will take the form of a BBQ, so please bring your own food, with the Chapter providing drinks. Relatives and friends are especially invited.

January - There will be no Chapter meeting this month.

February - Our regular Chapter meeting will be held on 16 February during which we will share our thoughts on the Gospel of the day and Rule of Benedict Chptr 6. This will also be the occasion of our Annual General Meeting, which will include the election of a President and committee members for the next twelve months.

Please remember all our sick oblates – in particular Tom Gollop, Lou and Johanna Pokucinski, and all our other oblates in need of prayer.

Also and always, continue to pray for our parent community in New Norcia.

Would you especially remember all our deceased oblates, particularly Lady Rene Eccles and Betty Fleming, who died in October.

We regret to report the passing of Dom Augustine Gozalo aged 89, who died at Mt. St. Camillus nursing home at Forrestfield on 7 September, exactly one month short of his 70th anniversary of monastic profession. It was great to see a good representation of Aboriginal people at his funeral Mass in the Abbey Church and burial in the New Norcia cemetery on 12 September.

New Norcia Studies No.10 is now available. This edition has over 100 pages of very interesting articles, one of which is about Salvado’s attempts at coffee production. Copies available from the NN Museum.

After an asthma attack, Fr Seraphim finished up in Moora hospital on Friday 16th August, however after a twelve day spell there, he was discharged, restored to health.

Dom Benedict has moved into new quarters at Toodyay.

Dom Chris has arrived back safely from Argentina. He thoroughly enjoyed his conference in Buenos Aires, but says he prefers to live in New Norcia

Congratulations are in order to Steve Storer who took another step on his journey on 21 August by being clothed in the habit of a novice, beginning his time of probation before becoming a Regular Oblate. Regular Oblates live the full monastic life, but instead of making vows first for three years and then for life, they make annual promises, which can more easily be dispensed with should their circumstances change. Since leaving Perth in January, Steve has been living the Benedictine lifestyle at the monastery and working very effectively as Assistant Procurator for most of that time. He will continue half-time in that position while he is doing his formation studies at NN. There were many Regular Oblates in the community from Bishop Salvado’s time right down to the 1920s, so in this case NN are reviving one of their long-standing traditions. He will be called Dom Stephen S, so that he doesn’t get confused with Dom Stephen R. No bets are being taken on there being no confusion however; so when you want one of them you’d better specify which one.

Dom Eric found his two months in the Carthusian monastery in England very helpful, but then decided to visit a couple of contemplative communities in France. The first, Solesmes, is famous for its expertise in plainsong. He was there for a month or so from mid-September before moving on to La Grande Chartreuse, the mother house of the Carthusians. It is famous for its remote and silent, prayerful atmosphere, as well as for its liqueur. He is now at Pluscarden in Scotland, before moving to Ealing.

Fr David continues to find loads of new archival material and has moved from Italy to Spain and France, thence to Ampleforth, then on to Dublin mid November and back to NN by the end of December.

In its most basic sense, silence means "not talking", or abstaining from unnecessary noise, turning off TVs, radios, etc. While not talking is the necessary pre-condition for silence, we all know that silence is more than that. Silence is a means to an end for a monk. Anyone who cares about God cares about silence. No one can meet God without silence.

Silence is a self-emptying, creating room, bench-space, for the Holy Spirit to toil. Silence removes obstacles that prevent us from hearing God. God speaks to us in silence. As the psalmist says, "be still and know that I am God." If we do not have silence in our lives, God will call and call, but always get a busy signal. Sometimes that voice will be the still, small voice that Elijah heard. Only silence will reduce the background noise enough to allow our detectors to pick up the signal.

You cannot hear God or meet God, so the ancient monastics said, because the world is noisy. People talk, hammer, advertise and shout slogans that demand our attention. So we go out into a wilderness, to a forest or oasis where we can easily live, where water may be found, a little food easy to grow, a little shelter easy to build, not too far from human habitations so that we can walk over to the neighbouring church on Sunday morning for Eucharist but far enough away so that we are off the beaten path to avoid tourists. Then we will be undisturbed.

We will not need to work long hours to keep our body nourished. Our other needs are few or nothing, unless we fall ill; a blanket, a bible, and another book or two; a knife, a few materials to occupy our hands, to make baskets, or ropes plus a pen and ink to copy manuscripts. Then we will have time to be quiet and hours of time to be alone with God, time to praise God in the psalms and in silence. This was the monastic ideal; the soul alone before its Maker. However, in fact the ancient monastics found out that it was not quite so simple. They found out that people walked out into the desert to pray and ended up as madmen, thieves or suicides.

A man goes out expecting peace and quiet and his expectations are shattered. He may be deafened by demons that seem to howl in the night.

He goes expecting to find God and escape the self. In fact, in solitude he finds that the self swells up larger than ever, 'till it fills all the space that should have gone to God.

He expects to escape passions and lusts because he will never see objects of desire. Instead, shapes of beautiful women float through his subconscious and consciousness.

He expects to escape greed because all he has is a little patch of vegetables, but he finds that his stomach growls all through the day and is harder to forget than when at home.

He expects that the joy of God will fill his cave and his heart. Instead he finds, especially at noontime, a melancholy, a sadness or depression that lays him low. So writes Owen Chadwick of this the monastic dilemma.

It is precisely this set of phenomena that led, over time, to Benedict's wisdom of living in community. Benedict is deeply respectful of the eremitical way of life but he is not just thinking of using community as a means to that end. The needs and demands of community temper our silence, and shape and focus our search for God in contemplation. Monastic silence is golden because it is a precious distillation of sustained fidelity to grace. Silence is not a cheap grace and it is not easily achieved. Silence is acquired by personal discipline, not an external asset whose absence is bewailed and blamed on others.

Chapter 6 of RB is devoted to silence. It is significant that Benedict uses the Latin word taciturnitas rather than silentium. Taciturnity, or restraint of speech, refers more directly to human noise or conversation that Benedict is trying to limit, not environmental noise. Ambrose Wathen points out that taciturn means more than physical silence. It refers to a person who is sufficiently serene and wise that his words arise out of silence and his silence itself speaks eloquently. Such a person will not use words to mask an inner emptiness, nor will he be silent when a good word is needed.

In RB7 on humility, the ninth, tenth, and eleventh steps deal with silence. Obedience and patience are humility in action; silence is humility in word. Benedict comments that in the face of our infidelity God is silent as a loving Father: "This you did and I said nothing." Later at the ninth step, a monk controls his tongue and remains silent, not speaking unless asked a question and does so out of love for silence. As Scripture says, "in a flood of words you will not avoid sinning, and a talkative man goes about aimlessly on the earth."

The tenth step of humility cautions about being too quick to laugh. It is frivolity that is being condemned, not a good sense of humour. At the eleventh step Benedict holds that a monk speaks gently and without laughter, seriously and with becoming modesty, briefly and reasonably, but without raising his voice. "A wise man is known by the fewness of his words."

Michael Casey comments that these steps describe a higher level of integration in monastic life. After much learning and insight we discover the need to be silent. We don't expect these steps to be realized in the early years of monastic life. As Casey writes, "This means short-circuiting the need to express oneself, to communicate, to feel in a state of relatedness to others, to recreate. It means standing more intensely alone, not yielding to the attraction of a moment's relaxation, but keeping intact the creative tension that mindfulness and a purposeful existence involve."

In RB38, "On the reader for the week," Benedict asks for silence during table reading: Let there be complete silence. No whispering, no speaking -- only the reader's voice should be heard. Since the reading at table was scripture, one is silent in order to hear the word of God.

RB42 is the next big chapter on silence; Silence After Compline. This used to be called the Great Silence. It was this silence that was broken only by the praise of God in the early morning.

Because our Horarium has changed -- we no longer go to bed within an hour of evening prayer -- our practice of silence has changed. However our Customary still states: "Quiet should generally be observed in the rooms and corridors of the monastery, but especially at night after evening prayer." We used to say, "After ten o'clock, no words."

It was in the year 1902 that Fr. Fulgentius Torres was elected as the second Abbot of New Norcia and by the end of April four years later, he was on board the SS Bullara, on its way to Wyndham, where he expected to found a new mission.

Leaving the ship at Broome, he purchased a schooner, the ‘San Salvador’ and hiring a Captain, they set off for a voyage of exploration along the coast to Wyndham, searching for a suitable place. The schooner finally reached Wyndham in mid June, with the Abbot exhausted by the trip. However he had found what he was looking for. For Abbot Torres, the only site suitable was the Barton Plain, where the Barton meets the Drysdale River. However, it took the Abbot more than two years to clear the canonical status of the mission with the Church authorities and to obtain the desired reserve for the mission settlement from government officials.

It was to be mid June in 1908, that the SS Bullara with the provisions and the San Salvador were to rendezvous at the required location and a joyful reunion held by Abbot Torres, Frs, Alcalde and Planas, Bro. Vincent and Fr. de Emo, who had been split between the two boats. The provisions were unloaded and the Bullara continued on her way, whilst the schooner took several trips to take the items further up the river. From there they had to walk many miles, surviving their first attack by Aborigines, thirty in number. However some blasts from the shotgun into the air dispersed them. They settled at a place which they named Mission Cove, in an area which the Aborigines called Pago. The Mission to the Aborigines of North Kimberley was officially opened by the Abbot on 15 August 1908, himself directing the planning and building of the settlement. By the end of August, he was satisfied with the progress made and prepared to return to the mother house at New Norcia, arriving there on 1 October 1908, after an absence of 103 days.

Interaction with the Aboriginal tribes was on-going, principally with the local Kwinis and the Kularis, but also with the more remote Walmbis and Warmala. Some 28 Aborigines visited the mission on 2 September and the monks were forewarned that the Kwinis and Kularis were preparing spears to kill them. The monks undaunted, continued to distribute watermelons in abundance to the natives from their garden. The entry in the mission’s diary for 27 September is laconic in the extreme: “On this day, between 8 and 8.30 am we were speared by the Aborigines, 103 of them came and also took away a good number of the watermelons. There was no further entry until 23 October, the writer being incapacitated due to injuries received.” Again for 30 September, the Aborigines arrived in even greater numbers and as the monks were again distributing watermelons, a surprise attack was mounted and Fr. Alcalde received three spear wounds, two of them serious. Once again a shotgun fired into the air saved the situation. Nothing was known in the outside world of what was happening at the mission as the monks had no boat or other means of communication.

The wisdom of the Abbot soon became apparent. The patience, kindness and perseverance of the monks had won a victory, for a complete change was taking place in the Aborigines from persistent enmity and distrust to confidence and lasting friendship. Abbot Torres did not live to see the final fruits of his many labours, anxieties and burning zeal as a sudden illness overtook him six years later and he died a most edifying death on 5 October 1914, at St. John of God Hospital, Subiaco, Perth.

It was not long before the monks realised that the long term continuance of the various tribes was in jeopardy, as it became apparent that deaths through inter tribal and family disputes and their dubious customs were far outweighing births. The position of women in the tribes was quite desperate and they were considered a disposable commodity. Pago had become the only refuge for Aboriginal women, chased everywhere for one reason or another by everyone, including their husbands. The monks gave them shelter and tried to show the elders how irrational were their complicated laws, which continually discriminated against the women. Women therefore looked on the mission as their only security from the cruelty and rapacity of the opposite sex, which outnumbered them beyond reckoning. Hence there was a limited life expectation for new-borns and the monks were particularly concerned about this factor, as it affected the very survival of the people. There were however increasing signs that those who had been some time in contact with the missionaries were absorbing the principles of Christianity and a few had been baptised at the point of death. On 21 August 1925, the second child born in the mission became the first to be baptised. The parents lived at Pago and the bush doctors were kept away from the delivery to prevent the sad recurrence of former experiences.

It is appropriate here to state that basically the work of the Catholic missionary is to give testimony to the truth (objective truth based on reason and on God’s own revelation, through His word made man, Jesus Christ) – to preach by word and action the good news of man’s salvation. On this basis the mission approached the Australian Aborigine, not with preconceived scientific or romantic ideas of economic or intellectual adventure, but purely and simply as a human problem. With deep conviction of the supremacy of the spirit in man, he saw in the Australian Aborigine, not ‘a human being essentially different from the European’, but the unfortunate man of the gospel story, in need of sympathy, love, understanding and a helping hand from the good neighbour. With this simple plan of civilisation, missionaries in North-Western Australia were not deeply concerned with, nor unduly disturbed by, the changing moods between sympathy and animosity which were later directed against the mission in official and pastoralist circles.

The 1984 Congress of Benedictine Abbots sent a remarkable message to oblates, expressing appreciation for oblates as Christians united with them in prayer and aspiring to a form of life inspired by Benedict's Rule. The abbots noted that oblates are not only recipients of blessings from the monastery, but are also are a source of blessings and help for the monastery. This essay explores how oblates and monastics might most fruitfully be mutual blessings at the turn of the millennium, faithful toGod's special intentions for us today.

The current situation with oblates

If we look at the current situation in the United States, we observe that the number of oblates affiliated with monasteries normally substantially exceeds the number of monastics at that monastery. In my home monastery, around 25 monks support and are supported by about 300 oblates, and the numbers of oblates has been growing rapidly in the last ten years. Given the number of contacts I receive from oblate directors and people interested in oblation all over the country, I presume this is generally the pattern.

The person interested in oblation today seems to have somewhat different interests than the oblate of 30+ years ago. In former days, the laity wanted to help the monastery physically -- growing monasteries needed so much and physical labour was a tremendous gift. Even today, many oblates offer essential support to their monasteries by volunteering in a gift shop or office, cooking meals occasionally, living on site in exchange for keeping the plumbing operable, and participating in fundraising events. In this older model of oblation, lay people offered what they had and knew -- their "secular gifts" -- in exchange for the prayers and spiritual support of monastics. Oblate formation was largely a matter of periodic meetings at the monastery where "Father" gave a presentation to admiring oblates.

But there is a new element in the hunger for oblation these days, a desire to share the spiritual life and the spiritual aspirations of the monks. There has always been a sense that monastics "have" something important, a peace of mind or a connection to the something More. Today, oblates are no longer willing to let the monks live the spiritual life on their behalf; oblates now want to share the ongoing dynamics of the spiritual life themselves.

A new sort of problem emerges with this "success", the question of how best to form oblates into Benedictine spirituality. Traditionally, when asked about the essence of the Benedictine life, Benedictines have offered in answer the words of Jesus, "Come and see." (John 1:39) "Come," Benedictines say, "live with us and learn, as you are among us." This is a sound and Biblical answer, but it doesn't quite work anymore, because oblate inquirers are unlikely to become monastics in the traditional sense. For oblates, the cloister and the vows are insufficient pointers to the underlying centre of Benedictine experience. So, how do we form oblates? How do monastics share with oblates what Benedictine life is all about? Indeed, is there anything left of substance to Benedictine spirituality, if we bracket the cloister and the vows?

If we believe, as I think we do, that Benedictine spirituality has value for non-monastics, then we need to endeavour to articulate that value. If we believe, as I think we do, that oblates are not second-class Benedictines, but do actually live Benedictine life "insofar as their state in life permits," then we must consider inviting oblates themselves into the conversation about core Benedictine values.

If these thoughts are a general description of what's happening with oblates, meanwhile, what is happening with monastics? These are not unrelated questions, though we often imagine that the issues and concerns of the monastic communities themselves are quite separate from what is happening with oblates. In general, monasteries are aging and vocations to the life are declining. A number of sources could be cited, but whatever our source of data, we will find that overall, although the number of Catholics are increasing as a proportion of the church-affiliated in the United States, the number of men and women religious is declining. As Fr. Dan Ward OSB observed in a 1998 issue of the ABA newsletter, declining numbers are forcing monasteries to evaluate not only the ownership and use of buildings, but also to re-focus on the most effective ministries, which can be carried out by fewer people. We could cite a number of potential reasons and a number of potential remedies for this situation, but this is not the place. Our interest here is simply to contrast the decline in vocations to monastic life with the increase in oblate vocations.

When we look at these two trends in relation to each other, how do we read these signs of the times? It does not seem fruitful to blame or judge; all of us accept that sheer numbers is not a significant measure of divine blessing. It is folly to suggest a straight-line extrapolation that monasteries will disappear while oblates will prosper, since clearly oblates are attracted toward something which monastics are living out. What, then, do the signs suggest? In particular, let us frame the question this way:

What might Benedictines now be invited to do or be, that can (only) be accomplished by the swelling of their ranks with oblates, that is, with "Benedictines" intentionally in the midst of the world?

I offer the following thoughts as one oblate's lectio on these signs.

1. Benedictine life is clearly influenced by the culture at large. We have only to look at the Rule itself to realize that Benedict expected monastics to bring their biases with them into the cloister and that he specifically set forth ways, such as daily scripture, prayer and communal relations etc., to make certain that cultural and personal values are routinely challenged by the Gospel.

2. Benedict himself and many of his sons and daughters, manage to be relatively free of cultural baggage; that's why the Rule continues to be fruitful across so many places and times. So often throughout history, it is Benedictines who seem similarly timeless, who speak with remarkable clarity in any age. In a certain sense, these voices stand as an ongoing witness to the truths which last, when surface things change. They stand as a challenge to the presumptions of any age.

I believe this witness is the essence of the Benedictine value of being "on the margins." Benedictines at best avoid the whirlpool, the seductive centre of society's fads, not primarily by being "separate," but by their commitment to be witnesses. They do this with the clarity of vision brought through their regular disciplines of vulnerable presence to God. I would suggest that this witness is strengthened - in the respectful interaction of oblates who live daily, directly in the pressures presented by the world - with monastics who live daily, directly with the challenges offered by their centre in God. If both learn to speak with each other with humble self-awareness, their mutual discoveries can be of inestimable benefit to the world.

B. Conversatio

Though we share our commitment to Christ through Benedict, we know that we speak with great diversity. In a 1996 editorial in the ABA Newsletter, Fr. Joel Rippinger OSB observed that though we have many voices, many opinions, we also have incredible staying power. He attributes our continuity to the tradition of conversatio.

Conversatio morum suorum is that strange, untranslatable vow so central to Benedictine life that we simply take it to mean, "living as a Benedictine." Above all, conversatio is about the paschal mystery of death and life as it is lived out daily for a lifetime. Conversatio is about being broken and renewed, being overwhelmed and being raised up. It is willingness to suffer and be utterly confused, because we have learned that is one way God leads us into the encounter with brand new life. Conversatio is about being in the hands of the living God, the God who always surprises us, always shatters our expectations, the God who surpasses our imaginations. Dare we begin to share, one with another, monk to monk and oblate to oblate, these painful and disrupting fires of our hearts, so that together we begin to discern the shape of the Spirit working among us all?

C. Call

Let me share a personal story. Several years after I became a "regular" retreatant at Valyermo, I began to hear the "stories" of the monks -- not so much the stories of their history and vocational call, but the stories of their lives together in community. At that time, I was surprised to hear that cenobitic life is so difficult; yet now I know that many monastics have observed that the most difficult aspect of the life is "my brothers/sisters." Joan Chittister's observation in Fire in these Ashes, rings true: that any monastery is a cauldron of the very issues that touch our society as a whole -- of jealousies, of old hurts unforgiven, of angers and slights. Any unfinished psychological business will come up sooner or later and all the variety of human issues play themselves out in a monastery - the more intensely for being concentrated in the monastic environment.

At first when I became aware of this in my home monastery, I was really disappointed. After all, I went to the monastery to get away from just those issues in my own life. The monastery was my place of peace and tranquillity, the place where I could be "holy without disruption". I much preferred being a casual guest, ignorant of all the goings-on.

Then, I thought about it and realized that if the monks could seek God, even in the midst of their neurotic and sinful inclinations, then so could I. If their home was holy, as I knew it was, even though it contained so much strife and struggle, then my home too could be holy.

Over time, I have come to appreciate the true gift of the monastery to me. It is not primarily as a getaway, a respite from my own struggles. Rather, the Benedictine gift is the persistent aspiration toward God even and especially in the face of daily struggles. God meets me most reliably at the point of my temptations and self-doubts and discomforts. So reminders of my creatureliness are not causes of discouragement and despair, but are instead signs of a deepening invitation to live in Christ's own life, just here and now. By the witness of their own commitment to ongoing conversatio, the monks encourage me to believe in my own yearning for God. Sometimes I can return this gift to them, by reminding them of the deep longing of their own hearts.

I am suggesting that monastics and oblates can be mutual blessings, not just to provide mutual support and encouragement, though that is certainly important. But the mutual blessing may also be a shared vocation of help for one another in the crucial task which God gives to Benedictines in this time; that together, monastics and oblates are to be witnesses and a challenge to our society as a whole. By our willingness to be open to and transformed by the living God, we model for our society the essential work of moving into the next millennium with health and wisdom.