Our thanks go to Brian Low and all the office holders and committee members for their able assistance and commitment during the past twelve months and we welcome Brian back for his third (and final says Brian!) year as President.

We had a good roll up of oblates for the AGM in February, with a total of eighteen in attendance. It was pleasing to welcome Fr. Michael Leek OSB from Pecos Monastery (Olivetan Order) in New Mexico, USA – an Aussie over here on compassionate leave to tend to his sick father living in Fremantle. Fr. Michael gave the oblates an illuminating talk on the origins of the Olivetan Order of Benedictines and their various foundations around the world.

We also welcomed Glenys Tabone from Beaconsfield as a visitor.

For oblates, those receiving this newsletter and other interested viewers, we have made available previous issues on the New Norcia web site. For those with Internet access, please note that the last five newsletters are now listed, dating back to December 2000. The address is: www.newnorcia.wa.edu.au and click ‘Other Links’ to view the Oblate page.

Our thanks go to Eleanor and Dominic Sgherza for opening their house to accommodate the oblates Christmas BBQ and social meeting. Some twenty people were in attendance including our Spiritual Director and an enjoyable time was had by all, especially the family dog Kiesha, which dined to capacity. It was good to see our elder statesman Tom Gollop there, who has not lost his appreciation for a good drop of Red!

We say farewell from Perth to Oblate Novice Steve Storer, who has decided to relocate to New Norcia for an indefinite period. Steve will be one of Dom Chris’s assistants in the well running of the Community and will no doubt undertake the living of a substantially different lifestyle there. All the oblates will wish Steve well in this new position. Steve intends of course to take his final oblation with the oblates at our retreat in May.

New Norcia Studies No. 9 has now been released and is available from the Archives Section at New Norcia, cost $25.00 plus $4.00 postage within Australia.

2001 marks the centenary of the death of Rosendo Salvado, founder of New Norcia.

This issue of New Norcia Studies brings together a fascinating range of articles on his work with Aboriginal peoples, his relationships with

Protestants, convicts and even his entry into the horse breeding business with his purchase of New Norcia’s first Arab stallion. It also investigates New Norcia’s interest in the great movement towards Federation, while the newly translated Monastery Chronicle for 1901 reveals what were the real concerns within the cloister at that time.

New Norcia Studies No.9 contains 14 fascinating articles, over 92 pages with 22 photos – several in colour.

own weakness and the sheer stubbornness of things are a part of our whole experience of the human condition as dislocated by sin.

Manual work was not highly valued in the ancient Greek and Roman world, partly because there were slaves to do it and also because of an exaggerated esteem for political and military life. But the Jews in both Old and New Testament times did value physical labour. They saw it as a part of the pattern of work and rest, recorded in the book of Genesis, a pattern God also followed, working for six days and resting on the seventh. The Jews believed that good hard work achieved discipline, security, and the avoidance of evil.

The Gospel atmosphere is one of people at work. Farmers, fishers, shepherds, vinedressers throng around Jesus who himself was known as the son of a carpenter. Jesus worked more years than he preached. He took work for granted as a human necessity and, in fact, spoke of his supreme mission as Saviour in terms of work. Once he said, matter-of-factly, that the Son of Man came to serve, not to be served.

The apostles taught that work is a moral essential of Christian life. Saint Peter wrote that hard work in patient union with Christ guards us from evil. Saint Paul too, had a good deal to say about work. He proclaimed that in Christian life there is no distinction between slave and free person. Christians work to earn their living and to keep away from evil. Those who refuse to work should not expect to eat. Work makes almsgiving possible and should be done for Christ’s sake. Work is linked with charity to the poor and Christian discipline as in Paul’s second letter to the Thessalonians. This has become an essential element in a Christian theology of work.

The early Fathers of the Church add another note in their insistence that work is not a punishment for sin, because Adam and Eve worked in the Garden of Eden before any sin. They were put there to till and care for it. God blessed them and said to them, “Be fruitful and increase, till the earth and subdue it, rule over the fish of the sea, the birds of heaven and every living thing that moves upon the earth” (Gen. 1: 28-29).

In monasticism, work was valued as a spiritual exercise and a discipline. It could be penitential when it was burdensome, but that helped guard the monk against laziness and sloth. Saint Benedict says with no hesitation, “They are truly monks if they live by the labour of their hands” (Ch. 48). In his Rule, prayer, reading and work divide the hours of the day. All three find their centre in God, and a balance among them is of vital importance to the well-being of the community. Work provides a relaxation from and a complement to the mental activity of reading and prayer. As Benedict summed it up, “Let the brethren serve one another... for this service brings increase of reward and charity” (Ch. 35).

From the sixth to the twelfth centuries the monastic philosophy of work inspired monks and nuns to develop model farm systems, to create centres of trade and home industry. Monastic innovations in agriculture during the medieval period, helped the recovery of unused land to feed a growing population. It also improved the working conditions and economic opportunities of neighbouring peasants. Shops built in monastic compounds gave a livelihood to carpenters, cobblers, furniture-makers and others; besides this, artistic gifts are provided for the benefit of society. They were influential in the development of civil and Church law, in handing on a knowledge of medicine, in the growth of art and architecture, and in the progress of education.

The rise of capitalism and the spirit of unrestricted acquisition gradually dominated the world of work, producing modern economic life. Nature was explored and exploited as never before; science began to control all expansion. Human beings suffered a worse exploitation. Many workers laboured in inhuman conditions for long hours at starvation wages in jobs of mind-numbing sameness. By the end of the nineteenth century labour unions had begun to come to the rescue of workers. The Church too, gave them support through the great social encyclicals of some modern popes. Today, economic justice must be the concern of all Christians.

In Benedictine communities the purpose of work has traditionally not been unlimited productivity and profit, but rather providing service for others, to achieve enough for a simple life style. For Benedictine Oblates in Christian communities anywhere, there must be a refusal to be dominated by things in order to be free for God and neighbour and to have something to give to the poor.

death on the cross and the desiccation of the body as Jesus draws slowly and agonisingly towards the moment of extinction; the ninth is of Jesus’ joy, transcending all pain, in saving His creatures. The tenth is of Jesus’ pierced heart, which becomes both the source of the cleansing flood of blood and water, which washes sin away and a sanctuary for all those who are to be saved.

The descriptions of what Julian sees in her visions are very detailed and clear, almost as if she were giving a statement in court. There is no attempt to stir up emotion in the reader, or to involve us in her emotions at this point. From the beginning, she seems to have felt the need to record and transmit her impressions very carefully, as we see from this description of the blood trickling from beneath the crown of thorns:

At the time three things occurred to me: The drops were round like pellets as they issued, they were round like herrings scales as they spread, they were like raindrops off a house’s eaves, so many that they could not be counted. This vision was living and hideous and fearful and sweet and lovely. (Chptr 7.)

In spite of Julian’s detachment however, this is no sanitised Hollywood version of the Crucifixion with a quick cut to the happy ending in case we get disturbed and have to face the challenge and the brutality of human evil. In her careful attempt not to sensationalise the cruelty of what was going on, Julian is also concerned to avoid a merely escapist and in the end, a trivialised presentation. In the eighth revelation there is a long description of Jesus’death on the Cross:

The long torment impressed me as if He had been dead for a week, dying and on the point of death, always suffering this great pain. And when I say that it seemed as if He had been dead for a week, that means – that the sweet body was so discoloured, so dry, so shrivelled, so deathly and so pitiful that He might have been dead for a week, though He went on dying. (Chptr 16)

It is worth remembering that when Julian comments that the pain she experienced in sharing Jesus’ suffering ‘exceeded any mortal death’, she was herself on what she thought was her death bed. This is no naïve exaggeration. The death of the Son of God is the worst event that ever befell the world and all creation is implicated in it:

All creatures which God had created for our service, the firmament and the earth, failed in their natural functions because of sorrows at Christ’s death, for it is their natural characteristic to recognise Him as their Lord, in whom all their powers exist. And when He failed, their natures constrained them to fail with Him, insofar as they could, because of the sorrow of His sufferings.(pg210).

Thus all our sufferings ever since are seen as participation in the outrage to nature that Jesus’ death was.

Julian then moves on to talk of the ‘pains that lead to salvation’. How thoroughly she has absorbed this idea is seen in her reaction to the ‘friendly proffer’ to stop looking at the cross before her and look up to the Father in heaven. She has not denied the unpleasantness of the experience, nor her reluctance to undergo it, but now she goes a step further. She chooses Jesus, even in His suffering. She refuses to recognise any other way to heaven than by Him, realising that the motive for all this pain is the love which will turn all this suffering into joy.(Chptr 19.)

Julian points out that there are three ways of contemplating the passion of Our Lord. The first is compassion for His pain, leading us to contrition for our sins and humble gratitude. This vision is incomplete without an appreciation of the joy to which we are led, so complete that it wipes out the significance and even the memory of any pain.

The second way of contemplation is realising the love which impelled Him to suffer for us. She reports Jesus as saying ‘It is a joy, a bliss, an endless delight to me that ever I suffered my passion for you and if I could suffer more, I should suffer more’.

Of course He would – isn’t that what love means, to be delighted to do anything for the beloved and think nothing of the cost? Is not Jesus the most powerful, most noble and most honourable lover?

In the third way of contemplation, Julian completely rejects this kind of sado-masochistic bullying. She draws our attention to the ‘joy and bliss which made Him take delight in it’, comparing Jesus to a cheerful giver:

All His desire and all His intention is to please and comfort the one to whom He is giving it. And if the receiver accept the gift gladly and gratefully, then the courteous giver counts as nothing all the expense and labour because of the joy and delight that He has because He has pleased and comforted the one that He loves.(Chptr23)

No morbidity, no lingering guilt should prevent us from enjoying the gift. We should see ourselves not only as saved from damnation and brought into joy, but as a source of joy to the One who did so much for us.

In the tenth revelation, Jesus says to Julian ‘see how I loved you’. (Chptr 24) He offers us the gift of His perfect and eternal love, simply so that we may freely trust in Him and be happy. Julian’s personal understanding and response to the passion has certainly deepened during the course of the revelations, but at this point it ceases to be of purely personal concern. The place to which she is drawn is ‘large and wide enough for all mankind that will be saved’. This is an experience that is available to everyone.

It is this, which explains the care with which Julian describes and develops her experience. The growth, which has taken place while she meditates on her vision, makes her conscious that this is a gift for the whole Church and she is concerned to pass it on intact. Julian’s theology is not merely abstract, a body of thought. It is dynamic, a relationship of love which reaches out through the centuries to all those who will be saved.

*****

Julian clearly points out that ‘mystical experiences’ are no guideline of greater spirituality. In Chptr.9 she writes, “The Revelation itself does not make me good. I am only good if as a result I love God more. And to the extent that it makes you love God more - it is of more value to you than to me - I know for certain that there are many who have not had any revelations or visions outside the ordinary teaching of Holy Church and yet who love God better than I do.”

Having only recently made my life oblation, I am hesitant about putting forward my views on the Benedictine family. The old saying about teaching grandma to suck eggs comes to mind. But then again: out of the mouths of babes and sucklings...

I used to think of the Benedictine way as rather bland, compared to the austerities of Carmel, or the joyful abandonment of Francis and Clare. The Benedictine way seemed so sane, so ordinary! But as I explored it more deeply in recent years, I began to find it profoundly revolutionary. I suppose this discovery came about through wrestling with the concept of "Conversatio Morum". I know that has been variously translated and interpreted, but the meaning that constantly comes back at me is: a conversation with, or a challenge to, the prevailing mores.

In his Rule, Benedict quietly challenges the prevailing values of every society since his day. He subjects them all to Gospel scrutiny. Let me just draw out a few examples for our modern-day, mainly Anglo-Saxon world.

We have become a wasteful, throw-away world, abusing God's creation and contributing to injustice and starvation. Benedict, on the other hand, reminds us that all the utensils and goods of the monastery, and by extension, of the world, are as precious as the sacred vessels of the altar and the cellarer (that's all of us!) should not be prone to greed, nor be wasteful or extravagant. Distribution should be according to need and consideration given to weakness.

How different from our modern culture, where might is right, the plenty is for the strong and the weak are despised and exploited.

In our culture, work is for enrichment, not for ennoblement or fulfilment. Workers are far too often exploited and menial workers despised. Many are thrown on the scrap heap, because of so-called downsizing and work improvements. When our society cuts prices, it is not out of altruism but to put our competitors out of business. The children of Benedict, on the other hand, are to take quite another view. {"The evil of avarice must have no part in establishing prices" RB 57:7} We are to see work as ennobling, a gift from God and to God. Work is a means and not an end. Rather it is ranked with Lectio Divina and the Opus Dei as part of the Godward life.

Unlike in Islam, and in so-called "primitive cultures", for too many of us God is relegated to the outskirts of our society. Worship becomes an optional, if aesthetically pleasing extra, to the business of living. But for Benedict, God is the reason for living. Nothing comes before the Work of God.

Our society not only throws away things, it does the same with people. It encourages self-fulfilment based on selfishness. Divorce is rife. Perhaps that is because we are not encouraged to work hard to save marriages. Benedict encourages us to serve one another, to support the weak, to persevere in difficult relationships, as we live the vow of stability. People are not disposable things, rather Christ is to be seen as dwelling among us. Problems are not to be solved by scape-goating sections of society, or by changing partners, but by patient perseverance, and by obedience to our God.

Benedictine Oblates are to regard all of these challenges to our prevailing mores not in a strident or an "holier than thou" way. The children of Benedict witness quietly, in and out of the cloister, by being unremarkably faithful.

This book is available in the library and recommended for oblates to read. Chapter 73 of RB concludes that the Rule is only the beginning of perfection. It further states that anyone hastening on will be assisted by the observance of the holy Fathers teachings. The ‘Conferences’ are called up specifically by Benedict as one of the tools for the cultivation of virtues.

At the turn of the sixth century the Mediterranean world was witnessing the decline of Roman rule

that had formed the bedrock of its civil order. During the chaos of those years, there arose in the deserts of Egypt and Syria monastic movements that offered men and women a radical God-centred alternative to the present society. Among the most eloquent interpreters of this new movement to Western Europe was John Cassian (c365-c435). Drawing on his own early experience as a monk in Bethlehem and Egypt, he journeyed to the West to found monasteries in Marseilles and the region of Provence.

Included in this volume is Cassian’s masterpiece, the Conferences, which is a study of the Egyptian ideal of the monk. This new translation has an insightful introduction by the distinguished Regius Professor-Emeritus of Modern History, Cambridge University, Owen Chadwick, who writes of Cassian’s achievement: “like the Rule of St. Benedict, his work was a protection against excess and a constant recall to that primitive simplicity where eastern spirituality met western.

John Cassian wrote twenty four Conferences, however the translator has apologised that a selection of only nine has been included in this particular volume, however they will give at least a sense of what the man was trying to do and of the subtle range of his concerns.

Text and comment to the editorial committee

Period

MEETING PLACE

PRAYER LIST

ITEMS OF INTEREST

Work

THE PEARL OF GREAT PRICE

From ‘Tales from the Magic Monastery’ by Theophane, courtesy Amazon .com

SEE HOW MUCH I LOVED YOU

THE BENEDICTINE CHALLENGE