St Benedict says it’s the novice-master’s job to find out whether the novice truly seeks God. That’s not a whole lot of use to me, because I privately believe that everybody truly seeks God. I know a lot of people would say they don’t and with their funny ideas of what God means, it’s probably just as well they’re not seeking those funny gods; but whatever they are truly seeking, unconsciously, that I think is the true God.

I mean everybody really wants to be happy, to be completely and permanently happy and there’s only one thing that can bring that about for any human being and that one thing is God. Sometimes some of us are aware that that’s what we need, what we want, what we are looking for. On a good Sunday, those of us who turn up to Mass are at least vaguely aware that that’s why we come to church.

Moses knew that was what he was after when he climbed up the mountain of Sinai in the early morning and the Lord descended in the form of a cloud and Moses stood with him there. On a very good Sunday we are aware that the Lord has descended among us in the form of a sacrament, maybe, in the form of some words from the scriptures, in the form of some music that carries us away, in the form of some human face in the congregation – in whatever form the Lord chooses and we stand there with the Lord.

The Lord said to Moses, ‘Lord, Lord,’– he’s explaining the Hebrew name of God: ‘a God slow to anger’ – he means never angry; ‘rich in kindness and faithfulness’ – he means never anything but more kind and faithful than we could ever understand or hope for. When we stand here with the Lord, that’s still the explanation of who we’re dealing with. True, we are a headstrong people, but the Lord forgives our faults and our sins and adopts us as his heritage.

--‘Jesus said to Nicodemus …’ Well, he said rather more than we heard in the gospel reading and it’s pretty profound stuff, worth reading and pondering over – it’s in chapter 3 of St John’s gospel. But I don’t think Jesus did say the bit we heard. I think this bit was inserted by the gospel writer as his comment on what Jesus said to Nicodemus.

Anyway, whoever said it, this is what he said: ‘God so loved the world’, this is the real God all right, the same one as Moses was dealing with, ‘… so loved the world that he gave his only Son’. That’s the nature of the real God, giving, giving all He’s got, ‘… so that everyone who believes in Him may not perish but may have eternal life.’ That looks as if the eternal life is only for believers. Let’s hang on to that for a minute.

‘Indeed, God did not send the Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through Him.’ So at least what God wants is for everyone to be saved from whatever danger there might be. ‘Those who believe in Him are not condemned.’ Well, we heard that already and we want to be believers. ‘Those who do not believe are condemned already, because they have not believed in the name of the only Son of God.’ So again, it looks as though those who don’t believe that Jesus is the Son of God are going to be damned, condemned.

That’s not quite what it says, however. It says they ‘are condemned already’. God was hoping that everyone would be saved through His Son. But it looks as though not everyone is. Does that mean that God has failed to achieve what He wanted? I don’t think so. I think it means that some of us have failed to recognise that we have in fact been saved through the Son of God.

People who can’t bring themselves to believe in a God who loves and saves everybody, who can’t believe that the Lord forgives our faults and our sins and adopts us as His heritage, those people are condemned to be unhappy, not condemned by God, but condemned by their own inability to recognise the true God, the God who is never angry, never anything but more kind and faithful than we could ever understand or hope for. They are unhappy people now, but I think God has a pleasant surprise in store for them eventually.

--‘Brothers and sisters, agree with one another, live in peace and the God of love and peace will be with you.’ This is the true God again, the one that Moses stood with on the mountain, in the early morning, in the form of a cloud of unknowing, the one who sent His only Son into the world to save us.

‘The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ’ – this is the human Jesus, made Lord in the resurrection; but over the centuries we have realised more and more that it is also the eternal Son of God who was sent into the world to become the human Jesus.

‘The love of God’ – Paul probably means God the Father, he doesn’t use that language very much, but over the centuries we have realised more and more that the self-giving God whom the human Jesus called His Father, is also the giver of divinity to the eternal Son of God.

‘And the communion of the Holy Spirit’, His communion with the Father and the Son, ‘… be with all of you.’ Over the centuries we have realised more and more that the God we stand with is a communion of three divine persons, in communion with us and with every thing and with every body in creation.

The scientists down the road here know that the more they discover of the mysteries of the universe, the more mysteries they will find to investigate further. Over the centuries, we are reaching the same conclusion about the holy mystery of the one God in three Persons, to whom be glory and majesty, dominion and power, before all time and now and forever. Amen.

The first question that St. Benedict asks about one who is newly come for the reformation of his life is this: ‘Is he truly seeking God?’ This is a fundamental question and if it cannot be answered in the affirmative there is little hope that the novice will become a good monk or a good Oblate, or that he will later reform his life and begin to seek God.

But what is meant by - ‘seeking God’? Is God hidden somewhere, so that He must be found? Is God lost to us in someway, so that we can never find Him unless we make a diligent and persevering search? Our experience seems to suggest just the opposite, that we have only to lift up our hearts and minds in order to find God, that He is ever near us, interested in us, anxious to help us, that we can receive Him even daily in the Holy Eucharist if we so choose. Why then are we told that we must seek God?

It is not so much a question of God's being lost to us, as of our being lost to Him. Let me use a concrete example. A few years ago a number of us happened to be in a large city and thought that we would like to visit a certain Catholic institution that we had never seen. It lay on the outskirts of the city and covered a considerable area of ground and we were sure that we could find it quite easily. We drove to the spot where we thought it was, but found no sign of it whatever. We asked a passer-by and he informed us that we had merely to take a certain turn at the last crossing and we would immediately see the place in the distance. Of course it was not there and we spent an entire hour covering the area, asking directions and following them conscientiously. We finally had to leave without ever actually seeing the place. As later experience proved, we had been on the opposite side of the hill on which it stood and at one time were probably no more than a hundred yards from it,

If we substitute God for this institution I think we have an idea of what seeking God means. God, unlike the institution, is always aware of us. He knows where we are and what we are doing and by His grace He gives us the strength to come to Him. But it is not always easy for us to find Him. We do indeed ‘find Him’ by prayer and meditation, but that is often like a telephone conversation. We might have stopped somewhere on this adventure I was describing and telephoned to the institution. They might even have given us direction. But our telephone conversation would not have placed us where we wanted to go and their directions might have been no more accurately understood than the directions we were given.

In a similar way, the fact that we hold converse with God occasionally does not mean that we are united to God in any permanent or stable sense. It means that we are close to Him and that we have the means of becoming ever more closely united to Him, but often we come close to Him without actually arriving at union with Him. We may be only a hundred yards away, as it were and yet as far away as if many miles separated us.

‘To seek God’ therefore means to seek permanent and unchanging union with Him. All Christians are obliged to seek God as their last end, but those who follow the Rule of St. Benedict are trying to seek Him in a more complete and exclusive manner. And that is not an easy thing to do.

In the first place, the world around us presents a long and brilliant boulevard to our view - a vista of bright lights and cozy homes and beautiful parks that invite us to come and see and be happy. It is perfectly clear that this boulevard does not lay in the direction of our goal, but it is easy to convince ourselves that perhaps we can reach our destination just as easily if we take this road.

Even if we resist the temptation to follow this route, we are not thereby any more certain about the correct route. The area ahead seems to be dark and covered with trees, but presently we come upon a very nice road winding over the hill, which seems to lead precisely where we are going. In the spiritual life we might call this the Avenue of Self-righteousness. As we follow this road we make out various objects that seem to confirm our opinion that this is the right way. In the first instance it is an awareness that we are free of mortal sin and that we haven't even a tendency in that direction (as if we were constitutionally impervious to temptation). Presently we note that we are always faithful in our prayers and fervent too. Then we are pleased to find that we always contribute generously to the church and are kind to our neighbours and the poor. As we hasten along, other objects come to view - our zeal in fasting, our spiritual reading, our sincerity in seeking God. So we hurry on our way, to come at last over the final hill and find before us a vast open plain, totally uninhabited save for the birds and forest creatures.

That this Avenue of Self-righteousness is a false road can be shown from the parable of the Pharisee and the Publican. The Pharisee thanked God that he was not a sinner like the rest of men. He took pride in the fact that he fasted twice in the week and gave a tenth of all his possessions to the Church (Luke 18:11-12). You and I always read into this story a certain amount of hypocrisy, as if the Pharisee were lying. That is not the case at all. Our Lord in no way suggests that any of the Pharisee's statements are untrue and if you and I could consciously make such statements about ourselves, wouldn't we feel rather satisfied too? But our Lord says that this man was not justified. On the other hand, the publican was justified because he considered himself a sinner and asked God for mercy. Our Lord in no way suggests that he was not a sinner.

Strangely enough, it is the Pharisee who is too likely to be our ideal in our seeking of God. We have the profound impression that we must be able to come before God on the last day and say, ‘I am worthy, 0 Lord, of enjoying Thy heavenly kingdom. I have not committed adultery, have not robbed the poor, have not been dishonest with my friends. I have obeyed all the laws of the Church and have even done some things that were not strictly commanded by law.’ Even though we should be able to say this, we would not thereby be saved. We do not save ourselves. We are saved because Christ died and rose again for us.

St. Paul was already aware that this might mean to some, that it doesn't matter how many sins we commit so long as we are sorry for them. But he is quick to reply that that is not the case. ‘What then shall we say? Shall we continue in sin that grace may abound? By no means! For how shall we who are dead to sin still live in it? Do you not know that all we who have been baptised into Christ Jesus have been baptised into his death?.. .Thus do you consider yourselves also as dead to sin, but alive to God in Christ Jesus’.

(Romans 6:1-2, 11).

It is only through Christ that we can come to God. ‘I am the way’ (John 14:6). To seek God, therefore, does not mean chat we strive to cover ourselves with glittering virtues of our own choosing. It means that we give ourselves over to Christ and permit Him to lead us to God. Invariably He leads us by the narrow way He Himself trod - the difficult road of humiliation and discouragement and failure. It is not a road that we can lay down for ourselves. We cannot make ourselves humble without first being humiliated, we cannot make ourselves discouraged, we cannot make failures of ourselves, in a way that is fruitful unto grace and sanctity. Only Christ can do that.

But how shall we place ourselves in Christ's hands? How shall we dispose ourselves to follow the way He will show us? By following the Rule of St. Benedict to the best of our ability. By recognizing the importance of prayer, obedience and humility by striving to do only the things that please God. And especially by making use of the great means of sanctification, the Mass and the sacraments, in which Christ Himself is active to save us. When we do this, Christ the Way, will be at work in us leading us to the Father and eternal happiness.

The Monastery of Saint Macarius is situated at the Wadi Al Natroun, in the ancient desert of Scetis, some ninety-two kilometres from the desert road that joins Cairo to Alexandria. It was founded in 390 by St Macarius the Egyptian, around whom, in order to benefit from his spiritual fatherhood, gathered more than four thousand monks from different regions - Egyptians, Greeks, Ethiopians, Armenians, Nubians, Asians, Palestinians, Italians, Gauls and Spaniards. Among them one would have met scholars and philosophers, members of the highest aristocracy of the time, alongside simple illiterate fellahs. From that time until today, monks have always inhabited the monastery.

1969 saw the arrival of a dozen monks, under the spiritual direction of Fr. Matta el Meskin. They entirely renewed the monastery, as much on the architectural as on the spiritual level. Previously they had lived together cut off from the world in the caves of the desert at the Wadi el Rayyan, about fifty kilometres south of El Faiyum. For twelve years they had lived a completely eremitical life, in the spirit of the first fathers of the desert. This period in their lives had thus served to fuse them together.

It was this group then, who in 1969 left the Wadi el Rayyan in obedience to Patriarch Cyril VI, who had ordered them to go to the monastery of Saint Macarius to renew it. The Patriarch himself received the group, blessed it and assured it of his prayers, asking for the grace to make the desert blossom again and to people it with thousands of solitaries. At that time the monastery had only six old monks and the ancient buildings were falling into ruin. The superior of the monastery, who was then the bishop of Asyut, warmly welcomed the new group.

Later, under the Patriarchate of Pope Shenouda III, after some seven years of incessant activity in reconstruction and spiritual renewal, the monastery of Saint Macarius grew to more than sixty monks. Most of them are university graduates and before entering the monastery, have practised various professions in the world, as agriculturalists, veterinary surgeons, doctors, pharmacists, engineers in all branches and so on. They live in the greatest spiritual unity, practising fraternal charity and unceasing prayer of the heart. The same spiritual father, who keeps the unity of the spirit in the monastery, directs them all. Renewal is also manifest in the careful rendering of the Office and other liturgical prayers, for the monk’s aim, as much by outward practice as by assiduous study, to show forth to the Church the authentic spirit of worship of the early centuries.

Reconstruction

The new buildings of the monastery, planned and constructed by monks with the necessary competence, are on the point of completion. They consist of more than a hundred and fifty cells (each cell has a room for work, a bedroom, a wash room and a kitchen). There is a large refectory where the monks come together once a day for a fraternal meal, a new library of considerable size and a large guest house with several reception rooms, also numerous individual rooms for retreatants and temporary guests. In addition there are the various dependent buildings of the monastery - kitchen, bakery, workshops, farm buildings, etc. These new buildings occupy a space six times larger than that of the old monastery, nearly ten acres in all.

Care has been taken also to restore the ancient heritage of the monastery. This difficult and delicate work has been well carried out under the supervision of the best archaeologists of the ‘Service of Antiquities’ and in conjunction with the monks.

Agriculture

At the request of the community, the Egyptian government provided 130 hectares of desert land around the monastery at a token price, for them to improve and cultivate, also to establish a professional youth centre. Various professions and disciplines are taught there. The necessary buildings for this project have been constructed a kilometre to the north.

Some of the land has already been improved and planted with olives and figs - large cattle sheds have just been built and the monastery hopes to receive from Providence aid to enable them to carry out successfully this project for young people. The ideal, which lies behind this undertaking, is to unite spiritual and moral formation with professional training.

Resources

To date almost a million Egyptian pounds have been spent, without access to any capital sum or being in a state of financial security. The monastery has no banking account, it does not collect donations and is not subsidised by any organization. It never makes its financial needs known – except to the Lord in a common prayer offered for this purpose – and money just comes in through daily gifts, according to need, often in a way so miraculous that it leaves no doubt that God is taking the responsibility for this enormous work, as much on the material as on the spiritual plane.

Admission

The only condition for admission asked of new candidates by the spiritual father is, according to his expression, 'that he should have felt his heart stirred by love for God, even if but a single time'. For it is the love of the Lord which has united us and which does not cease to direct our common life from day to day. We have no other rule and no other aim than to submit ourselves always to the will of God out of love for Him. His Word in Holy Scripture declares His divine will to us. Thus our chief occupation is meditation on the Word of God. There lies the source of our vitality, of our renewed thirst for God and ever increasing love for men.

The Rule

Love is the only rule of the monastery, love without condition or limit such as has been shown to us on the Cross. This love is at once the moving spirit and the end of all our actions, of all our efforts and all our sacrifices. Most of the monks are well advanced in the experience of divine love.

There is no rule of penances or corrections, for it is believed charity will itself be more effective than any correction. The sense of being strangers on this earth makes it easy to submit to one another through love for Christ.

The monks day

There is no detailed timetable. The greater part is left to the discretion of each monk, according to what is advised for him by the spiritual father. However a first bell arouses all at two o'clock for personal prayer, each one in their own cell. The second bell at three o'clock brings the monks to the church to sing together, in Coptic, the midnight praise. This is the most perfect moment of the monastic day. Great pains have been taken to arrange the liturgical chants in the best way according to the most ancient and authentic chants of the Coptic Church. In the singing of these harmonious melodies, voices blend together as an expression of the union of souls and it is truly with one heart and voice that we sing the praise of our Lord. All monks are conscious that in participating in this daily praise and taking part in the common meal, they taste daily, by anticipation, the beatitude of the kingdom to come. About six o'clock, this celebration ends with the Office of Prime.

Work and Prayer

After Prime, each monk sets about the task which has been assigned to him by the spiritual father and which normally corresponds with the profession he had in the world.

The practical works of the monastery are diverse in their activity, the building sites, the machine room, the carpenter's workshop, the forge, the plantations, the farm, the guesthouse, the dispensary, or again in the huge monastery kitchen. This kitchen caters for our workmen - who can number up to two hundred, as well as our guests, who normally number fifty, but can be several hundreds at holiday times. The monastery dispensary is served by several of our monks - a doctor, a dentist and several pharmacists. It offers all kinds of medical care and remedies to the monks, to the workmen, and to visitors.

All the works are carried out under the attentive eye of the spiritual father.

To be completed in the next newsletter.

The year 2004 is the fourteenth centenary of the death of Pope St. Gregory the Great (c. 540-604). St. Gregory is one of the four great Doctors ("teachers'') of the Latin Church, with SS. Ambrose (c. 339-397), Jerome (c. 342-420) and Augustine (354-430). He is also known as the Apostle of England, one of the greatest of St. Peter's successors and one of the most important spiritual influences in the history of the Western Church. Later legend has added other titles of fame to Gregory. He has been credited with organising the prayers of Roman liturgy, composing its music and giving a permanent new definition to the institution of the papacy. But modem historians tell us that his contribution to the liturgy was probably quite modest, there is not a shred of evidence that he ever wrote a note of music in his life and his political efforts in fact had no long lasting effect. Nevertheless, he truly deserves his position as patron Saint of the Roman liturgy and of the papacy, because his doctrine left its indelible stamp on them for 1000 years and more.

Gregory was above all else a man of God, a man consumed with desire for God. He was a monk, a contemplative, a mystic. He could speak of the things of God with authority, because of his deep knowledge and love of the scriptures and because of his own manifestly authentic experience. His mysticism is one of light, of felt experience, of vision. It thus balances, without opposing, the stream of tradition that emphasises the aspects of darkness and negation in mystical experience. Here is a very typical passage, illustrating Gregory's habitual cast of mind – ‘God, in some way, without however being known as He is, makes Himself seen by a soul that breathes only for Him. He makes himself heard in the depths of the heart, without being heard by the ear. He pours himself into the bosom, without going forth out of Himself. He lets himself be touched, though He is without a body. He abides with the soul and in her without occupying any place. But if a soul keeps far from her mind all thought of earthly things, in order to love God only, she feels some spark of that divine fire and perceives some ray of that divine splendour, or if she does not comprehend His excellence and what God is in Himself, she knows at least what He is not. For she perceives that He is above every essence. A soul that is in this state contemplates the divinity, is ravished in admiration and so many wonderful things are shown to her that they infinitely surpass all that the mind of man can understand.’ (Moralia In Iob: V, 34)

Those above all who inherited Gregory's spirit and ensured its survival in the Church were the Benedictine monks. It has been well said that the ‘Benedictine centuries’ (roughly the 8th to the 13th) were also the Gregorian centuries. Even after the monasteries lost their dominance, Gregory's influence continued to be all pervasive throughout the Christian West. St. Thomas Aquinas quoted him in his Summa more than any other Church Father apart from Augustine. For later teachers of prayer like St. Teresa of Avila and St. John of the Cross, Gregory remained an essential reference point. As Pope, Gregory manifested all the characteristics and virtues St. Benedict asks of his Abbot. Indeed there seems to be a natural harmony of outlook between these two Saints. We see in Gregory the same Christ-centred theology as in Benedict, the same love of order and of peace, the same pastoral sensitivity, the same emphasis on humility and the same approach to prayer. But whereas Benedict wrote for monks alone, Gregory wrote for all Christians without exception. So he is a centrally important teacher for all who inherit the Benedictine tradition, oblates no less than monks. I even like to think of Gregory as in some way a secular oblate, for though his monastic life had been cut short, he never lost touch with his monastic roots and his monastic friends. They helped him keep his feet on the ground. Or, in his preferred image, their example helped him to keep the storm-tossed ship of his soul securely anchored in the calm and sheltered waters of prayer. In a letter to his friend Leander, Bishop of Seville, Pope Gregory speaks of his time as Papal envoy in Constantinople: ‘I used to flee to the monks' companionship as if to a harbour completely sheltered from the billows and waves of secular business. For indeed the duty that forced me to leave the monastery had plunged the dagger of its constant demands into my former peaceful tranquillity. But when I was with them and able to give myself to attentive reading of scripture, I drew new life from the daily yearnings of compunction.’

May your association with your monastery be in some way a similar support for you!

Many people are perhaps a little vague about the period of history in which Gregory's life was set. Let me then first put him in perspective, before describing something of his life and writings. To go back first nearly three centuries, in the year 312 Constantine became the first Christian Emperor of the vast Roman Empire. With him, Christianity emerged from centuries of persecution and came to replace state paganism as the official religion of the civilised world. The century that followed was the age of the great Fathers of the Church and their struggle against the heresies. The Arian heresy was the most serious and dangerous of them all. The priest Arius denied the Trinity and the Incarnation. He thought that God the Father had in some way created His Son or Word, who could not therefore be called God. The Catholic Church rejected this heresy and others like it, expressing the orthodox faith especially through the first four Ecumenical Councils. Gregory would later declare that for him these Councils were as holy and binding as the four Gospels.

Another epoch-making decision of Constantine, had been to split the Empire in two and to move the principal capital to the new Rome at Constantinople. During the 5th century, the Empire of the West crumbled before successive invasions by Goths, Huns and Vandals, its last Emperor Romulus Augustus was removed in 476. Italy thus became a Gothic Kingdom. Gaul was taken by the Franks, Spain by the Visigoths, North Africa by the Vandals. Nearly all these invading nations were Arian Christians, bitterly hostile to the Catholic Church. The Angles and Saxons who conquered South and East Britain were pagan. Meanwhile, the Roman Empire of the East remained strong. Indeed it was to endure as the centre of Greek Christian civilisation until it was finally captured by the Muslim Turks in 1450.

Shortly before Gregory's birth, the Emperor Justinian determined to reconquer the West. He launched a successful invasion of Italy in 533 and established his rule there through an Exarch. This official lived not in Rome, but in Ravenna and was often to be a thorn in Gregory's side. For the liberating forces, though Catholic Christians, proved themselves often more of a scourge to the people than the Goths had been. Threatened then from the East, most of these forces withdrew, leaving the door wide open behind them. Through that door, soon enough, would come the Lombards, the most savage and cruel of all the barbarian nations that had hitherto preyed on the wreck of the Roman Empire.

The Italy of Gregory's life time never ceased to be technically a part of the Eastern Roman Empire. That should have ensured peace, but the reality was almost constant warfare. The Empire was unable to protect the people from recurrent famine, or alleviate the catastrophic effects of flood and plague. Gregory thought the situation so dire that the end of the world must be imminent. He often repeated: ‘our world

no longer announces its coming end, but already shows it forth’.

Gregory's family was of the high aristocracy, owning extensive estates in Sicily, as well as property in Rome. They had a long tradition of public service; also of fervent Catholic piety. As a young man, Gregory himself had held public office as Prefect of the City. But when his father died, he gave everything up in order to enter a monastery he himself had founded in Rome. There he lived very strictly indeed, certainly not according to the Rule of St. Benedict. He permanently damaged his health through excessive fasting. His monastic peace was shattered in 578 when the Pope ordained him deacon and sent him as his personal envoy for some years to the Court at Constantinople. Gregory obeyed the summons, but he took a group of his monks with him. His most important work, the ‘Moralia in Iob’, began its life as a series of homilies to these monks. His mission accomplished, he returned to Rome and his beloved monastic life. But when Pope Pelagius died in 590, Gregory’s experience and abilities made him the obvious candidate and he was duly elected.

To be completed in the next newsletter.

The Benedictine Oblate

Newsletter of St. Gregory’s Chapter

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