Still Here

Yesterday, July 11, was my 10th anniversary of profession, so this is my last blog of this series. It’s been a profound and very growthful experience for me, ordering my thoughts and feelings about monastic life. Thank you for sharing this stage of my journey.

This week, I’m asking myself these questions: “Why do I stay? What do I get out of it?” I’m finding it’s surprisingly easy to answer them. Fundamentally, despite the niggles, disappointments, losses and detours along the road, I stay because this life is shaping me into a better, more loving person. I have undoubtedly had periods where I have felt that the mystery that is God was receding from me, but if I look back over the 10 years, I can see that the setbacks were temporary. I am more immersed in God and closer to loving others unconditionally than when I started.

Why is that? Cardinal Basil Hume once said that monastic life takes place in the tension between the desert and the market place. It sounds uncomfortable and, at times, it is, but I’ve learned that it’s that tension between extremes that is the place where I am most apt to find the wordless answers to the questions that have followed me all my life: What is God? What is my place in the universe? What does it mean to live a good life? Monastic life is not all contemplation, and neither is it a full-on immersion in the material.

Sometimes, I veer more one way, sometimes more the other. It’s that constant search to find the still point, neither rejecting the world nor being dominated by it, that is the essence of being a monastic. And it is in finding the still point, or at least constantly striving to find it, that I realize the monastery is the right place for me to be.

 

Karen Rose, OSB                                                                            July 12, 2019

The Road Not Taken

There is a famous poem by Robert Frost, The Road Not Taken. You come to a fork in the road and you have to choose one of the paths. That happened to me when I made profession at Saint Benedict’s Monastery 10 years ago. The road that I didn’t take was staying in England among what was safe and familiar, with people I knew and loved. Going back there recently made me acutely conscious of what I lost through not taking that path.

It is the strangest sensation to be somewhere that was home but has now become less so. I felt connected but also disconnected at the same time. Places were familiar, but they had also changed. People had changed, too. So had I. It was a great experience to be able to visit with family and friends face to face, but sometimes there would be an undercurrent of melancholy. I could enjoy them now, in the moment, but I knew it was fleeting; the moment couldn’t last because I would get on a plane and go back to my life in the US.

After profession, there were many years where I flirted, sometimes very seriously, with the idea of leaving and going back to England. I’m always going to love my homeland, but this time I recognized that I didn’t have the same sense of overwhelming belonging. I hope I never lose touch. I hope to visit England many more times in the future, but rather sadly, this visit was the time when I realized the rightness of my decision to enter the monastery. I’m mourning my losses now, but it’s the kind of grief that has gratitude at its heart. I’m grateful for all that my life in England gave me and I know it will always have a cherished place in my heart. I’m also grateful that it prepared me to make the choice for monastic life here at Saint Benedict’s, where I’m traveling a different road, but one that I think is the right road for me.

 

Karen Rose, OSB                                                                               July 5, 2019

Community Lessons

Being away from community, as I have the past two weeks, made me think about what it means and how it’s altered me in these past 10 years. I think I can detect stages.

When I first entered the monastery, I loved everything: the sisters, the prayers, the way of life, watching TV programs I wasn’t interested in, sharing a bathroom, eating things I didn’t like. You name it, I loved it! I was completely bought into the idea of sharing everything.

That morphed into a phase where I wasn’t quite so sure if it was all so lovely. The community made a couple of decisions that I didn’t really think were good ideas. I started to have the experience of what it means to give up your own will. Somewhat grudgingly, I realized that, if the community made a decision with which I disagreed, I was still going to have to try to make it work. The alternative is to become a carping, bitter woman; that didn’t attract me. Nevertheless, I didn’t find it easy when my way turned out not to be the chosen way.

There also came a point, I am sad to report, when I recognized that as a person, community had made me less nice. I noticed that I was more conscious of getting my fair share, that I would think things like, “If she’s not doing that, then why should I?” or “Why is she being allowed to do all these things when I’m being refused?” I didn’t want to be that kind of a person, so I consciously decided to simply rejoice at the good fortune of my sisters rather than complain that it wasn’t me. I was helped in this by observing that the sisters who are the wisest and the most pleasant to be around are the ones who are glad for others.

So, 10 years on, how do I feel about myself in community? I think it was very beneficial to pass through these stages. They helped me to get to know myself better, they clarified for me the sort of person I want to work on becoming and they made me more sensitive and accepting toward others. We all need to live through different phases and face different challenges at different times of our life. Sometimes that makes us grumpy or sad. I’ve learned that’s not always a bad thing because it can be a learning time which is necessary to enable us to become better, kinder people.

Karen Rose, OSB                                                                       June 28, 2019

What's a Benedictine?

When I was first thinking of entering the monastery, I was often asked the question, “What do Benedictines do?” It’s a question that people still ask me periodically. I find it both simple and hard to give an answer.

It’s simple because Benedictines are committed to seeking God through a life of prayer, work and community living. It’s hard because we don’t “do” a particular thing. We are not, for instance, a teaching or nursing order, although many Benedictines are teachers and quite a few work in health care.

When it comes down to definitions, a Benedictine monastic vocation is not essentially about doing; it’s about being. Work is one of the ways that we seek God, but it’s not the reason for the existence of the Benedictine order. Primarily, we live together as a Christian community, following the teachings of Christ as laid down in the Rule of Benedict. We pray together, share a common table and try to adopt a pattern of life which enables each one of us to find a framework to assist in our journey to God. We desire to reach out to others through our liturgies and our ministries because we want others to be able to share the many positive things about Benedictine monastic life which are transferable to life outside the monastery. These are values such as awareness of God, peace, hospitality, love of learning, etc. But we can really only share these values by living them out day by day so that people can see that it’s a good way to be, a way to show God’s love in a troubled world.

For me, being a Benedictine is a work in progress. There are many challenges, such as managing relationships in community, my prayer life, the demands of work and the need for leisure. I struggle at times to not feel overwhelmed by all the things I have to do. Yet, as I look back over 10 years of professed life, I can see a consistent thread, which is the desire to keep drawing closer to God and a deepening understanding that it is only as I live more and more unreservedly into the life that I’m able to appreciate how it’s helping me to get there.

Karen Rose, OSB                                                                               May 31, 2019

 

Graced by Aging

In monastery terms, I am relatively young, but actually, I’m getting up there in years. It’s an interesting experience being younger and older at the same time. I was, for example, surprised when my dental hygienist asked me were most women older when they entered the monastery. (For the record, I was 50 when I entered). I was so used to being told that I’m still young and that your 40s, 50s and 60s are the prime of life, that I was taken aback.

At some levels, I easily believe that I’m young because I’m fortunate to have a lot of energy and I don’t have any major health conditions that limit my activity. On the other hand, I notice that I need more sleep. I can, for instance, still manage to stay up really late, if necessity dictates, but whereas 20 years ago I would have carried on as normal the next day, now I’d appreciate a couple of days to laze around and recover.

I also notice that I take more intense pleasure in smaller things. It sounds a bit trite to say this, but I revel in things like spring blossoms, blue skies, fluffy white clouds and the sight of dew sparkling on the grass. I don’t have the same desire to travel that I used to have, nor to seek out the exotic and unusual. I can wonder at the smallest things right on my doorstep.

As I said, I’m pretty healthy, but I did have my first brush with major illness about a year ago when I was diagnosed with breast cancer. It was early stage and I never felt ill with it, so it seemed theoretical quite a lot of the time. However, I had two moments when it struck me forcibly that I could die of this. Reflecting on these feelings helped me to come to terms with my own mortality in a way I never had before. When I was younger, I knew intellectually that life would eventually end, but it didn’t seem real. Having cancer made death real, but in a very positive way. It was a pleasant surprise to find that I could accept fully that one day I would die and that this didn’t make me feel frightened, but simply me made me more conscious of how much I appreciate my life, the world around me and the people in my life. It helped me to live each moment more intensely in the present.

In fact, I don’t think much about my age, but I definitely feel graced by the aging process because I’m aware it helps me to live my life with a greater sense of gratitude and a deeper love for the gift of every day.

 

PLEASE NOTE: There will no blog for the next two weeks (June 14 and 21) as I will be away. See you on June 28.

 

Karen Rose, OSB                                               June 7, 2019

 

Hearing "No!"

Obedience is one of the three monastic promises we make when we profess as sisters. We declare that we make these promises “according to the Rule of St. Benedict, the norms of the federation of St. Benedict and the living tradition of this community.” The fact that it’s a living tradition means that we don’t try to replicate living like the monks did when St. Benedict wrote his Rule in the 6th century. Our endeavor is to live the spirit of the Rule in a way that is meaningful in the 21st century. This means that we are constantly challenged to assess how obedience looks for us today.

We make all the promises freely and in the knowledge that we are willingly handing over some of our power to make decisions as individuals in favor of what we see as a greater good: becoming part of a community seeking God together.

Obedience is not simple. It is not about doing exactly as you are told, like a child. In monastic life, there is a concept of mutual obedience, which means listening to one another, tolerating ideas and views that may not be the same as your own and trying to do this in a spirit of love and openness. Ultimately, the prioress is in the position to make final decisions, but we are expected to contribute our piece of wisdom.

What happens when things don’t go the way I’d like? It’s taken me 10 years to be able to say this, but I’ve realized that it is a great gift to be able to hear, “No!” When I get a “no” to a personal request, or when a decision is made on behalf of the community with which I don’t agree, my monastic promise of obedience asks me to accept that, without grumbling, and make whatever has been decided work. If I take obedience seriously, I can’t stand aside and say, “Well, I don’t agree, so I’m not going along with that.” I’ve bound myself, under a prioress, to the spirit of the Rule, the norms by which we are governed and the living tradition of the community. I’m part of whatever is decided, for better or for worse, whether I like it or not.

You might be asking, “Where’s the gift in all this?” Well, it’s being able to hear the “no” and not be shaken by it; it’s the realization that my inner core of peace is not disturbed, for example, whether we do or do not change the use of a building. I may have a view, but getting my way isn’t central to my well-being or to my relationship with God. Like everyone, I prefer to see my views prevail or be told it’s okay to do the thing I want to do but I’m very grateful to know that I don’t have to get my own way in order to be at peace and to realize that God is there, unchanging, whatever I am asked to do and whatever the prioress and community decides.

 

Karen Rose, OSB                                                                              May 24, 2019

Loving Life

I’ve always been a person who enjoys thinking about the meaning of life. As a student, it was one of my greatest pleasures to spend an evening with one or two close friends holding deep and meaningful conversations, trying to fathom how we could save the world and what exactly was our place in the great scheme of things.

My meditations on the meaning life have probably become less grandiose over the years, but there has never been a time when these big questions ceased to fascinate me. Something that has surprised me, though, is the way aging has made me more aware of how much I love life and how important it is to make the most of every day.

When I was younger, I assumed that it was the best time of my life and it was, indeed, a time full of energy, growth, happiness and challenges. It came with a sense of time being limitless, even though, theoretically, I knew it would come to an end sometime. It was as if I could keep searching and trying things because I had all the time in the world to find exactly the right way to save the world. If I thought about getting older, it was with a sense that the best would be over, I would have done what I had to do and there would be no more glorious striving.

As I’m getting older, I find I think differently. I’m conscious that more of my life is behind me than ahead of me, but what that’s done is make me more aware of how much I love being alive. As the number of moments left to me become fewer and fewer, I love each individual one more and I’m very conscious of the need live each one with care and purpose. I enjoy this! In fact, I’d go so far as to say that, as I age, my interior life gets better and better and I love living more and more.

 

Karen Rose, OSB                                                                        May 17, 2019

 

Go Letting

People talk a lot about letting go. It’s seen as something that you do actively. You decide to clear out the closet and let things go; you decide to stop eating out as frequently and you’re letting that go. However, as I look back over 10 years of monastic life, I realize that the letting go has happened to me. Sure, I’ve made some choices about living more simply, not accumulating as much stuff, but mostly it’s been a process of accepting that less is more. I’d say that I’ve been letting the go happen.

When I entered the monastery, I was very sure I was following God’s call. Ten years on and, despite many bumps in the road, I think I was right. But it always felt like an active process: I listened to God, I heard the call, I acted on what I heard.

As I review where I am now, it feels different. I find I simply don’t have the need to do things that I used to. I loved to go to the movies, opera, ballet, restaurants and there was always another place entering my list of places I wanted to travel to. I still love that those things exist, and I’m very grateful for the opportunities I’ve had to indulge those interests. I think they’ve given me pleasure, broadened my horizon and generally been a good thing in my life. I don’t actively think that I couldn’t bear to do any of them anymore and, in a moderate way, I still do some of them occasionally. However, I find more and more that I’m content with less and I don’t feel a real, impelling desire to do any of these things. If some of them happen, that’s fine, but if they don’t, they don’t, and I’m not bothered. They’ve let me go.

When I felt called to monastic life, something I wanted badly was to become more detached from things. I sought an interior desert. The challenge is that you can’t just make detachment and the desert happen. I’d have to say that the monastic way of life, with its rhythm and particular way of looking at the world, has done it for me. I’ve become more detached. This isn’t the same as not caring. I care very much about how people treat one another, about integrity and making ethical decisions, but somehow I now do that from a place of greater calm and emptiness. I’ve been let go.

 

Karen Rose, OSB                                                                            May 10, 2019

Dealing With Death

I had experiences of death from an early age. My father died when I was five and the two grandparents who were living when I was born died when I was aged six and eight respectively. I would never recommend this as an experience for children, but I have always felt that it was a lesson in how good can come out of bad and sad. I was fortunate to have a loving and very competent mother, who dealt with the challenges of being left a widow at an early age in a way that helped me still to feel loved and secure. There were also other adults in my life who cared about me and I didn’t lack positive, loving male influences in the shape of uncles and family friends. It definitely could have been much worse.

There came a point in my life when I recognized that, although I undoubtedly missed my father’s presence, it was possible to have something bad happen to you, to come to terms with it and go on to have a happy and satisfying life. I guess I learned that absolute perfection in all areas of life isn’t required to make life fulfilling. You can have pockets of sadness, but the underlying fabric of your life isn’t destroyed.

I worked in hospice for several years and experienced death from another angle. That, too, was sometimes very sad, but also positive because it made me realize how precious life is and the need to live every day consciously to the full because none of us ever knows when the end is going to be. All this was, I think, a good preparation for entering the monastery. St. Benedict tells us to “keep death daily before us.” This isn’t morbid. It’s simply good advice about making the most of the present moment and accepting that life on this earth does not go on forever.

Don’t get me wrong; I have no desire to die at the moment, but I think my life experiences and periodic meditation on St. Benedict’s words have definitely had an impact on how I look on death. I don’t see it as something bad that we should try to avoid but the culmination of who we are now. I don’t have a clear view of what lies beyond and I don’t really worry about it. My focus is on living as fully as I can in the belief that my dying is a part of my living and I hope I can make it a worthwhile part of my life. I’d be dishonest if I said I don’t have any fear of death because I think we all worry about the process and how we’ll cope with physical or mental infirmities, but that doesn’t stop me from aspiring, when the time comes, to make my death a significant and meaningful part of the days and years that have gone to make up the gift of my life.

 

Karen Rose, OSB                                                                                    May 3, 2019

 

What's Wrong With Millenials?

What’s wrong with millennials? NOTHING! That’s what I think anyway.

The topic is on my mind because I was raised to paroxysms of anger recently when I read an article, presumably not written by a millennial, which took the line of how could they possibly turn out okay if older generations didn’t pass on their values and faith. Now, I have nothing against passing on faith and values, if they’re good ones. As a baby boomer myself, I know I exhibit certain baby boomer characteristics, like being confident in the rightness of my own opinions, so I tend think I have a lot of good ideas to share with people both older and younger than myself. What I really disliked about the tone of this article was the way it suggested that people of the writer’s generation had been entrusted with some blueprint of faith and morality and that all the rest of us would be lacking if they didn’t brainwash us into being exactly the same. It was millennials who came in for the full force her concern, but baby boomers and generation X-ers were also implicitly found wanting.

In response, I would like to say this: I work with a millennial who is one of the most sensitive, caring women I know. She and her generation-X parents seem to have managed quite well. I live next door to a college composed of nearly 2,000 millennials. I never cease to wonder at their sense of social justice, their concern for those who are marginalized by society and the stream of volunteer projects they undertake to make a difference. I recently read about a 15-year-old Muslim girl who has started to fast for peace and now has a whole group of people fasting with her. 

This is what I think. Age has nothing to do with goodness. There are wonderful seniors, baby boomers, generation X-ers and millennials, and there are nasty ones, too, in all those groups. Instead of trying to prove that whatever age group we are in is somehow better than the others, I believe people who want to live in a world that rates justice and integrity highly should seek one another out, regardless of age, because together we can make a better world for all generations and the generations to come.


Karen Rose, OSB                                                                    April 26, 2019

Waiting for Silence

Silence is on my mind right now. We are approaching the holiest time of the year, the Triduum. This is the period stretching from the evening of Holy Thursday to the evening of Easter Sunday. It's three days but it's also one day, symbolizing the Paschal Mystery, an arch that begins with death and ends with life.




At the monastery, apart from services, we keep silence for most of the Triduum. The silence begins this evening, Holy Thursday, after the Mass of the Lord's supper; it continues until after Mass on Easter Sunday, which we celebrate at dawn on Easter morning.


The silence is a time for inner reflection, a time to spend with God and the mysery and wonder of  Christ's passion, death and resurrection. I'm waiting for it in a state of nervous anticipation. I love this communal silence but I also find it quite daunting. This isn't because I don't like keeping silence. I do, but there is something a bit scary about standing on the edge of silence and waiting to dive in. It's like jumping off a cliff into a deep, dark pool. I don't know how deep the water is; I don't know what I'm going to find in the darkness of the silence. I know God will be there, but what does that mean? What will I hear in this silence where there's just me and God? WilI want to hear what I hear? Will I be called call to something difficult or challenging?




At this time (10 a.m. on Holy Thursday) , I simply pray that I'll be ready for whatever awaits me in the silence.


Karen Rose, OSB                                                                     April 18, 2019

What I Don't Believe

“If I had a God whom I could understand, I would never hold Him to be God.” Meister Eckhart

I find it’s easy to fall into shorthand ways of talking about God and the divine. I think this stems from the desire to make God manageable, containable, understandable. I also think I do myself a disservice when I allow this to happen. Every time I describe God in terms of something that I know, I make God smaller than God is. If I keep making God smaller, then I deny myself the possibility of becoming part of God’s greatness.

Here follow things I do not believe:

1. I do not believe that God is something separate from me or from creation. God is creation. God is in me, sustaining me right now.
2. I do not believe God has a plan. Plans are linear, they move from point A to B to C. God is not constrained by points or goals or targets.
3. I do not believe suffering is a mistake on God’s part. Although I don’t understand it, I accept that it is a part of the world as it is created. My task is to find where God is in it.
4. I do not believe that God prefers me, my family, my country or anything else particularly associated with me to other people and their connections. God doesn’t have to single me out. God loves each one of us infinitely, including people who are much nastier than I am.
5. I don’t believe I have to name God to know God. God is not bound by any theories or rules that I, or anyone else, makes up. God transcends everything and is simultaneously in everything. People can be aware of that without being conscious that they are aware.
6. I do not believe that the afterlife will be like a large family reunion. I don’t know what happens after we die. I just trust.
7. I do not believe I need to know anything about God. I need only to trust enough to allow myself to be open to falling into a Mystery I can’t understand. I hope that God will do the rest.

 

          Karen Rose, OSB

Wanting Nothing

There was a period for several years before I found the monastery when more and more insistently I found that I wanted nothing. I don’t mean that I couldn’t think of anything that I wanted, but that I actively wanted not to have anything. I didn’t want to be burdened by possessions because I felt that having things weighed me down and kept me from God. Things demand attention and maintenance and I wanted to be rid of that to make more room for God in my life.

Mistakenly, as I now know, I thought everything would be taken from me when I entered the monastery. I thought my life would become simpler, that by not owning anything personally, the detachment that I sought would be handed to me on a plate and I wouldn’t have to think about possessions anymore.

It doesn’t work like that. First of all, if you live in the monastery, you are given the necessities like shelter, food, warmth and clothes. Once you realize you will have these things, you start to have opinions about them and you start to feel that your room is your little kingdom. At least, that’s how I felt. Secondly, although if you buy something like a book, you’ve bought it out of the communal money pot, it doesn’t feel any less that it’s my book. Thirdly (this was the biggest blow to the dispossession dream), you discover that, as a member of the monastery, you bear a moral responsibility for how the community makes and spends its income. Thus, the problem of having things was doubled, not diminished. Ever since I came here, I have had to bother not only about my personal relationship with possessions, but the communal dimension as well.

Initially, I was also thrown by the fact that we lived rather comfortably in the monastery. Then I realized that things aren’t being run for my benefit. I may have wanted to struggle with living more spartanly, but some sisters need a special diet or have conditions that mean they feel the cold, so places have to be warmer than maybe I would choose. This was a good lesson for me in that I let go of the pride of wanting to be a martyr and instead became grateful that all these things were available to me.

At a deeper level, I have also started to understand that wanting to have nothing was not really about the possessions themselves. Just letting go and being grateful meant I didn’t angst about their absence or presence. I find now that I can take pleasure in things, but my happiness isn’t dependent on them. A new chair might be nice, but it’s not essential. If I get the new chair, I can enjoy it, but if it’s removed, then it doesn’t disturb me. I’ve discovered that I only want the necessities of life, because the non-necessities are not essential to my inner peace.

 

 Karen Rose, OSB                                                                         April 5, 2019

 

 

 

Ebb and Flow

The tide comes in and the tide goes out. That’s the nature of the sea. It’s also a good metaphor for the way I live my faith.

As I look back over the years, I can trace a constancy of commitment to my search for God. On the inside, that has remained consistent; however, it doesn’t always look the same from the outside. The sea of faith is always there and I’m always somewhere on it, trying to set a course for home (God), but there’s also the push or pull of the tide which changes the way I steer and navigate.

When I entered the monastery, it was with the expectation that now I’d found the absolutely right way to take the quickest route to God. It was quite unsettling as it slowly dawned on me that I was still at sea and my faith and its expression would still ebb and flow.

At first, I was very diligent (and somewhat self-righteous) about having a perfect attendance at community prayers and Mass. I was so sure the Benedictine way was right for me; I wanted to be a good nun and make the most of this newly-found straight course.

Imagine the consternation when the boat started to leak and the seas became unpredictable! I found that, helpful as community prayer can be, it started to feel as if it was taking the place of personal prayer and that God, as a living, active presence in my life, was drifting further away.

Having spent ten years as a professed sister, I’ve become comfortable with the realization that I can’t sit back and think I’ve found the perfect way and will never have to make any adjustments again. A lifelong commitment to seeking God means a willingness to keep reflecting, working out what’s best at this point in my journey. Right now, I’m not at community prayers quite as often as I once was, though I recognize that part of choosing the monastic path means participating in community prayer. When I am there, I am fully present. I’m happy about that because it’s a way of prioritizing quality over mere quantity.

Paying attention to my own needs and listening to where I hear the Spirit call me has also made me less critical of others and more willing to trust my sisters. If someone isn’t at prayer, I work from the assumption that she has a good reason, not that she can’t be bothered. This seems to me a good lesson about living in community: I don’t always know best and I don’t always know what’s happening in someone else’s life. What I do know is that I’m part of a community of women in which each and every one has committed herself to the Benedictine, monastic path and that is enough to merit my trust and respect.

 

Karen Rose, OSB

Inside Community

Before I entered the monastery and lived in community, I thought I knew what it would be like. I’d lived a life where trying to nurture my inner self and my relationship with God was always significant. I thought living in community would be like that, but more intense, and surrounded by people who were all doing the same thing, which would make it easier.

As I approach the tenth anniversary of profession, I realize that it took me awhile to understand that the living in community itself was at the heart of the monastic experience. It’s the place where you are honed and being honed isn’t always comfortable. I learned that you can feel really drawn to the Rule of Benedict, that you can nurture your spirituality through Benedict’s wisdom and that you can adapt Benedictine principles to your way of life and your working situation, all of which is very worthwhile, but the full monastic experience, as envisaged by Benedict, is incomplete if you don’t live it out in community.

Living in community is a 24/7 commitment. I soon realized that although we are all seeking God, we don’t all start at the same point; we have different family and life experiences and different interests and different approaches to the world. In other words, we are all individuals. We wouldn’t necessarily choose the others to be our life-companions, yet we have to make things work. I believe it’s this endeavor to persevere and create a loving, monastic community, in the face of not-very-good odds, which is a primary witness to the Gospel value of loving our neighbors, whoever they are. We live in close proximity to one another, we have to make decisions about our future together, all in a context of trying to reconcile women who may be very different. Unlike in a marriage, where there is one other person, there are scores of us and we didn’t choose one another; God chose us.

We don’t always manage to do things in an ideal way. Living inside community means I had to let go of the notion that a monastery is a place of peace, where nothing ruffles the tranquility. I learned that the surface may be placid and exude calm when you pay a short visit, but underneath it’s a very real life where we have to deal with conflict and difference and accept that we are not always very good at it. I think, though, it’s the fact that we’re not always very good at it that makes it worthwhile. It’s a real challenge to have to live with others, to disagree and yet know that in order to fulfill our calling we somehow have to rise again, after every knock, and make it work.

 

Karen Rose, OSB                                                                          March 22, 2019

 

Inside the Job

I have the best team of workers anyone could wish for. There are 11 of us (some full-time, most part-time) who work directly in the mission advancement department and several others who provide help with specific projects. Most are sisters, plus two employees and a volunteer. No one is perfect and I’m not claiming we never make mistakes, but I know that each and every one always strives to do her best. Each has her own area of expertise and I have complete confidence in their dedication and ability to do a great job. This makes my job as director much easier than it would be if I had to keep checking up on whether things were getting done.

So, given that I’m freed to think about the bigger picture, what do I do? I have certain basic tasks, connecting with donors, doing some writing (e.g. this blog), going to meetings, dealing with queries, liaising with the press, reporting back to our leadership, etc. Beyond that, there is the strategic stuff. I’m not particularly target-driven or goal-oriented. I tend to be a person who seizes ideas and opportunities as they occur and runs with them. I love it when things succeed, but I’m aware that if you try new things they won’t all work out and I’m comfortable taking the risk. It has to be a calculated risk and the probability fairly that high that things will go well, but I believe it’s important not miss opportunities because of excessive caution. Okay, there’s my management strategy in a nutshell.

How does all this fit with my monastic life? Being a sister is a whole person commitment. It’s not on the cards to say that Monday to Friday, 8:30 a.m. to 5 p.m., the monastic journey is suspended. So how does that look in a busy work environment?  And believe me, it is busy. We are not floating around all day on a reflective cloud, taking the odd phone call and typing the odd letter.

I think the answer to the question is “love.” Love is at the heart of the Gospel and the heart of the Rule of Benedict. In the workplace, this means that underpinning all our work is love for one another, for the community whom we serve and represent to the world, and for the people with whom we connect. We pray for those who ask for our prayers with love and concern. We love our donors, not because they give us money, but because they are neighbors and friends crossing our path right now; they are the people to whom God is giving us the opportunity to show Christ’s face. We put out our social media posts in the loving hope that something we say is going to inspire someone or help them get through the day.

To do our job effectively and authentically, we have to see one another not just as co-workers. We share one another’s joys and sorrows. We are people with a common purpose. At the root of that purpose is sharing a message of love to the world. It would be a hollow message if we didn’t show genuine love and concern for one another, the sisters in our community and the people whom we seek to serve.

Karen Rose, OSB

On the Job

When I first graduated from college with a degree in philosophy and theology, my aspiration was to save the world. I started small as a nurse’s aide in a hospice, a period intended to give me some practical experience of solving the problems of a small section of suffering humanity while I thought about how to reach the rest of the globe. (FYI: I am still thinking!)

The endeavor proved more difficult than I anticipated and, over the years, I narrowed my focus, while still keeping in mind that the job I did should always be concerned with helping people. I spent about 25 years working in healthcare, either in clinical practice or research.

Here at the monastery, I made a distinct career change or, more accurately, I should say that in consultation with the prioress a new path was presented to me. After I first professed in 2009, I started to work in the monastery’s development and communications office. My role in the office has changed over the years, and the name of the department has changed to mission advancement, but basically I’m in my 10th year of service in this area.

Now, in the outside world, I would not be an obvious choice for fundraising work because I don’t like asking people for money and I’m not terribly interested in finances. As long as I have enough to eat and a warm bed to sleep in for about the next month, I’m prone to think that tomorrow will take care of itself. One of my favorite scripture passages is: “Consider the lilies of the field, they toil not, neither do they spin…therefore, take no heed for the morrow, for the morrow has troubles enough of its own.” However, the prioress, presumably with the guidance of the Spirit, thinks I’m suitable for the job, so here I am doing it.

The communications part is fine. I love reaching out to share our life and our message with people through our magazines, website, social media, etc. I’m so glad that I’m part of a team providing reflective, spiritual moments in people’s days and that we provide ways for them to connect with us to ask for prayers.

The thorny issue is the fundraising. It is undoubtedly a challenge for me, but, like many challenges, it has genuinely been a source of growth. Sister Gen Maiers, who was director of the department before me, used to remind me that I have given my life to this monastery and the Rule of Benedict. If I think it’s worth that much, then why would I not think people might want to partner with us, including giving money, to support our mission and ministries? That definitely helps.

The longer I’ve been here, the more I see communications and fundraising as being intertwined. I’m fortunate that I have never been asked to raise money for the sake of raking it in. We ask when we need and most of that need is to ensure that we can continue ministries that reach out to others. I’ve also realized that if you have a message (we do: basically a message of peace, love, prayer and the importance of community) and you believe in that message, then you want to share it because you know it’s a way to make the world a better place. When you share it, you find there are many people out there who believe in the same message and actively want to give their support, often with a gift of money, but also time and prayer. It doesn’t feel like a business transaction or taking from someone. It feels like people finding one another and coming together to make good things happen.

Karen Rose, OSB                                                            March 8, 2019

Extreme Living

Some years ago, when I first read Michael Casey’s book on monastic living, The Unexciting Life, the blurb on the back contained a phrase about monastic life being exotic but unexciting. The phrase and, indeed, the whole book, has provided a source of reflection for me ever since.

A monastery isn’t exactly the place you think of when you are picturing somewhere exotic—palm trees, sun, sand, blue sea and dancers in hula skirts! What makes it exotic is the way we live. There are around 200 Sisters of Saint Benedict. We range in age from 31–103. We come from different backgrounds, cities and countries, yet we choose to live together for one simple reason: the pursuit of God through living under the Rule of St. Benedict. That's an extreme choice, so you could describe it as exotic, in the sense that it's not usual.

We are all adults, but we don’t have our own homes, our own bank accounts or our own cars. We don’t even have control of our lives because we live under obedience to the prioress and to one another. The prioress does not assume the role of a dictator, because we are all freely choosing to live in this way. She takes account of the opinions of the community and cares about sisters as individuals. Nevertheless, as professed sisters, we all understand that we have given up control of our lives. This is extreme living, exotic living.

Despite all our differences of taste and temperament, we choose to live together as a community. We believe, as St. Benedict tells us, that we go to God together. That doesn’t mean we become unthinking automatons. Our aim is unity, not uniformity, and our commitment, as I see it, is more about helping each sister to build the framework of life which helps each one in her search for God. It’s about caring for one another and being sensitive to the needs of the other.

Really, this is quite a tall order. It is not easy and it is not exciting. It can be a daily grind. We rub against one another and we’re not always kind. As in many walks of life, we have an ideal and, as humans, we often fall short of the ideal. Monastic living means that when we fall short, we are committed to getting up and trying again, whatever that takes. And always, always, always, the falling and the rising are lived out in community, which carries the need to consider not myself and one or two other people, but myself and 199 other persons. A different way to live? An exotic way to live? I would say, “Yes!”

Karen Rose, OSB                                                                March 1, 2019

It's Not About the Clothes

When I realized that I was called to monastic life, the last thing on my mind was the effect that would have on my wardrobe! That’s as it should be, so it came as quite a shock to me how strongly some people feel about what sisters wear.

I’ll give a little historical detail to begin with: When our founding sisters reached Central Minnesota in 1857, they wore a traditional habit with full veil. With few modifications, sisters wore that until the Second Vatican Council asked religious orders to go back to their roots, find the heart of their tradition and work on ways to express that authentically in the late 20^th century. It was during this period that a decision was taken to allow sisters to experiment. Some retained their habit, some modified it and, eventually, some did as St. Benedict suggests in the Rule and began to wear clothing that is from the locality. Essentially, this meant they wore ordinary clothes. By the time I entered in 2007, most sisters had given up the habit and new entrants did not have the option of adopting it.

None of this was a big deal for me. I wanted to seek God. I didn’t (and don’t) care much what I wear while I’m doing that. I don’t think God cares either. God is more concerned with what is in our hearts than with our clothes. It has, therefore, quite shocked me that, at times, people will truly attack us for not wearing a habit, as if the clothes are the only thing count. It saddens me that kindness, love for God and our neighbor and a genuine desire to seek God seem to count for nothing against what we wear.

Having said that, I would be less than honest if I didn’t confess that what I wear is a definite part of my monastic journey and the search for God. I have always liked clothes. I had a mother who dressed well and liked clothes and a father who was never backward at complimenting my mother on how she looked. Clothes mattered in my family, but more in the sense of creating an attractive atmosphere in which to live, rather than being the thing that defined you.

When I came to the monastery, I was comfortable with my own style and, happily, I didn’t need to make much adjustment in what I wear. As a sister, you obviously have to be quite modest in dress. You don’t want to look as if you are trying to attract a mate but that doesn’t mean you have to look a frumpy mess all the time! I wasn’t required to alter my style especially but I’ve found over the years that I want to. Considering occasionally what does and doesn’t feel right to wear, and why, has become part of my monastic journey.

I think my endeavors are based on trying to simplify. Over the years, I’ve noticed that I wear fewer trinkets. At one time, I often used to wear a cross. Now I don’t. I wear my profession ring and earrings but I’m noticing that the earrings are getting smaller and less noticeable. At the same time, I find I can take pleasure in seeing someone else look dressed up. I don’t think there is anything wrong with it. I don’t have a desire to make everyone be the same. We are individuals, making our own way to God, and some of our uniqueness shows in our clothes choices. That’s fine!

Something that really pleases me is that I think clothing is an area where I have truly become less judgmental. Living with my sisters, who display a wide range of clothing preferences, I’ve realized that love, kindness and faith are not modified in any way by the clothes you choose. That’s really freeing. I feel called to simplify many parts of my life. I feel I need to cut away distractions and “extras” in many areas, including what I wear. I accept that others sisters may not feel that need in the same way, yet God loves each of us equally.

This is how I’d sum up the clothes quandary: My clothes choices can help me in my journey toward God, but the journey isn’t dictated by the clothes.

Karen Rose, OSB                                                 February 22, 2019

Peace and Love: Part 2

“Never turn away when someone needs your love.” Rule of Benedict (Chapter 4)

There was a time in monastic life when sisters were very restricted as to how often they could visit their family, “particular friendships” within the monastery were discouraged (i.e., there were no BFFs) and sisters didn’t make friends outside the monastery. I wasn’t a sister at the time but, as I see it, there was a rationale there. It was the idea that by committing to religious life you gave up everything so that you could focus entirely on following Christ with no distractions.

However, sisters move with the times and there is a softer approach now which recognizes that, as humans, we need connections with other people; we need to love and be loved. How that’s lived out varies from monastery to monastery and how we live may look different from how it did in the past, but I think underlying our life and our approach to relationships is still the belief that Christ comes first and that expressions of love and care toward others are part of how we follow the Gospel and Benedictine path of loving.

How does that pan out in daily life? Well, we are encouraged to maintain family relationships and close friendships and it’s fine to have friends outside the monastery. However, I find that it’s quite complex to keep a balance here. For instance, major religious feasts call me to be with my community. What are we if we don’t celebrate Easter and Christmas together?  Yet it’s a real tug at the heart to be absent from people with whom I have lifelong connections and also to have to live with the knowledge that I spoiled other people’s Christmases by coming here. Yet, I truly want to be with my monastic community because these times are part of the cement that bonds us together as monastics and differentiate us from a group of women simply choosing to live together.

Another significant lesson I have learned is that there are some people, including sisters, you like and naturally feel drawn to and, actually, that’s okay. These people will be your friends, the people with whom you recreate. However, community doesn’t work if you focus solely one person. You have to be open to others and you have to care about each and every one, whether or not you see them as chums. You can be close, but you can’t be exclusive. I learned that you can’t choose who you like, but can choose to be generous with your love and at least try to include everyone.

This brings me to celibacy. Celibacy is included in the monastic promise of “fidelity to the monastic way of life.” I think this is probably something that each person handles differently. For me, the challenge is that it’s hard to give up that one-to-one relationship, the specialness of joining yourself with one other person. I love the theory of sharing my love equally with sisters, of channeling to the whole world the energy that would usually go into the one primary relationship, but it’s one of those things that sounds aspirational in theory and turns out to be very difficult in practice. I guess, though, that’s one of the points of monastic life: challenge yourself to be greater than you are, try to want what’s best for others and just keep going along the particular path you have chosen.

 

Karen Rose, OSB                                               February 8, 2019

 

Peace and Love: Part 1

“Peace and love” sounds like a hippy phrase from the 70s! However, you could say that St. Benedict had already called dibs on the concept in the 6^th century when he wrote his Rule, the small book which Benedictine monastics use to guide their daily life in community.

One of my favorite quotes from the Rule occurs in Chapter 4, “The Tools for Good Works”: “Never give a hollow greeting of peace or turn away when someone needs your love.” It encapsulates what I want to say in my blogs this week and next. Peace and love matter to every human being, but when you live in community, they take on a particular significance.

This week, I’m going to concentrate on peace. When people visit monasteries, they often comment on the sense of peace and calm. They’re right. I know that because I’ve experienced it myself when a guest in monasteries.

Never be fooled in believing that the sense of peace simply happens. It doesn’t. Somewhere in the background, there will be a band of nuns or monks working like crazy to create and maintain the peaceful atmosphere. Peace is hard work. What makes it even harder is that it can only be authentic when it’s not an illusion, but an expression of something deeper. This is where I have found it gets really challenging.

Living in a monastic community means that I live with a group of women who are all committed to seeking God through the Benedictine way. We have this in common, but that doesn’t mean we don’t have differences. Some of those are minor, like preferring red to green. Yet, even something like that can be a challenge when you live with someone who always wants things to be not quite the way you would choose. In order to be at peace, you have learn to let go sometimes, but to let go graciously, in a way that doesn’t make the other person feel diminished by your sacrifice. At the same time, you can’t just let go of everything on principle because sometimes your opinion is a valuable and necessary part of the total community wisdom. It a tricky balancing act and you have to work on it every day in order to do your part to make peace a reality.

Maintaining peace is an art and a commitment which lies at the heart of monastic life. Without peace, you can’t truly love.

Karen Rose, OSB