Our Time Out

We were closed the last week of August, as we are every year.  It is our time for our annual retreat, ten days of mostly being silence together.  Some might find this strange, but it is a time honored monastic custom, and one which is refreshing.  We step out of our usual routines and stop lots of activity in order to have more time for reflection and prayer.  

This year we made a part of the retreat a discussion of the book New Monasticism:  What It Has To Say To Today's Church, by Jonathan Wilson-Hartgrove.  The author is a Baptist minister who, with his family, live in a "new monastic" community. . .that is, several families living together, sharing in common, having regular prayer, and taking as their model the Holy Rule of Benedict.  This life is closely allied with service to poor neighbors and witness to issues of justice.  There are many such groups around the country, Catholic and Protestant.

We got a new "take" on what is similar about our vocation, and some ideas about what might be different.  Further, the discussion seemed to give a kind of shape to our silence.  We were all thinking about the same kinds of things.