Posts Tagged ‘A Lifetime of Developing Response’
Mulling Matter Over – Br. James Koester
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Br. James Koester
Cyril and Methodius
This morning, we conclude the sermon series “A Lifetime of Developing Response.” Over the last few weeks, we have heard from each of the senior Brothers, as we have reflected on our years as members of the community. Today it is my turn. Now, don’t read too much into that. I am not sure that my having the last word is meant to signify anything of great importance! But you never know.
I must admit, I find it difficult to comprehend that I am one of the senior members of the community. Yet the reality is that when I came to the community, those who were then the senior members, were not that much older than I am now, and the things we say in the Rule about the gifts and challenges of old age were written with them in mind! So, like the others who have preached on these Saturdays, I find myself in the odd situation of discovering myself where I least expected to be. Read More
Falling in Love Changes Everything – Br. Geoffrey Tristram
Br. Geoffrey Tristram
I will always remember Peter. He was a member of my parish when I was a parish priest. He was about 30 years old, and a really nice person. But he was restless. He never stayed in one job for very long and had a succession of short-term girlfriends. I would often joke to him about this, but I’d also challenge him sometimes and ask why won’t you commit yourself to something or someone in life. And he would always use a phrase which I can still hear. He would say, “Oh, I’m keeping my options open.”
By the age of 30 I had already closed down lots of options in my life. I had made lifelong ordination vows as a deacon and as a priest. And many of my friends had closed down options in their own lives by making lifelong marriage vows. It seemed to me that it was okay to keep your options open perhaps in your twenties, but that “keeping your options open” for too long risked leading a life lived on the surface, without roots or depth. Making lifelong vows to another person or to God was I believed a way of finding permanence, integrity, and authenticity in one’s life. Read More
Life as a Recurring Invitation – Br. Curtis Almquist
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Br. Curtis Almquist
Galatians 5:22-26
Psalm 19:1-4
Matthew 13:44-46
A college roommate and I share a monthly conversation. He recently asked me whether I remembered a place on our college campus that was particularly significant. His question evoked lots of memories; however, the most significant place for me was actually not on campus. It was off campus in a nearby park to where I frequently rode my bicycle. In the park was a particular tree I always climbed. I would sit in stillness and silence on a large, outstretched limb and look down on life. I was trying to get a perspective on life and to figure out where I belonged. Though there was every outward sign that I was thriving, on the inside I was lost.
Following my college graduation, I had had an adventurous and fulfilling life, mostly; however, what I had sought as a college student was still my presenting need: a place to belong. The psalmist says, “My boundaries enclose a pleasant land” (Psalm 16:6). And that is what I discovered here, within the enclosure of our monastic community: a very challenging, fulfilling container in which to abide as I “worked out my salvation” (Saint Paul’s words, Philippians 2:12). A place to thrive. Read More
Living with Equanimity – Br. David Vryhof
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Br. David Vryhof
James 1:2-6
Psalm 131
Matthew 6:25-33
Many people, perhaps most people, imagine that monastics live quiet, fairly uneventful lives. They might assume that we don’t have to deal with the daily upheavals that life in a marriage or in a family with children can bring, or with the challenges of working to earn a living. They might imagine that we have hours of leisure to pray and to read and to contemplate the mysteries of life. Life goes along pretty smoothly in a monastery, they think, and it must be nice to live in a community of like-minded individuals who are committed to loving God and to loving and supporting one another. “How I wish I had your life,” they sometimes say.
But there can be plenty of upheaval in a monastic’s life. There can be times when the community is not in agreement and one has to accept a decision that he did not favor. There may be things a brother wants to do but is not given permission to do, or things he’d rather not do that he is asked to do. There are times when the community faces particular challenges around its buildings, its finances, its ministries, or its members. There can be sticky pastoral situations. Perhaps the most painful times are those when a brother leaves the community, for whatever reason. We may have grown to love that brother and now feel the pain of his absence in much the same way as when couples separate or divorce. Read More
Responding to God in a Life of Joy – Br. Jonathan Maury
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Br. Jonathan Maury
“O God, you caused your blessed evangelist Saint John so eminently to receive the love of your dear Son Jesus Christ: Grant to us your servants that that we may evermore abide in that love, and accomplish your holy will. Watch over the Society of Saint John the Evangelist for good. Give your elect angels charge concerning us, and make your Holy Spirit to rule our hearts, that our lives may be holy, our prayers acceptable, our wants supplied, our words directed, and our work prospered, to the glory of your Name; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.”
The prayer just offered comes from the earliest days of the Society of Saint John the Evangelist. It is presently used to conclude the Chapter Office in which we hear and reflect on our Rule of Life, chapter by chapter, day by day. It is, I think, a fitting way to begin a sermon series in which our community’s elders meditate upon their developing response to the grace and gift of commitment through profession in life vows.
Listen for a moment to the introduction of Chapter 39 from our SSJE Rule of Life (1997):
“Jesus’ offering of his life on the cross was the supreme expression of his love for the Father, made in perfect freedom through the Spirit. . . . This free self-offering is expressed anew in our lives when, abiding in Christ, we find in him the power to surrender ourselves entirely to God, by taking the vows of poverty, celibacy and obedience for life. When a brother vows to abide in our community until death, the whole brotherhood rejoices in the gift of freedom that enables him to make this commitment after years of testing.”
My path of commitment to life profession in religious vows began, I believe, with God’s call to existence and being, which I share with my Brothers, each of you present and all of God’s children. We were chosen by God in Christ before we were even capable of owning and choosing the gift of being for ourselves. The religious life vows of poverty, celibacy, and obedience were preceded by God’s commitment to me in Holy Baptism. Through the outward and visible sign of burial in water and the inward and spiritual enlivening of God’s creative Spirit, we have all been sacramentally incorporated into the death and resurrection of Jesus by the loving purpose of the Father. Our commitment to God’s call and our desire to respond to that gift are themselves signs of God’s commitment to us as beloved children. My present commitment was born out of my parent’s response to God’s love in faith and trust by bringing me to the font of regeneration.
Commitment to religious vows in Christ, I am certain, arises from my need of God’s love at every moment to sustain me in being. The vows provide the framework for my own life through the common baptismal commitment we all share. The vows are the means by which God is shaping me in the unique image and likeness of his love which God has created me to be. Lived openly in the face of the Church and the world, both in my faithfulness and in my failings, the vows become the creative means by which God is revealing the image of Christ in me. “When He is revealed, we will be like him, for we will see him as he is,” as Saint John’s first letter promises (3:2).
In our Rule of Life we hear that “Father Benson has taught us that the call of God in the religious life is continuous, abiding and progressive. As profession brings to an end the period of probation, so it inaugurates a lifetime of developing response.” In light of this teaching, we elders of the community have been asked to testify to the wisdom of our experience and to our ongoing response to the grace and gift of vowed life.
My personal experience has been of ongoing, unconditional welcome and acceptance, just as I was when I joined the community and even as I am now. God’s commitment to me and to our everchanging community of men, I believe, has always been there drawing me to Jesus. Even I, one given to rebellion and self-assertion, one presuming to know already exactly how I was best suited to serve and love God, was welcomed and accepted into the particular fellowship necessary for my transformation. One wounded by addiction and romantic dreams, even this man, was challenged to accept being born again, “born from above,” to surrender my life to Christ in a community of mutual commitment composed of holy and fallible men. Joined to a company of those desiring to “see the kingdom of God,” years of formation in vows, are even now bringing me to submit to a “greater, higher power” than my helpless self. I continue to experience the vows of poverty, celibacy, and obedience challenging me to accept the molding and shaping of God’s fierce and unfailing love – despite my many resistances.
In this hope, my developing response has and continues to be a growing desire to live “a life hid with Christ in God,” as apostle Paul teaches, to be “separated from the world in order to be joined to the world” as a monastic. My at times flagging desire is to respond to God in a life of joy. My desire is for a life of faithful response in the following ways:
- in continued proclamation of the Good News through the ministry of initiation as a baptismal catechist;
- by solidarity with Christ in prayer and action as one on the side of people who are deprived and oppressed;
- in serving the needs of those who desire to learn how to pray and deepen their conversion to life;
- in becoming God’s fellow-worker, acting in love and intercessory prayer for the reconciliation of all things in Christ;
- in listening with and to those who seek intimacy with God in the ministry of spiritual companionship and guidance;
- in readiness to repent whenever I fall into sin through confession and prayer of reparation and amendment of life, fleeing the demons of selfishness, pride and arrogance;
- in offering and sharing worship in word and sacrament in the company of Christ’s friends drawn into our circle;
- in humbly accepting the God-given freedom by which doubt and questioning do not separate us from Christ or one another, but rather yield to faith and hope of things not seen;
- in dedication to cooperation with the Spirit and growth in the face of the challenges of aging and diminishment.
All of this only possible with God as my helper.
How shall I, how shall each of us baptized into the death and resurrection of Christ, be made ready to respond today and every day to God’s call? We will surely come to know, as we need to know, though our commitment to one another and to God’s future forever losing ourselves in the wonder, love, and praise of Christ Jesus. Amen.