| Comments by Andrew on Monday, April 11, 2005 at 00:00 |
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Does joining the Trappists mean never going home to see your family, except in cases of death or illness? This is a great deterent to me in discerning this way of life. I dont think one or two weeks a year would destroy the solitude that one lives the rest of the year. Wouldnt it be harsh to leave ones family and never see them again, especially when monks are allowed to go to conferences but cant see their families? Please explain this rule, and any suggestions for one who may be attracted to monastic life but does not want to totally abandon their families. Thank you.
Your love of family is beautiful. Not only desireable but also commanded by God. Love of God expressed by a life of prayer is also beautiful and commanded. In the monastic way of life, Trappist monks follow the Rule of St. Benedict as their guide in expressing their love of family and of God. In chapter 66, St. Benedict writes, "...the monastery should be so established that all the necesary things, such as water, mill, garden and various workshops, may be within the enclosure, so that there is no necessity for the monks to go about outside of it, since that is not at all profitable for their souls." Cistercians follow this rule more strictly than other monastic orders. In order to fulfill both our love of family and also be wholly orientated to a life of prayer, Cistercian monks and nuns express familial love by correspondence, occassional telephone calls, visits from family members at the monastery, and home visits when there is a serious illness or death in the family. As a pilgrim people whose homeland is in heaven, we give up one expression of familial love, that of visiting home annually, for another expression, that of prayer as we journey to become citizens of heaven. When my father left me at the monastery the day I entered, there were tears of sacrifice in his eyes. But twenty years later he wrote such a sweet card I shall never forget it: "Your joining the monastery has been the greatest success of my life." Those on a long journey give up some conveniences and human consolations for the sake of greater graces and blessings. My father's blessing was not only to have a son in the monastic, Trappist way of life, but also his willingness to love God more than his own flesh and blood, more than the consolations he could have enjoyed had I followed a different rule of life than St. Benedict's. In times past when travel and other means of communication were very limited by distance and time, contact with family in many ways of life was difficult and rare. We are fortunate in our times to have alternative means of communication to express and sustain our love.
We do occassionally travel to another monastery or school for ongoing formation related to our life of prayer. But this is also very rare. |
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