To Be a Monk
An Essay on the Cistercian Vocation

  1. To Be a Man
  2. To Be A Christian
  3. Experience of the Divine
  4. Community Life
  5. Solitude
  6. The Word of God
  7. Fraternal Love
  8. Compassion and Humility
  9. To Be A Monk In Practice
  10. Signs of a Call to be a Monk
  11. The Monks of New Melleray
  12. Daily Monastic Schedule
  13. Entering New Melleray
  14. Entrance Procedure

A monk tries to love each and all of his brothers as he loves himself. He tries to get beyond the dichotomy and alienation of the "isolated ego." The ordinary way of viewing things is in terms of "me and mine" as separate and opposed to "him and his." The monk progressively realizes that we, though many, are all one, sharing one destiny, having one welfare, being members of one another in the Body of Christ. Whatever is detrimental to my brother hurts me; whatever is good for him is my blessing. Community life is both a cause and an effect of this mutual love.

We can distinguish two levels of the community life. The one is deeper, hidden. It is an invisible spiritual ocean formed by the confluence of the unseen rivers of love, faith and prayer that emanate from each monk's heart. Only God, who sees into the hearts of all, knows how much each monk contributes to the spiritual treasures of the community. He who is the most humble, who serves most generously, whose inner love and prayer are most pure and deep: he is the one who contributes most to the community life. The other level of community life is that of visibility. Here community life is externally perceptible as "doing things together" and "doing things for one another."

So we do manual labor together or for each other. This labor provides our material sustenance. It also enables us to give of our surplus to others in need. We eat together. This maintains the health and strength we need for the service and worship of God. We pray together. This is the ultimate reason why we work, eat, and live together: we want to pray together. People who love each other naturally want to live together. Monks love each other and naturally want to pray together, because prayer is the apex of life for monks. In spirit, we are praying together incessantly. In body, we pray together often, as much as seven times a day and more. We esteem our assemblies for the Eucharistic Prayer and the Divine Office to be the highest and holiest of all our communal activities. In our cenobitic monastic life, we prefer nothing to the "Work of God" which is our communal prayers. It is our most precious means to union with God and our most elevated expression of that union.