Breakfast and Seminar

Since I entered in 2006 I have gone through various periods of breakfast foods. For the first months, I ate granola each day. Then I began eating oatmeal; for the longest stretch, I ate several slices of toast and a piece of fruit; for the last six months, I have been eating a large bagel each morning. During the second nocturn of Vigils this morning, I had a sudden urge to eat grits. When Vigils was over, I headed to the coffee room and ate two bowls of instant grits, with butter. I have no idea where this urge originated. I have yet to discern whether it is the Holy Spirit blowing me open to the new creation or one of the powers and principalities of the Southern world invading my Hoosier soul.

This past week I have been working to get a lot of my liturgical work prepared for the next few weeks. On Monday I will fly to Louisville where I will be met and driven to Gethsemani, our mother house in Kentucky. All the juniors of the region (a little less than 20) are gathering for a 10-day seminar with two of our seniors: Mother Agnes of Wrentham (Massachusetts), who will speak about finding the extraordinary in the ordinary, and Dom Thomas of Vina (California), who will present conferences on Gregory's Life of Benedict.

Safety Mask

To demonstrate to Mr. Industrial Safety that I can follow appropriate protocols, here is a photo of me and Hugh cementing a window:

A close-up of the brush working the cement under the lead:

Mercy

Bi'simillahi ihr rahman ihr rahim (In the name of the Benevolent and Merciful). This was a prayer one of my Senegalese co-workers taught me more than 25 years ago. I was told to pray it often. I do.

Today, the second Sunday of Easter, is a Sunday to focus on Divine Mercy. This weekend retreatants have been studying mercy in scripture and in their own experience.

John Paul II, early in his pontificate, wrote an encyclical on God's being "Rich in Mercy." In one of the chapters, he focused on the revelation of mercy in the Hebrew scriptures. The footnotes include a long one (#52) on the semitic roots for the word, including the root rhm shared by words in both Hebrew and Arabic.

Dom Christian de Chergé, the martyred prior of our monastery in Algeria, wrote a long essay on mercy in which he linked John Paul's encyclical with passages in the Qur'an. He and his brothers lived as neighbors, working side by side, with the villagers of Tibhirine. This sharing of experience is one of the principal means of inter-religious dialogue lived today.

After lunch I walked into the woods. I gathered some moss to put around the jade tree I care for. Throughout the woods were branches of white dogwood blossoms and threads of redbud. Brilliant green beetles were flying about.

Working continues

I will just keep on posting pictures. Here are a couple of me soldering the Margaret Mary window and a shot of the window of Jane de Chantal and her kids.

Working

For the past few months we have been taking pictures of our work in the glass shop. Yesterday Chaminade gave me a CD with 250 files. I will share some with you.

Working in glass

Here is the outside of the glass shop where I work each morning.

And here is the light table where I often work. You can see two of the recently completed windows that were installed in a church in Louisiana: John Bosco and Jane de Chantal, left and right respectively.

Yellow

The cloister walk is dark red tile -- for the most of the year. Currently it is yellow with pollen. Pollen gets tracked into the church and into the refectory. Three nights ago at Vespers, I could feel my throat closing up -- so I started taking a double dose of my antihistamine.

When I cleaned the large window sill in my cell, the paper towel turned yellow. Now that the air conditioning is on in our cells, I can keep my windows closed and most of the pollen out.

However, the dogwood is still pink.

We currently have nine men in the novitiate -- 2 novices, 3 postulants, and 4 observers (2 of whom will be leaving in the next 10 days after their 2-month period with us). As undermaster (assistant to the novice director), I am kept pretty busy assisting them in absorbing monastic practices.