At our community pre-Compline
His Quote on page 26 reminds us of an enlightening monastic document.
John Paul II Orientale Lumen.
“The Monastery is the 
prophetic place where creation becomes praise of God and the precept of concretely lived charity becomes the ideal of human co-existence; it is where the human being seeks God without limitation or
impediment, becoming a reference point for all people, bearing them in his heart and helping them to seek God”(9). --------------
The whole document is rich in the monastic tradition and makes great Lection Divina. The following excerpts touch on direct references to monks and monasticism.
Monasticism as a model of baptismal life
9. I would now like to look at the vast panorama of Eastern Christianity from a specific vantage point which affords a view of many of its features: <monasticism.>
In the East monasticism has retained great unity. It did not experience the development of different kinds of apostolic life as in the West. The various expressions of monastic life, from the strictly coenobitic, as conceived by Pachomius or Basil, to the rigorously eremitic, as with Anthony or Macanus of Egypt, correspond more to different stages of the spiritual journey than to the choice between different states of life. In any event, whatever form they take, they are all based on monasticism.
Moreover, in the East, monasticism was not seen merely as a separate condition, proper to a precise category of Christians, but rather as a reference point for all the baptized, according to the gifts offered to each by the Lord; it was presented as a symbolic synthesis of Christianity.
When God's call is total, as it is in the monastic life, then the person can reach the highest point that sensitivity, culture and spirituality are able to express. This is even more true for the Eastern Churches, for which monasticism was an essential experience and still today is seen to flourish in them, once persecution is over and hearts can be freely raised to heaven. The monastery is the prophetic place where creation becomes praise of God and the precept of concretely lived charity becomes the ideal of human coexistence; it is where the human being seeks God without limitation or impediment, becoming a reference point for all people, bearing them in his heart and helping them to seek God.
I would also like to mention the splendid witness of nuns in the Christian East. This witness has offered an example of giving full value in the Church to what is specifically feminine, even breaking through the mentality of the time. During recent persecutions, especially in Eastern European countries, when many male monasteries were forcibly closed, female monasticism kept the torch of the monastic life burning. The nun's charism, with its own specific characteristics, is a visible sign of that motherhood of God to which Sacred Scripture often refers.
Therefore I will look to monasticism in order to identify those values which I feel are very important today for expressing the contribution of the Christian East to the journey of Christ's Church towards the Kingdom. While these aspects are at times neither exclusive to monasticism nor to the Eastern heritage they have frequently acquired a particular connotation in themselves. Besides, we are not seeking to make the most of exclusivity, but of the mutual enrichment in what the one Spirit has inspired in the one
Monasticism has always been the very soul of the Eastern Churches: the first Christian monks were born in the East and the monastic life was an integral part of the Eastern
The strong common traits uniting the monastic experience of the East and the West make it a wonderful bridge of fellowship, where unity as it is lived shines even more brightly than may appear in the dialogue between the Churches.
Between Word and Eucharist
10. Monasticism shows in a special way that life is suspended between two poles: the Word of God and the Eucharist. This means that even in its eremitical forms, it is always a personal response to an individual call and, at the same time, an ecclesial and community event.
A father in the Spirit
13. A monk's way is not generally marked by personal effort alone. He turns to a spiritual father to whom he abandons himself with filial trust, in the certainty that God's tender and demanding fatherhood is manifested in him. This figure gives Eastern monasticism an extraordinary flexibility: through the spiritual father's intervention the way of each monk is in fact strongly personalized in the times, rhythms and ways of seeking God. Precisely because the spiritual father is the harmonizing link, monasticism is permitted the greatest variety of coenobitic and eremitical expressions. Monasticism in the East has thus been able to fulfil the expectations of each Church in the various periods of its history.[31]
In this quest, the East in particular teaches that there are brothers and sisters to whom the Spirit has granted the gift of spiritual guidance. They are precious points of reference, for they see things with the loving gaze with which God looks at us. It is not a question of renouncing one's own freedom, in order to be looked after by others. It is benefiting from the knowledge of the heart, which is a true charism, in order to be helped, gently and firmly, to find the way of truth. Our world desperately needs such spiritual guides. It has frequently rejected them, for they seemed to lack credibility or their example appeared out of date and scarcely attractive to current sensitivities.
Whatever path the Spirit has in store for him, the monk is always essentially the man of communion. Since antiquity this name has also indicated the monastic style of coenobitic life. Monasticism shows us how there is no true vocation that is not born of the Church and for the Church. This is attested by the experience of so many monks who, within their cells pray with an extraordinary passion, not only for the human person but for every creature, in a ceaseless cry that all may be converted to the saving stream of Christ's love. This path of inner liberation in openness to the Other makes the monk a man of charity. In the school of Paul the Apostle, who showed that love is the fulfilling of the law (cf. Rom 13:10), Eastern monastic communion has always been careful to guarantee the superiority of love over every law.
This communion is revealed first and foremost in service to one's brothers in monastic life, but also to the Church community, in forms which vary in time and place, ranging from social assistance to itinerant preaching. The Eastern Churches have lived this endeavour with great generosity, starting with evangelization, the highest service that the Christian can offer his brother, followed by many other forms of spiritual and material service. Indeed it can be said that monasticism in antiquity—and at various times in subsequent ages too—has been the privileged means for the evangelization of peoples.
27. With regard to monasticism, in consideration of its importance in Eastern Christianity, we would like it to flourish once more in the
27. With regard to monasticism, in consideration of its importance in Eastern Christianity, we would like it to flourish once more in the
For the complete text see
WEB vatican.va/holy_father/john_paul_ii/apost_letters
See also:
'Orientale Lumen' Its Relevance to Liturgy and Monastic Theology. A Joint Symposium at
1 comment:
Father Donald,
A most fascinating article on monasticism. The monastic vocation is at the heart of the quotation, but I am also alerted by the words, "In the East..."
... this coincided with my reading of "Centering prayer"... I followed several links and discovered the "apparatus" known as the chotki (or komvoschinia) which you will have seen in the Holy Land. The article you quote ends with the comment that the Eastern monasteries would make a valuable contribution to the religious life of Western Christians. I am 'drawn' by these converging references, and have made myself a chotki which accompanies me as a walk. It seems to me that one can 'call out' the Jesus prayer, however distracted, whereas the Rosary requires more considered reflection, at a given time. I wonder if Nunraw Abbey Shop might ever consider promoting this 'poor man's' prayer method? I show below the links I settled upon and the key information (excluding the excellent illustrations) for anyone who might be 'drawn' as I am.
William.
http://www.chotkis.com/chotki.htm
Slavic Chotkis - 33-Bead Chotki used by both Slavs and Greeks to represent the 33 years of Jesus' life. In reality, there are 34 beads on most of these chotkis, one extra above the cross, a decorative accent,or an extra Jesus Prayer for the intentions of the Pope. There is the 100-Bead Chotki, the traditional Slavic configuration, with 3 sets of 33 beads plus one additional bead above the cross, or the 103-Bead Chotki (Vervitsa) the asymmetrical old Slavonic configuration which is still used by Russian monks.
The Jesus Prayer is based on the prayer of the Publican. The chotki was perhaps designed with Confession in mind. We are to come to the Mystery of Reconciliation in the spirit of the Publican - humility and contrition.
http://www.chotkis.com/komvoschinia.htm
Greek Komvoschinia - While Greeks tend to prefer komvoschinia made of knotted wool (a technique known to the monastics who are so skilled at it), many Ruthenian Catholics choose to apply the Slavic beaded construction to the Greek configurations of 25, 50, and 101 bead komvoschinia,using colours suited to the cultural and religious heritages of the Greek Catholic and Greek Orthodox peoples. The 25-Bead Komvoschinia is the shortest configuration of Komvoschinia, 25 prayer beads and one divider bead above the cross; the 50-Bead Komvoschinia, 2 sets of 25 beads, separated by a divider; and the 101-Bead Komvoschinia divided every 25 beads according to the Greek tradition with one additional prayer bead above the cross. There is finally the 103-Bead Komvoschinia. Some people prefer their Komvoschinion divided every 10 beads, with three additional prayer beads above the cross.
http://www.chotkis.com/history.htm
In the beginnings of Christianity, the repetition of a short verse from the Psalms or of the Our Father prayer came into vogue, especially among the monastics of the Thebaid in Egypt. In the time of St Basil the Great in the fourth century AD, the practice of reciting the Jesus Prayer was predominant among Eastern monastics. The Jesus Prayer had a number of forms including: "Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me a sinner".
St Basil prescribed the saying of the Jesus Prayer in place of reading the Psalms and the Divine Office for those who were travelling or who were otherwise impeded from using the liturgical books in their prayer. The knotted cord became, by far, the most popular prayer counter. The East used nine turns of the threading needle to create one knot, a tradition that went back to Pachomius of Egypt. Beads and other materials were later used for prayer cords and prayer chains that the West has come to know as the "Rosary" or a garden of roses ("rosarium").In the West, the prayer cord was also popular. When St Dominic received the rosary from the Mother of God, what he received was a knotted cord and Dominicans and other Western monastics wrapped these large circled cords around their wrists as part of their monastic uniform - very much like Orthodox clergy and monastics do today.
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