Monastic Immersion Experience - Sinking in!

I have been here at Visitation Monastery in North Minneapolis for three weeks now - and this past Wednesday a little commitment ceremony was held in which I made my promise to live with the community - to live their way - for the next six months. They asked me to write my own statement of commitment.

Since I am the first person to come to Visitation for the Monastic Immersion Program, there was no model or example to follow. I ended up writing several drafts - the process or narrowing down what I wanted to say was surprisingly meaningful to me - and this is what I ended up saying:

• I would like to begin by sharing what has been my favorite scripture for all of my life:

One thing have I asked of the Lord, that have I sought after:

To live all the days of my life in the House of the Lord,

To behold the Beauty of the Lord,

And to inquire in his Temple.

I always wanted to live in the house of God – which I originally associated with finding my right place in the Church – although I see it more broadly now.

Another important thought has resonated in me since my late teens or early 20's – from the existential philosopher Soren Kierkegaard: Purity of heart is this: to desire only one thing. I've spend many decades trying to unwrap what that means.

And it seemed to me that the key to living with singleness of heart, embedded in the House of the Lord, would be to practice what Brother Lawrence taught about the Practice of the Presence of God by continually refocusing my attention on Him. I have tried all my life to do this – and I always wished I could do it within a house of prayer – with others of like mind.

When I came here last summer, I discovered that this is the place my heart has hungered for – a place where everyone lives every moment of every day oriented toward the presence of God - where all the activities and concerns of each day are infused with prayer.

I remember asking Sister Katherine last summer when I first visited here: "What do I not know about you that makes you the way you are?" I know now what it is. It is the way you live these monastic rhythms, the way you have learned to be with each other and with the neighborhood.

That recognition awakened in me a fierce longing to live this way – I believe that longing was God's call to me to leave what I have known and receive the gift I have so long sought.

I am deeply grateful to you for inviting me to share this way of living.

I commit to you that I will try to live out of the spirituality of Saints Francis de Sales and Jane de Chantal. I will cultivate gentleness and quiet within myself. I will enter willingly and eagerly into the rhythm of your common and private prayer. I will try to be observant about what I can do to serve the needs of the community. I will try to set aside my own agendas to work wholeheartedly toward your goals. I will look for Jesus in the faces of the neighbors and friends who come to your houses. I will listen and value what you have to teach me about living this way.

I have a great concern that your presence here shall continue after you. I will do everything I can to tell your story and to encourage others to come see for themselves and to consider whether God is calling them to this unique way of iife. If it is too late for me to join your community, I will look for others who are younger and more able.

The better I know you, the more I love you. And I am so grateful for the love you have shown me.

I will try to make each day of these next six months the fulfillment of that old longing – to live every day – all day – in conscious awareness of the Presence of God in prayer, service, and community. I can't imagine any place where that might be more possible than right here.

I commit myself, with God's help, to share your life in this way.

Then, each of the sisters took one of the specific elements of Salesian spirituality, gave me the "word or phrase from it," and prayed a prayer of blessing for me to obtain that specific quality or virtue. Here are some of those words of blessing:


Sister Mary Frances chose the word Hope. Sister Mary Virginia word was Interiority . . . (and she said we'd talk about its meaning in one of our conferences soon.) Sister Katherine said she chose, "We are companions on the journey." She added that she chose that because "I feel that you already carry so many of our Salesian words are already  in your Salesian heart and it was appropriate to acknowledge that, by saying, "Let us walk together, encouraging each other on this journey."

Sister Suzanne chose Salesian simplicity: ". . . something i pray for you to really delve into while you are on this phase of your journey. I know you have greatly had to simplify your life in order to even come here for the 6 months immersion...no easy task. i greatly appreciate how you have done that and how you have/are managing to do all you do and keep all your materials and computer stuff in the third floor suite at Girard."

Sister Mary Margaret was not able to be there for the ceremony - but later told me her word of counsel for me was Optimism - and she reached up and traced the sign of the cross on my forehead as she said it.

So with those words, I am expressly admitted to the community - for these six months. I am embraced by lovingkindness. It was a deeply meaningful experience. I was surprised. I didn't expect it to be so moving. The next day I was still resonating with it, so I went out onto the back porch for some time for reflection. I looked up into the sky - and took the picture which is at the top of this post - this is a place which fosters contemplation.

So what is this Salesian spirituality that underlies Visitation life? I have known bits and pieces of it from the past: the phrase "it's easier to catch flies with honey than with vinegar" is extrapolated from the writings of St. Frances de Sales. He is sometimes called the Saint of Common Sense because what he taught is within the grasp of any sincere Christian: to live gently, trust the mercy of God, seek the presence of God within ordinary life, and let that gentleness extend to oneself as well as to others. Radical teaching - especially given the time period (17th Century, when Luther was roaring, Calvin was fulminating and the Catholic Church was anathematizing everything Protestant.

Years ago I kept this quotation under the glass on my desk at school: "There is nothing so strong as gentleness, and there is nothing so gentle as real strength." I didn't know they were the words of Frances de Sales.

For all their gentleness, the Visitation sisters aren't easy on themselves - they don't live the kind of austerity and perform the penitential practices that were common in in religious life in the era of Francis and Jane. Instead they practice an interior austerity where they internalize the teaching of their founders. Their practice of Holy Poverty is so complete that they own nothing at all individually. The large crosses which they have worn these 400 years are exchanged yearly so that there is no attachment even to this religious symbol - and they trade their bedrooms every year - also in imitation of the Lord who had no place to lay his head.


Everything that happens all day is immersed in love - and failures in charity are dealt with simply and gently by returning to the intention to "live Jesus."


One of my favorite quotes from Francis is this: If you happen to do something you regret, be neither astonished nor upset, but having acknowledged your failing, humble yourself quietly before God and try to regain your gentle composure. Say to yourself, "There, we have made a  mistake, but let's go on now and be more careful." Wow!


 A young married man who lives next door was given a booklet of quotes from Frances de Sales. He grew up in a a religious home, but has rejected his childhood faith in adulthood. After reading Francis, he came to one of the sisters and told her - his eyes filled with tears - "I never heard of a God like this one . . . "



In spite of the monastic "routine," every day is different because every day brings new people, new needs, new insights, new tasks to do. I have just come from Fremont House where neighbors are gathering to leaflet the neighborhood with posters advertising the "Neighborhood Night of Peace," coming up on August 1st. About 500 people are expected at Ascension Parish for this night of wholesome fun and neighborliness: there will be food, games, prizes, and sharing life. The event is co-sponsored by Christian churches and the neighborhood Mosque. This video shows what I expect to happen Wednesday night:  I saw that video last year - and that was one reason I came here - to see for myself.

In the middle of the day a woman came looking for help. She and her family have just moved here from St. Paul. She and her four daughters have been the victims of violence in their previous home - they were robbed at gunpoint. The oldest daughter was raped savagely and sustained injuries which will prevent her from ever having children. The perpetrator has been tried and is awaiting sentence of 36-50 years in prison. But the daughter couldn't endure living in that neighborhood any more. So they are getting settled here - and they need "everything." So the sisters found some hygiene kits left from camp - toothbrushes, combs, soap, shampoo, etc. and are helping them find other resources.

Today two young women worked most of the day at Girard House, helping the sisters  with cleaning and preparing for the big doings on the 1st. There were stacks of blue special-event T-shirts that needed to be folded and stacked by size. They came over to Fremont and joined us for Evening Prayer at 4:45.

Two small boys, 8 or 9, showed up, too. They sat on little stools, held the prayer books and hymnals, and at time for petitions, they asked prayer for a relative, Charles, who is in jail. They clearly understood little of what they heard - but they like to come and be here with the sisters. Sometimes they get treats. Sometimes they help out - I think they swept the back porch today.  I think they really come because they know they are loved.

So I am back at Girard House now (I delivered lemonade to be served by the leafleteers when they return from their task). And in a few minutes, I'll join Sister Mary Frances in the kitchen and we'll chop up vegetables for tonight's stir-fry dinner.  So stir-fry veggies and chicken for dinner tonight. We're having a guest for dinner - a judge who presides in juvenile court - an old friend of all the sisters. And after dinner, time for a visit.


And then we'll come upstairs here at Girard for Night Prayer (Compline) in the little chapel. (Which is now my charge. That means it's my responsibility to keep it clean and tidy and to change the decor from time to time.)






I was pleased to see that outside the chapel there is a little holy water font and a plate that reads "Peace to All Who Enter Here." It is identical to the one that is part of my door-knocker at home in Forks - the one that has been on my door for 38 years this month. It was a welcome sight - sort of bringing together two parts of my life.

Tomorrow is Sunday. We'll have Morning Prayer at 8:30 rather than at 7 AM. And then we'll go to the local parish for mass. Then we'll see what comes next.

We're having fish for dinner. We went to Pearl Lake on Thursday (the monastery's weekly "shut down day." We visited friends of the sisters who have a cabin on the lake - and we went out in a pontoon boat and fished for "sunnies," beautiful little fish with yellow and blue markings. It was the first time in years that I'd fished - and a very different kind of fishing than I am used to, indeed. It was the first time ever for Sisters Mary Frances and Mary Virginia. Mary Frances caught seven! I think we caught about 20 in all that afternoon. So tomorrow we'll eat 'em up!

So this is my attempt to share what it feels like to be "immersed" in monastic life! If I were younger, I'd ask to stay forever. And for now, I'll just live it one day at a time.