Monastic Experience Retreat at Pluscarden

To continue on the vocations theme and to steal shamelessly from Fr Tim:

Pluscarden Monastic experience retreat 2008
Live the monastic life for six days

The Benedictine monks of Pluscarden Abbey are organising a Monastic Experience Retreat for single Catholic men aged 18-40 to be held at the Abbey on 1st – 6th September 2008. The format will be the same as the successful retreat held last year and those who attend will live the same life as the monks and follow the monastic timetable. They will be in choir with the monks, do some lectio divina (spiritual reading) and prayer as we do, eat in the monastic refectory, do some manual work with the brethren each afternoon etc. There will also be a few talks and discussions on things such as the meaning of monastic life, monastic prayer and the Divine Office, and Gregorian Chant, as well as a tour of the Abbey some periods of recreation and a chance to speak with the brethren.

This is an opportunity for men who are considering a monastic vocation to experience our life ‘on the inside’ as well as for any men in the age group to share the riches of monastic spirituality. Those who came on previous retreats have ended up as monks, seminarians, diocesan priests, members of other religious orders and secular institutes as well as in various other ways of life.

Pluscarden Abbey was founded in 1230. The monastic community died out after the Reformation in 1560 but Benedictine monks from England returned to the medieval buildings in 1948 and resumed the monastic round of prayer and work. Over the years the buildings have been restored and at present the cloister is being completed. The community now consists of 30 monks, some of whom live in a daughter house at Petersham, USA and in a new monastic foundation in Ghana, West Africa. The monks live the classical Benedictine life of prayer and work centred on Holy Mass and the Divine Office celebrated according to the traditional schema of St Benedict, all of which is sung in Latin with Gregorian Chant. For more information on our way of life see the Pluscarden Abbey website

For further information on the retreat, contact Fr Augustine by email or by post at:
Pluscarden Abbey
Elgin
IV30 8UA

We cannot recommend this enough - if you’re a young man discerning a religious vocation, this is an absolutely wonderful opportunity to gain new insight into monastic life.

Consider Your Call

Last weekend Sr Andrea and Fr Dominic Rolls from Dorking joined students from Cambridge to discuss vocation. The event started with Exposition of the Blessed Sacrament followed by some discussion and then Night Prayer. The group (called ‘Consider Your Call’) were very friendly and engaging, and it is always inspiring to see young people responding generously to God’s call.

UPDATE: One of the participants, Vicky, has written a short account of the event here.

Monastic Witness

If you click here you can watch a short video of Fr Augustine of the wonderful Pluscarden Abbey explaining the importance of the witness of monastic life.

Unfortunately we couldn’t embed the vido here and the site is in Danish, but you can watch the video.

God bless!

A response to some queries…

Since we started the blog in July, we’ve had some queries regarding our habit, specifically on the question of veils. I apologise that it has taken so long to answer - I’m new to the blog scene and not as proficient at answering questions as many of the more experienced bloggers. Also, as you can imagine, we’re kept very busy. However, now that things have quietened down, I wanted to respond.

Firstly, as a new community (founded in 2000) with our main apostolate of crisis pregnancy care and the spreading of the Gospel of Life, we decided right from the very beginning to wear some form of dress that was recognisably religious.  This we have always done, albeit with a few variations along the way. What we currently wear (and have done for the last four years) is our final choice and consists of a simple, long black tunic dress worn over a plain white round-neck top. Over this is worn a simple black cardigan for warmth.  We wear sensible black shoes in the winter months and equally sensible black sandals in warmer weather.

Around our neck we wear a long silver chain with a crucifix (the one associated with Pope John Paul II) and on our ring finger we wear a simple silver rosary ring, which will be replaced with a wedding band when we take our final vows.

It is in our constitutions that we will receive a long black veil as a mark of our consecration when we take our final vows. This veil we will wear in the majority of situations, removing it only when pastoral concerns dictate otherwise. To help you understand what this means, let me explain a little bit about our working environment.

When we start working with a pregnant woman, one of the first things we assure her of is complete confidentiality. If we go to visit the woman, in her own home or in hospital, we generally wear a jacket over our habits so as not to be quite so conspicuous, thereby not breaking our promise of confidentiality.

In future, when we hope to take the veil following our final profession, we will wear it primarily as a mark of our consecration, and secondly as a witness to the world.

I am afraid there is no possibility of the “real nuns” habit some have mentioned: we are an active, dynamic young community doing what we believe to be the most important work of our time – protecting the lives, rights and dignity of all human persons from conception until natural death – against great odds and a society that has been corrupted by the “culture of death”. No one who meets us is in any doubt that we are religious sisters – our dress and, please God, our lives, demonstrate this in abundance.

We do as the Church requires in wearing a simple form of dress which is distinctly religious, ‘a religious garb that distinguishes us as consecrated persons’ (Vita Religiosa, 34). This habit is however ‘suited to the time and place and to the needs of the apostolate’ (Perfectae Caritatis, 17).

With regard to whether or not we will attract vocations if we don’t have a “real” habit, I must confess that I’m not sure we would want any young woman whose main marker for following God would be that she got to wear such a habit.

We love and admire our contemplative sisters who wear a full habit and it is right and fitting for their way of life.  We recently spent our retreat with a wonderful community of enclosed nuns. We sat in choir with them, we ate in silence with them, we worshipped God at Mass with them and they had no problem with our mode of dress – in fact, except for the veil, one could hardly tell the difference.

As a community, we wear a discernible habit. Every day we say the full office, have a holy hour, attend Mass, say the Rosary and Divine Mercy, and eat our meals – all of this we do together. We participate in the life of the local Church, we fast when the Church fasts and we feast when she feasts. We have an annual community retreat, spiritual direction every six weeks and Confession at least every two weeks.  In addition, we try our very best every day to save unborn babies from being aborted and their mothers from making the biggest mistake of their lives. To paraphrase the great St Thomas More in A Man For All Seasons, if this be not enough to keep a man alive or, in our case, to prove that we are “real” religious sisters … We just long to get on with the task the Lord has given us.

This has been an epic response, but one I felt I had to give. I will not, however, be getting into a debate about habits/veils since, frankly, there are more important things to do. So please feel free to comment, feel free to pray for vocations to our community and encourage anyone you know who may feel called to our way of life – but please do not expect any more comment from me.

God bless,
Sr Roseann

Day for Life podcast

Recently we’ve had a few queries about the Day for Life podcast Sr Andrea recorded about the Sisters of the Gospel of Life.

You can listen to it here:

Or you can download it as an .mp3 here.

October

In October, the month of the Holy Rosary, we turn our thoughts particularly towards the Mother of God. Mary, as virgin and mother is the perfect model for all religious women.

Queen of the Most Holy Rosary, Pray for us!

The call to religious life has always been a radical call, to leave everything and follow the Lord - completely and utterly trusting in His Providence and in His Love - that is what we are all called to do.

Life in a religious community is not somewhere to hide away from the often harsh realities of life rather, if lived properly, abundantly, it is a place where we should embrace the highest and deepest realities of life. As with every life given to God in Baptism, it should echo every aspect of our human existence. No place for stagnation or compromise, only an ever deepening understanding and living of our knowledge and love of God.

In trying to understand and love God more properly, we are also committing ourselves to a similar level of communion with all of humanity. We are not, as some would believe, excluding ourselves. This continual challenge, which the Lord gives us, this constant searching and seeking, is what makes life worth living.

To seek the meaning of life and to discover the wonder of Creation and the Creator. To knowingly participate in the greatest story ever told and to be filled with wonder and awe. To be joyfully at peace, even during the most difficult times. This should be the mark of a true Christian, and certainly of a true religious. That people may look at us and note “see how these Christians love one another”.

No-one gives greater example of a life lived for, and with, Christ. Mary is the model for all Christian living.

As we explore her life, may we try to understand and gain inspiration from her witness and faithfulness.

Article in the Financial Times 15/09/07

The Sisters of the Gospel of Life were recently profiled in the Financial Times as part of a larger survey on the state of religious life in modern Britain. It’s not at all bad - pretty negative in places but the positive side comes through in the end, mainly thanks to Sr Roseann who, true to form, always gets the last word.

Religious life is not the visible presence it once was in the West, but new shoots are springing up all over. Our hope will not be in vain.

You can read the full article, and view the accompanying pictures here.

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The Sisters Of the Gospel of Life

Monks may be a slowly dying breed, but nuns can breathe slightly easier: there are estimated to be more than three times as many Sisters as there are Brothers in Britain today. Four hundred miles from Worth Abbey, I visit the Sisters of the Gospel of Life in their church hall in Glasgow’s suburbs.

The order was established in 2000 to support women with “crisis pregnancies”. Sister Roseann Reddy, a Glaswegian in her forties, has big cheery cheeks, a pudding-bowl haircut and a talent for speaking without pausing for breath. She’s in the middle of assembling a flat-pack cot – and looks flustered. “Our life isn’t the slightest airy-fairey,” she laughs. The order currently only has one other member, Sister Andreas, a 33-year-old former editor at an Edinburgh publishing house. They live in a semi-detached house, rented from the local diocese, rather than an ancient convent. And, without a priest on-hand, they have to drive a battered car to different parishes everyday to find a church open for Mass.

Their work was started in 1997 when Cardinal Winning, the archbishop of Glasgow, announced that any women with an unwanted pregnancy “of every faith and none should come to the archdiocese of Glasgow for assistance” rather than visit the abortionist. Sister Roseann, then a pastoral assistant in the Church, was asked by the Cardinal to run what became known in the tabloids as the “Cash for babies scheme”.

The Cardinal Thomas Winning Pro-Life Initiative has helped more than 2,300 women from across the UK – each of whom, when they have agreed to carry on with their pregnancy, has received prams, toys and clothes.

We sit down to talk in the pastel counselling room, watched from above by pictures of Jesus and Winnie the Pooh. Despite the soothing decor and Sister Roseann Reddy’s bonhomie, her Catholic message is hard-edged: “Religious life has always sprung out of the need of the time. The reason ours is a new order is that it has come out of the need to uphold and defend human life that years ago wouldn’t have been necessary. There wasn’t this – as Pope John Paul said - ‘culture of death’ that we are now living in.”

Sister Roseann believes in the importance of religious tradition: “We wear our habits most of the time – unless we are doing something like hill-walking or going to see the football. At a time when we’re losing religious identity, it has an incredible effect on people to see nuns in a habit. It’s rubbish that it’s a barrier to talking to people – it’s actually the exact opposite. On the bus or train people come up to us and say, ‘Sister, I’m a Catholic, but I wonder if you would say a wee prayer for me’. Then they’ll tell some story about their son who is on drugs.” And the habit, she admits, is a useful restraining influence: “I’m quite an aggressive driver. It’s dead good to have the habit on so that you keep the plot instead of losing it.”

As we tour the storeroom, Sister Roseann tells me her life story. Born into a Catholic family, she immersed herself in pro-life campaigning after seeing the Pope preach at Murrayfield rugby stadium in 1982. At 36, she decided to become a nun. But Roseann has seen very few others make the same commitment, despite the number of “nibblers” who have tried to live the life. “The chances are that the people who come to join you won’t stay,” she says, sighing. “People always give away their CD collection because they think they won’t need it any more. We tell them to put their stuff in storage”. But doesn’t this make her depressed about the future of religious orders? She bats away my negativity: “People always look to numbers but it’s always been two or three people who start things. Great things happen from very small beginnings.”

Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2007

Article in Scotland on Sunday 26/08/07

The following is an article from yesterday’s Scotland on Sunday.

There are, as ever, a few inaccuracies, obviously the part about not having to do a postulancy and novitiate is wrong. Also it wasn’t the pro-life initiative which was new but the ’sisters’.

Other than that it’s fairly positive and it was great to have it included in such a major article about 30 something women.

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I’m like any other 30-something - there’s just a shift of priority

Sister Andrea Fraile, 32, works for the pro-life initiative in Glasgow.

I’D BEEN thinking about religious life since I was 14. I studied Spanish and philosophy at Glasgow University and did a postgrad, but it was still on my mind. I lived in Edinburgh for a while and worked in publishing, during which time I met a woman who was working for the pro-life initiative and thought I’d try it too. In 2000, at the age of 25, we started up a community with another Sister and have been living in Glasgow’s Southside ever since. Had I joined any other order, I would have undergone a postulancy (a year’s trial period) and a novitiate (another two to four years) first. But because the pro-life initiative was new, I didn’t have to.

Sister Andrea Fraile.
Picture: Robert Perry

We work in a pregnancy crisis centre. Women who are pregnant phone or come to us from all over the country and we try to sort out their problems - be it a violent partner or dodgy housing - and help them to see there’s an alternative to having an abortion.

There was an element of risk in deciding to become a nun, but we all take risks - when you get married you’re committing yourself to one man. When I entered religious life, I thought, “Is this a crazy thing to do? Am I running away from something?” But you absolutely have to question yourself. And just as you have all sorts of romantic notions about how married life will be, the reality is different. It can be a struggle, but I see it as a challenge.

Growing up, thinking about religious life didn’t stop me fancying folk and thinking about marriage. At university I had a boyfriend for nearly four years. He was Catholic as well and our faith meant a lot to us. At times I think I live on another planet, but on a deeper level I am very much like any other 30-something woman. It’s just there’s a shift of priority and my days are more structured for prayer.

My parents live in Glasgow and I see them every couple of weeks. I’ve always had a good relationship with them and they’ve always been supportive. When I said I wanted to do this they were less delighted, not for themselves but for me. Early on, though, they saw that I was very content and their fears have been alleviated. You do get people who shake their heads and say it is a waste, but I don’t believe it is. You give your life to Christ - that’s not a waste. Sex obviously won’t be a feature of my life but I’m still a sexual being, and while there is an element of sacrifice, I’m not shutting off my sexuality, just channelling it in another way.

I’m not naive. I’m conscious of the fact I’m 32 and this won’t be magic forever; at some stage I’ll think I could have got married and had kids. But I have to trust God will see me through those times. If I have an ambition, it is that - to be more centred on Christ, so that age won’t really affect me. I’ll get old, wrinkly, haggard, knackered and maybe a wee bit crabbit - but hope that I can still be youthful in spirit.

Updated- Fr Nesbitt’s 40th Anniversary

Apologies for the lack of blogging of late (more on which soon). At long last we have the text attached to the picture we presented to Fr Roger Nesbitt on the occassion of the 40th anniversary of his ordination.

Your love of Our Lady and insight into her role in the Church have given us a vision of our own vocation and we, the Sisters of the Gospel of Life, who have been so inspired by that vision, wish to thank you for your love and encouragement.

May God bless you always.

More on Father Nesbitt’s 40th Anniversary celebrations

This scroll was presented to Fr Nesbitt on behalf of the many priests grateful for the role he played in their own vocations. In all there were thirty-seven signatories, evidence of the huge effect Father has had on the lives of those who know him, and of a truly fruitful vocation.

The text reads as follows:

We, the undersigned, wish to express to you our deep sense of gratitude for the example of priesthood which you have given us and which has inspired each of us to follow our own priestly vocations.

We are also deeply grateful for the kindness, patience and support which you have given to so many of us over the years and which has been such an encouragement and motivation in our lives.

Memorial of Our Lady of Mount Carmel
16^th. July 2007

Also spotted at the celebration, a great friend of the Sisters, Dan Cooper, known affectionately as Cooperman.