"Come down quickly"...

My brother, Andrew, has three sisters. If he wanted playmates he had to deal with the feminine principle. We had a little playhouse in our backyard that my grandfather built for us. It looked just like our house in miniature. It was one room with a porch, windows and a shingled room. We played inside and on top thanks to a sturdy tree. It was the epicenter of outdoor play until one day when a carpenter came and built a tree house. I think my Dad figured he needed something more boyish to play in. After the tree house was finished, my brother began to spend more time up in the air than on the ground. He spent less and less time with me and more time with the neighborhood boys. All of a sudden I had “cooties” and the tree house was a girl-free zone. As you might imagine I didn’t like that very much. I remember climbing the ladder, slowly because I was afraid of heights. I made it to the trap door and knocked hoping my brother would suddenly remember how much fun I was to play with. His response was immediate and decisive. The trap door opened and a bucket of acorns was dumped on my head. I held on for dear life and then returned to earth in tears. As soon as I told my Dad what the boys had done, he came down the hill to the tree house and barked, “Andrew Ix, get down out of that tree and apologize to your sister!” He did, of course. It didn’t change things. I still wasn’t welcome in his clubhouse, but he stopped trying to kill me. My Dad made my little brother accountable for his actions and gave him the opportunity to make things right between us.

I think the Lord, Jesus did the same thing for Zacchaeus. He called him down from his safe place in the treetops and offered him the grace to change. There are times in the spiritual life when we get stuck in some tree house of our own creation. We stay up there...comforted by the safety of monastic routine. We stay up there…so we can focus on what others are doing. We stay up there…because we fear the work of change that awaits us on the ground.

Yes, Jesus calls each of us to “come down.” The Lord wants to enter the house of our heart and do what the divine physician does best. He wants to heal us. Jesus makes it clear here that he’s especially interested in hopeful sinners who are willing to do the work of GOD. Our patron, Saint Benedict, has shaped that very desire into a beautiful way of life. May we each have the courage to “come down quickly” when the WORD calls us by name and embrace the challenge we find there. “Salvation has already come to this house.” We need only accept it.

Blessings and love to you all...

- Sister Vicki

They are at peace...

The Feast of All Souls is an opportunity to pray for all who have gone before us. Do they need our prayers? The Church teaches that if we’re not ready to see God face-to-face, the prayers of the faithful can help us. Do we really understand what that means? Not really. No one has come back from the dead except the Lord Jesus and his message was peace, eternal life, freedom from fear. So…what to do on this solemn day? I suggest we make a visit – not to grave or columbarium – but a visit with them in our hearts. When we image the face of a loved one and remember the love we shared, the love returns to us in prayer. Though beyond our sight, they come very close because they miss us, too. Should we worry about the state of their souls? I suppose we could but real faith in God means trusting the promises expressed in today’s readings. Jesus says, “I will not reject anyone who comes to me [John 6].” The psalmist prays, “even though I walk in the dark valley I fear no evil; for you are at my side [Psalm 23].” And in Wisdom we hear, “they seemed to the foolish to be dead; and their passing away was thought and affliction and their going forth from us utter destruction. But they are in peace [Wisdom 3].”

When my Mother died in 1990, it was faith that saved me. What Jesus said from the cross to the Good Thief kept me from despair. “This day you will be with me in Paradise [Luke 24].” “This day,” Jesus said - not tomorrow or next week or fifty years from now. When I pray for my Mother and all my beloved dead, I pray as if they are in the fullness of God’s embrace. It feels right. It feels true. They are at peace.

Blessings and love to you all…
- Sister Vicki

Such a "mother hen"...

Today’s gospel offers us a very interesting image of JESUS. As he describes his love for Jerusalem he says, “I yearned to gather your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings.” The gospel is a sad one – filled with ominous undertones and the personal exasperation of the greatest prophet to enter the City of David. Yet, as he contemplates his destination, JESUS offers us yet another testimony of the depth of his love. This image comforts me.

I’m from Northern New Jersey so I know as much about hens as I do about the surface of the moon! But, I had a mother. This experience is all I need to make sense of his love for us. If we were to make a list of every moment of mother-love, it might speak of the time before we had words – when being held and fed and comforted changed something in us, made us feel safe and worthy of love. The list might mention the way a mother gives the best of everything to her child – takes the burnt piece of toast or uses the money in the cookie jar for a doll instead of the dress she was saving for.

This hen-GOD has big wings under which we are kept safe. Most of us have had the experience of "the arm" – mother’s arm holding us back when the brakes were suddenly applied. Unconscious, instinctual and determined – a mother’s love knows no end. We can be 40, 50, 60 and still be someone’s little girl or baby boy. Imagine GOD loving us this way…and more! Remember, JESUS uses the natural world and all we understand to get the message through that we are loved beyond our deepest imaginings. GOD is always more. The gospel also highlights our freedom. JESUS longed to love the Chosen in this way but they “were not willing.” GOD still needs our “yes”, needs our permission to love us to death. Often, it is fear that stands in our way – a wall we build around our hearts because we can’t really believe that we are loveable. The spiritual life is about getting over ourselves and letting this love into our lives. All the wounds, the disappointments can be healed. Earthly mothers are always limited in their loving. Some even fail to provide the basic love a child needs to thrive. If that is the case we must find new mothers – women who will love us "as is" and put a Band-Aid on our hearts. Do not abandon or desert me, my savior, my God. If my parents rejected me, still God would take me in. (Psalm 27:9b-100). And, thanks to the Lord, JESUS, we have this beautiful image to contemplate. In our prayer we can try to imagine the warmth and safety JESUS offers to all people. God will cover you like a nesting bird. God’s wings will shelter you. (Psalm 91:4).

Blessings and love to you all...

- Sister Vicki

Tea, anyone?

In the monastery we have a “House Meeting” once a month. It’s a forum for bringing up the nitty-gritty things inherent in community life: cleaning the lint out of the dryer, leaving the seats back in the cars for ease of entry, turning the glasses over after they’ve air-dried, etc. Once, long ago, I remember the tea cup discussion. Apparently, tea stains and the dishwasher can’t quite do the job. We were asked – “we” being the tea-drinking nuns – to wipe out the mugs before sending them to the dish room. Easy enough to do, I thought. Today’s gospel gives us a similar reminder. The inside of the cup – the human soul – takes more work than the outside. It’s easy to look holy. It is far more difficult to actually be holy. But a little extra effort goes a long way in the spiritual life. One of the nice things about monastic life is the common goal – we are all trying to clean the inside of the cup.

Blessings and love to you all…
- Sister Vicki

News from the Monastery...

The Benedictine Sisters of Virginia are happy to announce...

The "Bristow Bulletin" has gone paperless! Sister Joanna Burley, OSB, one of our novices, is the new editor. You'll notice more color photos, expanded formats and more articles. http://www.osbva.org/Index_Images/Bulletin_Sept_2011_(5).pdf Subsequent issues will be available on the homepage of our website, www.osbva.org or by e-mail subscription. Enjoy!

We have a cricket in the Chapel...

It was hiding under the cart of GATHER hymnals behind our Chapel. Now, I think the little guy is somewhere in the body of the church. The cricket sings in the morning darkness before Morning Prayer and even during. I like the sound. It doesn’t disturb me or diminish the silence we keep. It reminds me that we are vigiling – waiting for the dawn to come – and listening deeply for the voice of God. It’s funny. If I saw the cricket, I’d probably gasp or suppress the instinct to smoosh him. Yet, as he adds his song to ours, I feel him a brother – part of God’s good creation. Although 6AM prayer is not physically easy, it is spiritually energizing. I find myself coming to wakefulness in the midst of a circle of faithful, loving women and we are all tuning in to the Presence together. The little one chirping in the hollows reminds me that all creation is waking to a new dawn – a new moment of grace. Such is the gift of life for all who wait in stillness. If we wait, God will come.

Blessings and love to you all…
- Sister Vicki

Galileo would love this!

Theology and science are not “strange bedfellows”. The God who created all things reveals the perfection and genius of creation through science. As our knowledge expands over the centuries, we discover new marvels wrought “in the beginning” – the work of the Word and Spirit at play making something wonderful from utter chaos. Today we celebrate the Exaltation of the Cross. The wood of humiliation became a standard of victory over sin and death. Christ’s obedient surrender to the violence and politics of his day opened a pathway for all who believe in his name. What does this have to do with science? This cross we adore and glory in is not only ours to embrace externally. It is actually a pattern found within the chemistry of the human body. “Laminins are major proteins - an important and biologically active part of the basal lamina, influencing cell differentiation, migration, adhesion as well as phenotype and survival [Wikipedia].” These proteins, when viewed microscopically, reveal the familiar shape. Many think it a simple coincidence. I’m not big on coincidences. We are God’s – body and soul. If we can see it now because of science, then it must be time to see it and bend a knee to the cosmic Christ who is first and last, within and beyond.

“Lord by your cross and resurrection you have set us free. You are the Savior of the world.”
Blessings and love to you all…
- Sister Vicki