A Newsletter for the Oblates of St. Peter’s Abbey

June - 2007O B L A T Emusings

Oblates are invited to submit ideas, reflections, and stories on the Oblate way of life. We will attempt to publish all articles in part or in whole when space allows. Send your aticles, as well as questions or comments to sthomasberg@growmercy.org

(28-10331 106 St NW Edmonton, AB T5J 1H8) -Peace, Stephen Berg “...that in all things God may be glorified”

Easter greetings to all the Oblates. Alleluia contin-ues to be our anthem during the Easter season. We want to sing out the glory of the Risen Christ. In keeping with the Easter Season I thought it might be interesting to look at what references St. Benedict makes to Easter in his Rule. In Chapter 8 St. Benedict uses Easter as the date for a change in the schedule of prayer and activities of the monks. St. Benedict calls for one schedule during the winter season – that is from November to Easter. The summer schedule extends from Easter to November. Prayer and activities are scheduled according to what works best for the season and what will give emphasis to the season.

The next reference we find in the Rule is in regard to the times for saying Alleluia. From the Feast of Easter to Pentecost Alleluias are said both with the psalms and the responses. In this way greater emphasis is given to Easter and the whole Easter season.

In Chapter 41 we find a special time being set for meals from Easter to Pentecost. It is all part of celebrating the Feast of Easter and then the season of Easter.

In Chapter 48 we find directions for manual labor from Easter until October. St. Benedict calls for a balance of work between what needs to be done and the time that is to be devoted to reading.

In Chapter 49 on the observance of Lent we find that St. Benedict calls for part of Lent as being a time for looking forward to Holy Easter with joy and spiritual longing. Monks are to look forward to Easter, to celebrate Easter and to have Easter as a time for the begin-ning of a new schedule in prayer and daily activities.

During the Easter season this year we watched the huge mounts of snow begin to melt, the water begin to gather and then flow especially in the creek which our main road to Muenster crosses. The two culverts that had carried the flow of water each spring have split at several of the manufactured seams. The force of the escaping water had washed away part of our road last spring. By the time we analyzed the problem, decided what new culverts to use for replacement, the early freeze up last fall did not allow any time for the installation of the replacement culvert. The eighty feet of six-foot new culvert are still waiting to be installed.

Thankfully the two present culverts even with their seams split in several places were able to handle the millions of gallons of water that in my estimation reached a depth of ten feet at the height of the water flow. Hopefully we will be able to install the new culvert during the coming summer.

We are looking forward to our next gathering of Oblates on June 9. Several new inquirers were present at our last meeting in October. The main item on June 9 will be a pres-entation on the Rule of St. Benedict by Abbot Peter. This will serve as an introduction to the Rule for all inquirers and for our newer Oblates.

It will also be a helpful review for all our Oblates. We want to continue to grow in our understanding of the Rule and receive help in living the spirit of the Rule in our daily lives. I am looking forward to seeing many of you at our meeting on June 9.

Oblate Day Agenda June 9, 2007

10:40 AM Praise11:00 AM Eucharist Noon Dinner with the Monks

Meeting in Jerome Assembly Room

1:30 PM Welcome and Prayer1:40 PM Benedictine Spirituality by Abbot Peter Novecosky2:30 pm Seven Circles of Prayer (Video)3:00 pm Coffee Break3:20 pm Why I wanted to become an Oblate by Pol Zwart3:40 PM Abbey Events4:00 PM Vespers with the monastic community

Next Meeting9am to 4pm, Saturday, September 29thSt. Anne’s Parish, Saskatoon -Speaker: Sr. Viola Bens, OSERegistration fee: $10.00 (incldes lunch and coffee breaks)

Oblate Director’s Message - Fr. Daniel Muyres

See you at St. Peter’s

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Oblate News

Abbot Peter, Oblate Director Father Daniel, Associate Oblate Director Ken Mansfield, and all ob-lates of St. Peter’s welcome Pastor Gary Belamy as Oblate Candidate.

OBLATEmusings

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“Evangelical embraces Benedictine Spirituality” Stephen Berg

Oblates on formation path to be Spiritual Directors

The following is an excerpt from an article published in the Religion section of the Edmonton Journal:

How is it that an Evangelical Church lifer, involved for the past 20 years as Sunday School teacher, deacon, and elder, has come to embrace the monastic teachings of St. Benedict?

It was no sudden convulsive shift. It was an evolution, a journey now of some eight years. And it was not so much a rejection of evangelicalism than a magnetic pull towards Christian antiquity, namely, a pull towards a monastic view of life.

The discovery that my faith could be connected to a time before and beyond the sad splits of Christendom through a sixth century monk captivat-ed me to the point that four years ago I found myself in the chapel of a Benedictine mon-astery, as a novitiate candidate, promising to live out the Rule of St. Benedict.

As an evangelical I was conditioned to a disembodied and ahistorical faith; a faith for my head and a faith that emphasized my future security. But Benedictine spirituality befriends earth and time. It sees the physical and the spiritual as indivisible. St. Benedict follows through the implications of the incarnation. Because God, in Christ, binds himself to the physical, heaven is brought to earth. That is, matter matters, and it matters profoundly. A wonderful example of this in the Rule of St. Benedict is the request that, “...all utensils and materials of the monastery be treated as sacred vessels of the altar.” For

Benedict there is no split between the sacred and profane, the holy and the ordinary. Everything is infused by divinity.

This is especially evident in the way we are to treat one another. Whether stranger or friend, rich or poor, we are to see Christ in everyone--not theoretically, but corporally--and receive them in the “warmth of love”.

However, this turn of mind and heart is not easy. My ex-perience is that it is one thing to be awakened to the schisms in my life that have misshaped me, and quite another to pick up and commit to do something about it. In fact St. Benedict warns me that the way is narrow at the outset and encourages his candidates to carefully consider the costs be-

fore embarking on the pilgrimage. But for anyone truly desiring God and willing to follow the Rule, St. Benedict is full of encouragement.

Benedictine disciplines are at ease with ritual and respectful of tradition. They are meditative, contempla-tive, and if one is disposed, even mystical. This can make an evangelical suspicious, but it needn’t be the case. One such practice is lectio divina. This is the daily prayer-ful reading of the Psalms and gospels. It’s not reading for information but for transformation. The words are not mined for meaning but instead are turned over, mouthed, tasted. Over time they leach down and re-shape you.

One monk, when asked what they did in the monas-tery all day said, “We fall and we get up, we fall and we get up.” This rings true for me. I don’t know if Benedic-

tine spirituality is making me a better person, this is not mine to measure in any case. What it has done is brought my faith out of my head. It has invigorated my faith by blur-ring the line between the natural and the supernatural. Its long history has given me a place to stand. Its liturgical form and view of time has given my life a sense of rhythm and spaciousness. Most of all it has given me the optics, where on occasion, I can see the sacramental character of all things.

Benedictine Oblates Dr. Alan Reese, Ken Mansfield and Pastor Gary Belamy (oblate candidate) just com-pleted one year of a two year “Spiritual Director’s Formation Program” at Queen’s House in Saskatoon.

The group meets one weekend monthly for ten months of each year beginning on Friday at 7:30 pm and ending on Sunday at 4:00 pm.

The goal of the program is to help prepare participants for the ministry of Spiritual Direction. In Spiritual Direction, a Director helps a person notice and respond to the movement of God. The concern is with the whole person and the entire faith life: body, mind and spirit.

The following are core areas of study:Personal DevelopmentSpiritualities of other Religious TraditionsPrayer and DiscernmentBiblical SpiritualityStages of FaithHistory of SpiritualitiesContemporary movements and SpiritualitiesSupervised experiences of Spiritual Direction

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BenedictineSpiritualityContinued... In these moments of what I can only call contemplative

grace, I am brought to an awareness of the inclusive character of Christ and the interconnectedness of all things, not least of all the interconnectedness of other faith traditions. Perhaps this ecumenical and hospitable spirit of Benedict is his greatest

legacy. It holds the possibility of dialogue and mutual understanding. And it holds the promise of one of St. Benedict’s prime values...peace.

(The complete article can be found on www.growmercy.org)

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