Abbey of the Arts

Transformative Living through Contemplative & Expressive Arts

  • Welcome
    • Prayer Cycle
      • Introduction to the Earth Monastery Prayer Cycle
      • Day 1 Morning & Evening Prayer:
        Earth as the Original Cathedral
      • Day 2 Morning & Evening Prayer:
        Earth as the Original Scriptures
      • Day 3 Morning & Evening Prayer:
        Earth as the Original Saints
      • Day 4 Morning & Evening Prayer:
        Earth as the Original Spiritual Directors
      • Day 5 Morning & Evening Prayer:
        Earth as the Original Icon
      • Day 6 Morning & Evening Prayer:
        Earth as the Original Sacrament
      • Day 7 Morning & Evening Prayer:
        Earth as the Original Liturgy
      • Prayer Cycle Leader Resources
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  • Books
    • Sacred Time:
      Embracing an Intentional Way of Life
    • The Wisdom of Wild Grace: Poems
    • Earth, Our Original Monastery:
      Cultivating Wonder and Gratitude through Intimacy with Nature
    • Dreaming of Stones: Poems
    • The Soul's Slow Ripening:
      12 Celtic Practices for Seeking the Sacred
    • The Wisdom of the Body:
      A Contemplative Journey to Wholeness for Women
    • Illuminating the Way:
      Embracing the Wisdom of Monks and Mystics
    • The Soul of a Pilgrim:
      Eight Practices for the Journey Within
    • Eyes of the Heart:
      Photography as a Christian Contemplative Practice
    • The Artist's Rule: Nurturing Your Creative Soul with Monastic Wisdom
    • Desert Mothers and Fathers: Early Christian Wisdom Sayings Annotated & Explained
    • Lectio Divina–The Sacred Art: Transforming Words and Images into Heart-Centered Prayer
    • Water, Wind, Earth & Fire: The Christian Practice of Praying with the Elements
    • Awakening the Creative Spirit:
      Bringing the Arts to Spiritual Direction
    • Lectio Divina: Contemplative Awakening & Awareness
  • Poetry | Art | Music
    • Music + DVD
    • Poetry by Christine Valters Paintner
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      • Monk in the World art series by Kristin Noelle
      • Saints & Animals art series by David Hollington
      • Sacred Time art series by Alexi Francis
      • Mary block print art series by Kreg Yingst
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    • Live Programs: Pilgrimage & Retreats
      • Monk in the World (Ireland)
      • Writing on the Wild Edges (Ireland)
      • Vienna Monk in the World (Austria)
      • Hildegard of Bingen (Germany)
      • Awakening the Creative Spirit: Experiential Education for Spiritual Directors in the Expressive Arts (Northwest)
    • Community Online Retreats
      • Lift Every Voice: Contemplative Writers of Color
      • The Way of the Hermit:
        A Spiritual Survival Guide for Dark Times
        with Kayleen Asbo, PhD
      • The Spiral Way:
        Celtic Spirituality and the Creative Imagination
      • Journey with the Desert Mothers and Fathers (Lent 2021)
      • Dancing with Fear in Troubled Times
      • Novena for Times of Unraveling
      • The Two HT’s-Harriet Tubman and Howard Thurman-on Being Free
      • Writing Into Bloom
        with Christine Valters Paintner
      • Sacred Time: Embracing an Intentional Way of Life (Spring 2021)
      • Poetry and the Sacred Garden of the World:
        An Online Writing Retreat
    • Self-Study Online Spiritual Retreats
      • Creative Flourishing in the Heart of the Desert:
        An Online Retreat with St. Hildegard of Bingen
      • Dreaming of the Sea:
        A women’s discernment journey through the story of the Selkie
      • Earth, Our Original Monastery
        A Companion Retreat to the Book (SELF-STUDY)
      • Exile and Coming Home:
        An Archetypal Journey through the Scriptures
      • Eyes of the Heart:
        Photography as Contemplative Practice
        (Companion retreat to the book)
      • Honoring Saints and Ancestors:
        Online Retreat for the Season of Remembrance
      • Lectio Divina:
        The Sacred Art of Reading the World
      • A Midwinter God:
        Making a Conscious Underworld Journey
      • Sacred Rhythms of Sky, Sun, Sea & Stone:
        A Creative Retreat with the Elements (SELF-STUDY)
      • Sacred Seasons:
        A Yearlong Journey through the Celtic Wheel of the Year
      • The Soul of a Pilgrim:
        Eight Practices for the Journey Within
        (a companion retreat to the book)
      • The Soul's Slow Ripening: 12 Celtic Practices for Seekers of the Sacred (a companion retreat to the book)
      • Water, Wind, Earth & Fire
      • Watershed Moments
        in the Hebrew and Christian Scriptures
      • Way of the Monk, Path of the Artist:
        A 12-Week Companion Retreat to The Artist's Rule
      • The Wisdom of the Body:
        A 10-Week Online Companion Retreat to the Book
      • The Wisdom of Mary and the Sacred Feminine
  • Calendar
  • Reflections
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Monk in the World Guest Post Series

Monk in the World guest post: Jason Jones

I am delighted to share another submission for the Monk in the World guest post series from the community. Read on for Jason Jones' wisdom about listening with the ear of our hearts.:

Hospitality of Listening

“He listens,” is what a new friend told me when we were both on retreat together.  We both had daily times to visit with a retreat leader, and my friend asked how my session went.  “Good,” I told him.  “It was good.  How about you?”  “He listens,” is how my friend replied.  The two words he listens said there was hospitality, openness, welcome, and safety in that time.  My friend’s story and presence were welcomed in the listening.  I had the same experience; I was welcomed in the listening.

A month ago I called a monastery, asking about scheduling a visit.  The monk who answered my call checked the dates to make sure there was room and said, “Yes, you can come.”  He didn’t ask for my biography or references, and he didn’t question me to make sure I was their type of person before welcoming me; it was only “Yes, you can come.”  I asked if I needed to make a deposit to secure my place, “No,” he said, “we’ll hold your place for you.  Just come.”  He was honoring the basic instruction in The Rule of St. Benedict that says, “All guests who present themselves are to be welcomed as Christ, for he himself will say: I was a stranger and you welcomed me.”[1]  I know when I arrive at the monastery there will be a room and a bed and a place at their table and a welcome into the monk’s life of prayer.  It’s a basic practice of hospitality, something that is part of the regular life of monastic communities.

Living as a monk in the world means hospitality is a part of our experience, too.  We welcome the guest as we would welcome Christ, and this can be lived out in an open place at a dinner table or with a welcome to a guest room in our homes, but it can be practiced, too, in the gift of listening.  Hospitality is shown when we consciously listen. Whenever we listen to another we show welcome to the guest.

Listening is not natural for most of us.  When we listen we unlock and open the door of our hearts to hear and welcome another.  For a moment we give up control to open ourselves to the experience of another, and that can be frightening.  We resist hearing another’s story because we’re more comfortable with our own perspective.  A friend, jokingly, said it well: “My problem is,” he said, “I think I’m right about most things, and I don’t have time for those who don’t understand how right I am.”  He was teasing, but there was truth there;  it’s hard to set aside our own rightness to hear another.  When we listen, though, we set aside our exclusive claim to the truth so that we might welcome another’s experience.

Although doing it might be frightening, the guest whom we welcome may be the one who brings us the blessing.  The person we listen to, the guest to whom we show hospitality, just might be a hidden angel coming to bless us in our welcome.  Benedict understood this, saying the guest is to be welcomed as Christ.  Benedict said, too, that the poor and the pilgrim should be especially welcomed,  because “in them more particularly Christ is received.”  When we welcome another, we’re to welcome them as we would Christ, because we know this other person is a creation of God, someone in whom God’s love and work and spirit is present.  When we show the hospitality of listening, we’re welcoming into our lives the good things God has brought with that other person.  Even when the other is challenging to us, a generous listen may bring an unexpected blessing.

Listening usually comes with a conscious choice to do it.  We’re more comfortable plugging ourselves up with headphones or staring into our phones.  The open door of a listening ear isn’t always our first impulse.  When we do listen, though, we living out a basic openness that meets another not with suspicion or mistrust but with a monastic hospitality where we welcome whatever blessing he or she might bring.  May there be an open place for the guest at your table and your home but most of all in the openness of your ears so that you might hear and know the blessing brought in your welcome and listening.

[1]Quotes from Benedict come from: Fry, Timothy, ed.  The Rule of St. Benedict in English.  Collegeville: The Liturgical Press, 1981.


Jason Jones

Jason Jones is the pastor of First Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) in Highland, Indiana (www.fcchighland.net ).  He enjoys cooking, running, art-making, and spending an evening with Max, his cat, on his lap.

Click here to read all the guest posts in the Monk in the World series>>

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9 Comments February 20, 2014

Upcoming Programs

The Spiral Way:
Celtic Spirituality and the Creative Imagination

Hosted by the Rowe Center
February 1-21, 2021
with Christine Valters Paintner, PhD

Journey with the Desert Mothers and Fathers
Retreat for Lent 2021

February 17-April 1, 2021
with Christine & John Valters Paintner and Betsey Beckman

Recent Reflections

  • Hildy Tales 3: Ní heolas go haontíos ~ by John Valters Paintner
  • Humility + Join us today for live prayer! ~ A Love Note from Your Online Abbess
  • Hildy Tales 2: Tús maith leath na hoibre – by John Valters Paintner
  • New Book Club for 2021: Lift Every Voice ~ A Love Note from Your Online Abbess
  • Hildy Tales One: Dia dhuit, is mise Hildy! by John Valters Paintner, Your Online Prior

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