Dear monks, artists and pilgrims,
The Good Zeal of Monks is a villanelle inspired by the Rule of Benedict, chapter 72. Good Zeal is from CinemaDivina, contemplative video essays created especially for lectio divina practice.
I am so pleased to introduce Marilyn Freeman who is a filmmaker in the Pacific Northwest of the U.S. whom I first met at St. Placid Priory in Lacey, WA, where Marilyn and I are Benedictine oblates. She has a true monastic heart and she brings it to a beautiful spiritual practice she calls CinemaDivina.
Rooted in the contemplative prayer and listening of lectio divina, CinemaDivina draws on film as sacred text, as a way to hear the sacred shimmering in this world.
She describes it herself this way:
CinemaDivina is an emerging body of contemplative video essays and a contemplative way of screening the films.
CinemaDivina films are short pieces created to help foster contemplation. Each film is created through the prayerful practice of lectio divina. CinemaDivina translates the ancient spiritual practice lectio divina to a filmic paradigm. Viewing CinemaDivina films within this contemplative screening practice may be especially beneficial, many have found it to be a process that opens hearts, engages imagination, inspires insights, and awakens the sacred in our lives.
The Good Zeal of Monks from Marilyn Freeman on Vimeo.
Artist Marilyn Freeman creates CinemaDivina works in the context of a Benedictine Monastery – St. Placid Priory and Spirituality Center where she is a Benedictine oblate and she is the author of The Illuminated Space: A Personal Theory and Contemplative Practice of Media Arts.
With great and growing love,
Christine
Christine Valters Paintner, PhD, REACE
Video © Marilyn Freeman