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Category: Abbess love notes

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Imbolc and the Feast of St. Brigid ~ A Love Note from Your Online Abbess

St. Brigid and the Fruit Tree There was the moment you could bear it no more. Your eyes brimming with great glistening drops summoned by the hunger of the world, the callous and terrible things men and women do to one another. Your tears splashed onto cold stony earth, ringing out like bells calling monks to prayer, like the river breaking open to the wide expanse of sea. From that salt-soaked ground a fruit tree sprouts and rises. I imagine pendulous pears, tears transmuted to sweetness. There will always be more grief than we can bear. There will always be

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New John of the Cross dancing monk icon ~ A love note from your online abbess

O night! O guide! O night more loving than the dawn! O night that joined The lover with the Beloved; Transformed, the lover into the Beloved drawn! —excerpt from John of the Cross’ prayer (contemporary musician Loreena McKennitt has a beautiful song with these words set to music) Dearest monks and artists, We have some new dancing monk icons which we will be sharing with you over the next few weeks. Artist Marcy Hall has been busy at work creating these delightful images. Last week we shared Teresa of Avila, this week is another Spanish mystic, John of the Cross.

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New Teresa of Avila Dancing Monk Icon ~ A Love Note from Your Online Abbess

Dearest monks and artists, We have some new dancing monk icons which we will be sharing with you over the next few weeks. Artist Marcy Hall has been busy at work creating these delightful images. I love Spanish mystic St. Teresa of Avila’s very earthy spirituality, she is known for finding God among the pots and pans. Probably best known for her book on the soul’s inward journey, The Interior Castle, in which she likens the soul to a castle made from a single diamond, with a series of concentric rooms within. As the ego is slowly released and love

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Coming Home to Your Body ~ A Love Note from Your Online Abbess

Dearest monks and artists, I was first diagnosed with rheumatoid arthritis when I was 21 years old. The only other person I knew at the time with this disease was my mother and her body had been ravaged by the effects of deterioration, with multiple joint replacements and eventually use of an electric wheelchair for mobility. I first dealt with my diagnosis through denial. I had just graduated from college and travelled across the country to begin a year of volunteer work. I managed to push my way through fatigue and pain for about six years before I was forced

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Feast of Epiphany – Follow the Star ~ A Love Note from Your Online Abbess

Dearest monks, artists, and pilgrims, The Feast of Epiphany is celebrated today. It is one of my favorite scripture stories as it offers us a series of powerful invitations. The last few lines of the gospel text, offer us a template for an archetypal journey, that is, one we are all invited to make. We can find ourselves in the text if we have ever longed to follow an inkling into the long night knowing there were gifts awaiting us. 1. Follow the star to where it leads The story begins with the magi calling upon the grace of night

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New Year Blessings + Wisdom of the Body (starts in a week!)

Dearest monks and artists, It is a quiet Christmas season for us here in Galway. After returning from a beautiful trip to Prague and Vienna for ancestral pilgrimage, John and I both promptly got the flu. I spent all of Christmas day in bed with a fever, barely able to stand up. We were planning on a quiet time anyway, but now the enforced solitude of illness is our companion. Of course it never feels good to be unwell, I am grateful that I am able to really let down and allow myself to heal during this time. I have

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Christmas Blessings ~ A Love Note from Your Online Abbess

The Risk of Birth This is no time for a child to be born, With the earth betrayed by war & hate And a comet slashing the sky to warn That time runs out & the sun burns late. That was no time for a child to be born, In a land in the crushing grip of Rome; Honour & truth were trampled by scorn- Yet here did the Saviour make his home. When is the time for love to be born? The inn is full on the planet earth, And by a comet the sky is torn- Yet Love

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