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Reflections

Category: Abbess love notes

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Honoring Saints and Ancestors

Dearest monks and artists, We are approaching the Celtic feast of Samhain, the great doorway into the dark half of the year in the northern hemisphere and a time when the veil is considered especially thin. This is my favorite time of year, when I feel the most energized and my heart comes alive to the wisdom of those who have walked before me. I share with you a short excerpt from our Honoring Saints and Ancestors online self-study retreat: Psychologist Carl Jung wrote extensively about the collective unconscious which is this vast pool of ancestral memory within each of

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Abbey of the Arts has a new website! ~ A love note from your online abbess.

Dearest monks, artists, and pilgrims, This love note is more of an update on what is happening around the Abbey as we are celebrating many good things! First, we have a brand new website up, thanks to the stellar work of Lacy Clark Ellman who is a Wisdom Council member and spiritual director, along with star graphic designer. Stop by our new site, and take a look to see what you think. The feedback has already been great about how fresh, spacious, and easy to navigate it is. If you find any broken links or odd formatting on pages we would be most

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Embrace your inner fool with Francis of Assisi ~ A love note from your online abbess

Dearest monks and artists, In spring of 2016 my ninth book will be published through Ave Maria Press titled Illuminating the Way: Embracing the Wisdom of Monks and Mystics. I am very excited to offer this set of reflections on the 12 dancing monks that have become the patron saints of our Abbey and connect each of them to an archetypal energy we can discover within ourselves. Today is the Feast of St. Francis, beloved by many for his passion for creation, his commitment to service and the poor, and his embrace of the inner Fool – that part of himself

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Celebrate the Feast of St. Michael and Autumn Equinox ~ A love note from your online abbess

Dearest monks and artists, Included in your love note today is a short excerpt from our current Sacred Seasons mini-retreat for the Autumn Equinox and the Feast of Michaelmas (register here to receive materials all year long to celebrate the turning of the seasons) written by your online Prior John Valters Paintner: “Do not fear, Daniel,” the Archangel Michael continued; “from the first day you made up your mind to acquire understanding and humble yourself before God, your prayer was heard.” ~ Daniel 10:12a The Book of Daniel, named after the hero and not the author of the story, is set

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The Call to Savor + Join us for Coming Home to Your Body ~ A love note from your online abbess

Dearest monks and artists, Our upcoming online retreat for women Coming Home to Your Body  starts on Monday, September 21st. I have been offering you very brief excerpts to ponder your own ways of contemplative embodiment. Here is the last installment: Only by welcoming uncertainty from the get-go can we acclimate ourselves to the shattering wonder that enfolds us. This animal body, for all its susceptibility and vertigo, remains the primary instrument of all our knowing, as the capricious earth remains our primary cosmos. —David Abram, Becoming Animal: An Earthly Cosmology One of my favorite poets is Rainer Maria Rilke. 

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Celebrate the Feast of St. Hildegard! ~ A Love Note from Your Online Abbess

Dearest monks and artists, September 17th will be the Feast of Holy Hildegard, one of the patron saints of our work here in Abbey because of her roots as a Benedictine monk and Abbess, and her incredible commitment to creative expression and nurturing aliveness. She is featured in our upcoming online retreat for women Coming Home to Your Body. I offer you this brief excerpt: I am the living breath in a human being placed in a tabernacle of marrow, veins, bones, and flesh, giving it vitality and supporting its every movement. —St. Hildegard of Bingen, Scivias I 4:4 Hildegard of

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Coming Home to Your Body: A Woman’s Contemplative Journey to Wholeness ~ A Love Note

Dearest monks and artists, I offer you a brief excerpt from our upcoming online retreat for women Coming Home to Your Body: Every breath is a resurrection. —Gregory Orr (excerpt from poem “Concerning the Book that is the Body of the Beloved”) In the Benedictine tradition there is a monastic practice called statio, which is the practice of stopping one thing before beginning another.  Imagine, instead of rushing from one appointment to the next, that between each one you pause, you breathe just five long slow breaths. Imagine how this might transform your movement from one activity to another. Or even

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