I am delighted to share another beautiful submission to the Monk in the World guest post series from the community. Read on for Bart Brenner’s reflection on faith. You are the wine, / I am the cup.I can yield nothing till I am filled up. (O Sun, morning prayer, day six) The pandemic brought illness and death, and a strange way of living—lock down, masking, and social distancing. Living in a cloistered community was not welcomed by many. As an octogenarian, living alone since the death of my wife six years ago, the pandemic gave a new meaning to hermitage.

I am delighted to share another beautiful submission to our Monk in the World guest post series from the community. Read on for Nancy Collins-Warner’s reflection, “Circling Stones.” On the hill behind our little cabin, perched in a river canyon, is a circle of stones I laid out a decade ago. As taught by an Elder, stones are placed in each of the directions with a larger one at the center. I enter from a particular direction on a given day; walk it clockwise (rarely widdershins); or simply be with the whole inscription on the earth, under an imminent sky.

I am delighted to share this beautiful submission to the Monk in the World guest post series by Lisa Bozarth Ozaeta. Lisa is joining Abbey of the Arts as our new seminary intern for the next two years. She is in training for ordination in the Episcopal church and we are delighted to have her enthusiasm and gifts in service to this community. She will be involved in several of our programs. Here she shares a bit of her own practice of silence: One of my rituals is to plant myself on my back deck early in the morning. I