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Invitation to Photography: Hospitality – What will you welcome in?

Welcome to this month’s Abbey Photo Party! I select a theme and invite you to respond with images. We began this month with a Community Visio Divina practice with our reflection on Hospitality with an image of a threshold, asking what you want to welcome in this year. If you have chosen a word for the year ahead, what qualities […]

Winners of the 2015 Give Me a Word Drawing!

It is truly amazing and inspiring to read through the words that have chosen you, our dear dancing monks, to guide and challenge for the year ahead. You can read them in the comments here. (And if you still need support for finding a word, the free 12-day mini-retreat is still available at this link). […]

Community Visio Divina: Hospitality – What will you welcome in?

Happy New Year!  With January we offer a new invitation for contemplation. Starting in December we returned to a monthly focus on our Monk Manifesto themes. Our focus for this month is on the second principle of hospitality: I commit to radical acts of hospitality by welcoming the stranger both without and within. I recognize that when […]

Sun’s Pilgrimage (a love note from your online Abbess)

Winter Solstice At this winter’s turning of the year let us go gently — for once – into the night, its dream-drenched, glittering stillness a haven for our souls. There is something beyond the dull brightness of mid-day, fluorescent and buzzing. Something to praise beyond the sun, triumphing over the intricacies of shadowed moonlight. Bring […]

Invitation to Photography: Thomas Merton on Silence

Welcome to this month’s Abbey Photo Party! I select a theme and invite you to respond with images. We began this month with a Community Lectio Divina practice with our reflection on Silence from Thomas Merton. I invite you for this month’s Photo Party to hold these words in your heart as you go out in the world to receive images in response. […]

Week 2 Advent Practices: Following the Fire

This is a weekly Advent series by Christine from the Abbey archives. If praying with the four elements kindles a spark in you, consider my book Water, Wind, Earth, & Fire: The Christian Practice of Praying with the Elements. Every being is praising God The fire has its flame and praises God. The wind blows the flame and […]