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Religious
Communities for Men BENEDICTINE MONKS: The Monastery of the Holy Cross Founded officially on may 3, 1987, the Monastery of the Holy Cross is attached to the Benedictine branch commenced by R.F. Jean-Baptiste Muard, founder of the Abbey of “La-Pierre-qui-Vire” during the last century (1850). After Le Barroux (the Mother House) made arrangement with the Vatican, our concern to stay faithful to Tradition led our Monastery to separate from the Mother House in 1988, in order to remain in the communion of those who protect the faith, and not of those who demolish it. We haven’t remained alone for long. The charity of a very great number of friends, often unknown until now has been for us a precious memory. Above all, we have benefited from the great and paternal support of Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre and Bishop Antonio de Castro Meyer who have guided the first steps of our foundation.
The monks fulfilling their primary duty: the worship of God The Rule of St. Benedict The Benedictine Order was born in the sixth century, without fuss and ignorant of the future held in store for it. It was born from the great heart of our Blessed Father Saint Benedict, who had received from the Most High, the grace of the paternity to gather a great number of sons, not only of those living, but also of those throughout the ages, by the light of the Rule which he has left as his most precious heritage. The centuries would recognize in this rule a special value. Little by little it would impose itself and would end up being adopted by all the monasteries of Europe. It would form the religious of the Middle Ages, and not only the religious but also numerous kings and lords, so that the people would educate themselves by contact with monks.
Ora and Labora This Rule – so says Bossuet – “is a synthesis of Christianity, a teaching and mysterious abridgement of all doctrine and Epistles, of all the institutions of the Holy Fathers, of all admonishments of perfection.” The Rule of Saint Benedict appeared in the sixth century, says Dom Delatte, “as the mature fruit of all past monasticism and the spirituality of the Fathers.”1 It represents, says the Reverend Father Muard, “the most perfect daughter of the first oriental rules, as the mother of all the others in the occident, as the sacred code which governed the monastic world for 1400 years, by the most venerable of all, by the profound wisdom and the eminent sanctity which shine from all its pages, by the perfection of the religious life that it established, by its togetherness divinely ordained, and by its admirable details.” 2
An easier but still necessary work It is this rule that R.F. Muard wanted to apply in all its force in his Benedictine congregation, which he vowed to the Sacred Heart of Jesus and the Immaculate Heart of Mary. This rule has no aim but to institute a school of service to God, as St. Benedict said himself, and as St. Bernard used to call it, a school of the love of God. This school, according to a great Benedictine of the last century R.P. Emmanuel, is built on these three columns which are, obedience, silence and humility. Three virtues of souls who want themselves to be formed, three student virtues, students of Jesus Christ crucified. On such bases one can build anything. Do you want to be great? Begin with that which is small. Are you thinking of constructing a great building? “Think first of the foundations of humility”, said St. Augustine 3. The foundations established by St. Benedict were good, solid and profound. On those would be built the monasticism of the Middle Ages, which has had such an influence on the formation of Christian Europe. This monastic influence started well before the sons of St. Benedict. In particular from Ireland (without forgetting however the monasticism of the Roman Province, and of other already christianized from the Occident) will come to Europe numerous monks who will sow everywhere – as far as Italy - the fire of divine love. Amongst these monks rose the incomparable figure of St. Colomban with his disciples and his monastic foundations of Luxeuil and Bobbio, which have had an extraordinary influence. The action of the Irish monks resembled a fire of generosity, these monks who were exiling themselves through love. The expression of their total gift and their indefectible attachment to Our Lord. However the Rule of St. Benedict was to be preferred to that of St. Colomban due to his discretion, that is to say, his very successful conciliation between the limits of human weakness and the heroic ideal of monastic life. As a historian said, St. Benedict knew how to moderate everything without diminishing anything. One could compare the rule of St. Colomban as the fire and that of St. Benedict as the live coal. What one has enflamed the other has conserved. Thus the sons of St. Benedict have returned through work to their predecessors while carrying their characteristic note of discretion.
New
French Foundation in Bellaigue - The Monastic Day at the Holy Cross First of all our time table:
A monastic welcome As in all monasteries, the monks of the Holy Cross divide their time between prayer, study and manual work. Yet during the foundation the work will be heavier because it is distributed among fewer people. In spite of this, the Office is chanted everyday. However the Mass is only sung three or four times a week. At Solesmes they have not had their Masses sung daily since Solesmes was founded in 1833. We are not then at fault on this point. Our studies are also in full progress. Two of our future priests are presently studying at the seminary of the Society of St. Pius X in Argentina. A contact with the population around us takes place when we go shopping or go for weekly walks. Our neighbors are beginning to come to our Masses in spite of the protestants and the progressists who complicate this apostolate. On Sundays we have at least forty faithful who come to the monastery for the Holy Mass. Silence characterizes the monastic day and can only be broken on account of work, and even then only when monastic signs no longer suffice to make oneself understood. However, we also have a weekly outing of a few hours where fraternal charity is joyfully expressed vocally. After Compline, the grand silence covers the house until the moment when the bell for Matins calls the monks to start their day, reminding them that in all things God must be first served.
The Chapel (outside) The Monastic Vocation St. Benedict drew up an infallible criterion for recognizing a vocation: see if the candidate truly searches God. If he searches something else he is deceived from the start. In the monastery one searches God and His will alone. That is all. But how to discern this? How in conscience to accept a young man in the heart of the community, as someone who truly searches for God? St. Benedict helps us again in indicating to us three signs of this purity of intention that he desires to see in his postulants. These three signs are the zeal for the Divine Office (Liturgy), the zeal for obedience and the zeal for humiliations and things that are difficult. These three signs cannot be mistaken if a soul truly searches God then it is pleased to praise Him and to humble himself. This humility will be noticed in the manner of his obedience and his acceptance of humiliations. Thus the monastic vocation recognizes this thirst for God, thirst of knowing and imitating Our Lord Jesus Christ crucified. There is also another trilogy commonly used. It is less profound but nevertheless not without interest: the desire, the aptitude and the acceptance. From these three signs, it is the last which is most decisive, then it is up to the Superior to judge the extent of the postulant’s desire and his aptitudes for the kind of life desired. In fact one returns to the signs given by St. Benedict which will be always those which superiors ought to follow to discern true vocations. Let us add that one can be a monk without being a priest. It is, in fact, the case of St. Benedict himself. It falls upon the superior to call to the priesthood those whom he deems worthy. In the early stages of the monastic life it was common to have only one or two priests in the monasteries. Today, by the desire of the Holy Church, the monks who have the aptitude are ordained priests in order to multiply the Masses that the world has such need of.
The Chapel (inside) As for the stages which will lead the candidate until the final gift of himself, they are those which are practiced here at Holy Cross. Having been admitted to the monastery, the candidate must first do his postulate which lasts six months. Then he receives the habit and his religious name. Two years will pass before, after the vote of the community, he might be allowed to make his temporary vows for three years. After these three years, he is ready for his perpetual vows, which will unite him forever to the Order and community to which he has made his profession, and above all they will bind him to God in such a way – so say the most respected Doctors – that this profession has the value of second baptism, effacing all sins, and debts owing to sin. 1 – This can be understood if one considers the words of St. Peter: “Charity covers a multitude of sin.” 2 – Or which charity can be greater than that which a consecrated soul is offering to the thrice holy God . . . 3 – Or that of any other house where one learns contempt for the present and attachment to Our Lord Jesus Christ and His Mother Immaculate, Queen of the Cloisters, to whom we dedicate these lines. Amen. We come to the end of this brief outline of the monastic life. May these lines assist souls who, as Father Emmanuel says, “suffer in the world, not having found their way, and who give thanks to God for their fortune, if a charitable hand shows them the door of a Benedictine Monastery.” Latest news of the Order: In the early months of 2000, we have acquired a XIIth century monastery in France for a foundation in this country. The foundation is due to take place next October. We recommend this important development to your prayers. Rev. Fr. Thomas
de Aquinas OSB Other Benedictine Congregations: Abbaye Notre-Dame de Bellaigue Monastère Notre-Dame-de-Guadalupe Footnotes: (1) Introduction to the commentary on the rule of St. Benedict. (2) Constitutions of the Benedictines of the Sacred Heart of Jesus and of the Immaculate Heart of Mary. Introduction p.9 (3) Sermon 69.
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