“You can come in here whenever you’d like,” Will told me as he led me through the lobby.
“Anytime?!”
I wanted to make sure I understood his meaning so I wouldn’t cause an awkward moment at 3am: Me, relaxing on the couch, casually reading in my pajamas.
“Oh, yeah! Come in here, turn the lights on…”
And when we toured the dining area: “So this? Is open anytime?” I sensed a theme.
“If you want a cup of tea at 11, come in here and help yourself.”
(Later, this struck me as funny, because my own kitchen is open all hours of the night, too, but it just doesn’t have the same allure.)
This “mi casa es su casa” attitude is like nothing I’ve ever seen before. It’s one thing to speak of valuing hospitality, but at the Abbey of New Clairvaux in Vina, California, hospitality is truly exemplified.
I had been shocked at how little red tape there was, to participate in this weekend retreat. California has a penchant for bureaucracy. So, no paperwork to fill out? No background checks, deposits, initials here, here, and here?
I had reserved a room for a weekend, in August, 2016. Come, they’d said. Get your key, and enjoy the place that is maintained and improved and beautified, just so that it can be enjoyed, and shared with others.
Saturday night, I spent time in the guesthouse: a small lobby with fluffy couches, and sounds of the koi pond fountain rushing outside. I had decided the next day I would go to all of the monk prayer services, beginning with 3:30AM. I had taken a (semi-accidental) nap earlier that day, so I figured I had some margin. After sitting in the guesthouse for about an hour, reading about the history of the Cistercian order, I turned the lights off and walked back to my room in the pitch dark. A bat flying low over the fountain almost hit me in the head. Maybe I’ll just stay in my room for the night, I thought.
The Mary Magdalene library is open all hours of the night, too, so I decided that perhaps I would study in there for awhile. More like a reading room, it sits only steps away from the guest rooms, and has a good selection of Catholic literature. I saw a couple books I could see myself reading, titles by Henri Nouwen and Richard Foster and Dietrich Bonhoeffer. But since I had already packed about 8 different books of my own, I was all set with weekend reading material.
That night, I showered and settled in the rocking chair under the floor lamp in the corner of the room, celebrating prematurely for pulling an all-nighter. But after about twenty minutes of reading I glanced at the clock – 10:24pm – and realized it wasn’t going to happen. When I was a teenager I could do things like this, but I’d grown to really dislike the night. Something about the cover of darkness just felt lonely and sad. So I read in bed for a bit and set my alarm for 3:00am.
I fell asleep around midnight and somehow managed to wake up before my alarm. I grabbed the flashlight and started the walk to the church. I wanted to know what it felt like to get up in the middle of the night, and part of me just needed to see it to believe it. Like that “tree falling” scenario, if no lay person sees the monks praying in the middle of the night, are they really doing it?
Well, they really do it. Not only that, but there were four other people in the pews at this (ungodly? pun intended!) time of night. Here I was patting myself on the back for making it to one measly nighttime service, and these people are here too. Oh, and the monks do it every day, and several times a day. They also stand in place for such a time that had me feeling like I would faint, and that my calves would begin to swell. Vigils lasted until at least 4:00am. I walked back in the pitch dark and decided to stay up so I could watch the sunrise. I went to the dining room and made some toast, and tea. There, I caught Brother Christopher emptying the dishwasher.
The first prayer I had attended was Friday evening at 5:45pm, Vespers. The wooden church was silent, with the public pews facing the large doors, from where the monks enter the vast space.
The pews where the monks sit were to my left, facing each other, an organ in between. I eased onto the creaky pew and sat in the silence, the air stuffy and stale. The bell rang so many times, and then the monks began shuffling into the building. They would bow to the center of the church.
As a Protestant, none of this made sense to me. I didn’t make the sign of the cross upon entering the church, with the little bowl of water outside the door. At the evening Compline service I didn’t know any of the kneeling and bowing things to do. I was really reluctant to be blessed with the holy water at the end of the prayers, and I had to pay close attention to when we were supposed to sit and when we were supposed to stand up again. But it brought tears to my eyes when I heard their voices lift for the first time.
Glory to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit: as it was in the beginning, is now, will be for ever. Amen. Alleluia.
I couldn’t help but sneak long looks at the monks gathered across the room. Few were bearded, not all Caucasian, many young men, some with glasses, hair cut close to the head. Brother Christopher told me he’d been there for ten years, and that he was from Petaluma. I don’t know if that’s something he wants to talk about or share, why would he? But when I had run into him in the kitchen I made small talk in the only way I knew how to make small talk with a monk in blue jeans.
What leads these men to join the monastic life? The simple answer is, of course, God calls them to it. But I couldn’t stop thinking about it all weekend. The world turns, with its news and politics and economic ups-and-downs and natural disasters. But these monks are gathering in the church seven times a day, and they’re tending a vineyard and fruit trees, serving wine, and some are making pottery and they’re reading and resting. Do they consider themselves Americans? Do they consider themselves citizens of this world at all? I can’t help but wonder all of the logistics. When they need their eyeglass prescriptions updated, do they leave the Abbey?
I managed to make it to the church by 3:30am that Sunday, self-congratulations in tow. But I decided I couldn’t make it at 7am for Lauds and definitely didn’t make Mass at 10:30. I’m not Catholic, I don’t need to keep going to these things that I don’t even understand, I thought.
And later, while reading Tozer, I felt my cheeks redden as he criticized legalists, and especially the Roman Catholic church, for building up systems and assigning holy days and putting a religion back in place that Jesus came to tear down. (No wonder I didn’t see any Tozer in the library.)
I agree with Tozer. I think as humans we want rules and systems so that we can stay inside the lines, but didn’t Jesus come so that the Law could be fulfilled and finished? Wasn’t that veil torn when Jesus died on the cross?
But on the other hand, their lives are beautiful and their lifestyle is holy. Their minds are set on things above, just as God commands us to do.
I think what bothered me, is that there is a commitment to Christ, surely there is, but isn’t there also a commitment to the Catholic Church and rituals and the Cistercian order?
Onto my favorite part of the whole property. There is a little cluster of trees along the pathway that provide shade and hold four bright feeders for the hummingbirds to buzz about and chatter and flap their feathery wings. When you stand still next to the feeder, it only takes a couple seconds for them to come back and drink, sometimes stopping to stare at this strange female human here, before dashing off again. The only time I didn’t hear their loud squabbling was when I walked by in the 3:00am darkness.
Hummingbirds are like little fairies. They bicker with each other and flutter about and go from feeder to feeder and tree to tree and flower to flower.
The Hummingbird Personality
I’ve heard author Elizabeth Gilbert talk about people whose lives are like that of a hummingbird – they are “driven by curiosity” – they jump from passion to passion and are interested in many different things. Our society often overvalues people who have a goal, go to school, start a career, and work at that career for 40 years until retirement. They know what they want and they are head-down and dedicated until they achieve it.
I am a hummingbird. I have considered almost every vocation and every hobby. Often, when I’m exposed to new options, I glamourize it in my mind and convince myself I should probably go for it, until I’m distracted by something else new and shiny. (Sometimes I think that it would be easier to have a list of all possibilities in life so that I could choose what to rule out, as opposed to opting in.)
The problem with this is the tendency to never see anything through to fruition. Hummingbirds often just scratch the surface and then move onto something else to learn about and experience, never staying in one place too long. A Jill of all trades, but a master of none.
Perhaps that’s why the religious lives of monks fascinate me so much. Their lives are ordered around routine, and simplicity, and self-control, but mostly commitment. One thing I’ve learned in my life, is that there is freedom in obedience and discipline. And when we are slaves to righteousness and Christ, we are actually liberated from sin and the world and saved from ourselves, and hell (a life without God, Who is all things Good, Peaceful, Holy, Beautiful, and Lovely.)
I realized at the end of this weekend that I felt so satisfied and at peace, like I could breathe again. Not only was it because of much needed uninterrupted time spent with the Lord, but also because when I sing words like “take me deeper, I want to know Your heart,” I can know that I really mean them. When I’m absorbed in Self and the world, I’m not always so sure.
But when I’ve done the work and spent the time examining my heart, I can honestly say YES, Lord, I want to KNOW YOU more. That’s the kind of peace that we should always have covering us, as children of God. And this is the kind of unending worship I will always be a part of – steady, consistent, moving forward in learning and obedience. I think this is what Jesus meant by worshiping in Spirit and in Truth, we get down to the nitty gritty of the human heart: our motives are pure, and distractions cease.
I drove home on Sunday afternoon, refreshed and excited for the future. The next morning, I thought how funny it was, the reason I was so tired.
“Wild weekend?” I could picture a coworker asking.
“Actually, yes! I was on retreat at an abbey and I hardly spoke for two days.”
My Heart's Overflow 