Christmas at the Monastery

 Here as we approach a brand new (hopefully happier) New Year, we\’d like to bring you some highlights of our Christmas festivities here at the Monastery.

On the evening of December 23, Santa Claus paid us a visit!

Santa brought each sister a copy of Matthew Kelly\’s book I Heard God Laugh and a few editions of a game called \”Yeti in the Spaghetti\”. We haven\’t played it yet so we\’ll let you know how that goes! 

We\’ve heard God laughing ourselves…

Next, on Christmas Eve afternoon, we had our annual visit from the Alexander family. 

The Alexanders outside the front of the Monastery. They wore masks in the parlor!

We are always happy to see the Alexanders and hear all about what they\’ve been up to over the past year or so. We had a delightful visit with them. 

After Vespers, our chaplain, Fr. John Lydon OP came inside to bless the creches in the community room and refectory. 

Community room

Refectory

We had two glorious Masses, one at night and one in the morning, followed by our traditional dinner prepared by the Knights of Columbus. Unfortunately, we weren\’t able to visit with the Knights and their families in the parlor after Mass as we have done for many years, due to COVID–the parlor gets really packed and we wanted to avoid a super-spreader event. Still, a few Knights were able to come and actually do the cooking. God bless them!

Our faithful Knights of Columbus, plus a future Knight, maybe

In the afternoon, in between prayers, we met together in the community room to see the gifts people gave us this year. Usually we get gifts \”for the community\”–a single gift everyone can use or benefit from. Sometimes we get gifts like popcorn or candy or cookies–always welcome! This year we received a new digital camera (the authors of this blog, the website, and Monastery Bells are particularly grateful for this!), some DVDs from the Teaching Company, and lots of books, in addition to the aforementioned food. We also got a new Chinese Checkers game, which gained a lot of applause from our dedicated players. 

Many happy hours of serious fun to come

Much to our surprise, we also received a number of \”individual\” gifts as well! Several very kind and generous benefactors put together various gifts, making enough so that each sister could receive her own. Best of all, these were gifts we could use: toiletries, bed socks, plastic containers, art supplies, word and Sudoku puzzles, and (of course) more food!

 

As you can see, we enjoyed the gifts, and we\’re tremendously grateful to all those who gave them! No matter how old you are, it\’s still fun to have something to open on Christmas. Thank you, all our benefactors, for giving us such joy and putting smiles on our weary faces this Christmas of 2020! 

We are still planning to post some pictures of our various creche scenes around the Monastery, so keep in touch! Remember, Christmas isn\’t officially over until the Baptism of the Lord, despite what the world may tell you–especially by stocking Valentines already (or so we\’ve heard)…

We wish all of you a most blessed New Year!