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Sister Mary Therese Renews Her Vows

 

Sr. Mary Therese of the Divine Mercy, our temporary professed sister, renewed her vows for one year on Wednesday, January 27, 2021.

This is a milestone in Sister\’s vocational journey, so we had to celebrate a little!

One of our sisters made Baked Alaska in three different flavors…

 …and it tasted as good as it looked!

We had a delicious meal in the community room, with the rare privilege of talking while we ate (we usually listen to a CD or something read to us). 

Since Cor Orans, the new document from Rome detailing rules for cloistered living, specifies the renewal of vows annually for three years after the initial three-year period of temporary vows, we may be doing this a lot in the future. But for now, we\’ll concentrate on the joy of this present moment. Please continue to pray for Sr. Mary Therese as she lives her vows for another year, and pray for us, too, that we may all be faithful to the Dominican vocation God has given each one of us.

“Living For The Other Side”: A Review of the Hillbilly Thomists’ New CD

I don’t really know anything about bluegrass, except what I heard on the Hillbilly Thomists’ first CD. But I do know this: I liked this CD a lot.

“Living For The Other Side” is a more introspective CD than “The Hillbilly Thomists”. If “Hillbilly Thomists” was a revival, this is a family reunion, fun but with a serious side to it. Most of the songs on this CD are original, which offers the talented brothers a chance to preach the Word through their deft blending of Biblical and doctrinal truth with contemporary lyrics. In the song, “You Will Still Walk Down The Line”, the chorus tells us, “Now people hear talk about eternity, / they just feel doubtful or afraid. / But truth is the very best medicine. / It\’s time to get real and get saved.” Or, on a more poignant note, from “Give Me A Drink”: “Give me a drink, I am thirsty. / I have drawn this well bone-dry / with this old rope and heavy bucket of mine. / Would you put in me a well I can draw from all my life.”

I have to confess, though, that the song I can\’t get out of my head is “Bourbon, Bluegrass, And The Bible”, even though only one of those things–the Bible–plays much of a role in my day-to-day life. The chorus for this runs:”Death’s in the world, and it\’s gone viral. / Everybody’s talkin bout a new revival. / When it\’s a question of love and survival: / bourbon, bluegrass, and the Bible.” Amen, brothers!

These songs speak deeply to me as a religious, and I pray they will speak to many in the secular world as well. I encourage you to go to their new website, hillbillythomists.com, where you can see music videos, order physical CDs, and download digital copies. And you\’ll be supporting the work of the Dominican friars, too!

About Our Website

 We\’ve been meaning to tell you about some of the features on our new website, and now that things have calmed down here (for the moment) we\’d like to do it!

As you can see, one new feature is the ability to order prayer enrollments on line. We offer both our card enrollments and our perpetual enrollments. There\’s a form you can fill out, or you can email us your information–whichever is more convenient for you. You can even make a donation for your enrollment, using a check or credit card

We also now have online giving! This makes donating to the Monastery extremely easy. As with the enrollments, we can accept a variety of payment methods and it\’s very secure. You can learn more about it here. 

We\’re very pleased with our website, and we are especially grateful to eCatholic, who provides the service allowing us to design this website and keep it online. If you are interested in a website for your Catholic parish, we highly recommend them. You can read more about eCatholic here.

And while you\’re thinking about it, please stop by our website and visit us there!

Guide our feet into the way of peace

In the verses from Luke\’s gospel known as “The Canticle of Zechariah” or the “Benedictus”, Zechariah tells his young son, the future John the Baptist, that he will be a prophet of the Most High. He will prepare the way, so that when He comes, He will “give light to those who live in darkness and the shadow of death, and…guide our feet into the way of peace.”

As we embark on this year of grace 2021, it is a perfect time to ask Jesus, the Prince of Peace, to guide our own feet in the way of peace. All of us are surrounded by conflict, division, distress, anger, and even hatred. People are fearful, and this fear makes them act in ways unthinkable under “normal” circumstances. The immensity of this situation is daunting.

One might recall here the prayer attributed to St. Francis of Assisi, asking that God will “make me a channel of Your peace”. We are not asked to solve all the world\’s problems single-handedly. We are asked to be peacemakers in the world we inhabit–that small sphere of family, work, church, and friends, or whatever your particular sphere happens to be. Every act of peace, every choice to love instead of hating, every gesture of reconciliation instead of revenge–these have an effect that reaches into eternity. It may be as small as giving someone a smile, or a friendly wave (since they can\’t see your smile while you\’re wearing your mask!). Or saying a kind word. Or not speaking when you really want to say something.

In 2021, let us make a resolution to ask God where He is asking us to bring peace. And then let us do it. May God give us all the peace we so need and desire!

Snow, Y’all!

While we do occasionally get snow in Texas, it\’s rare in Lufkin–and this was (for us) quite a snow! We got a couple of inches in most parts–enough to completely cover the grass and even enough to make a snowman (or snow nun). We realize those of you in northern climes are probably smiling at this, but most of us come from warmer regions of the world and we were delighted! Also we didn’t have to drive in it–native Texans tend to be very bad at driving in snow. We actually got even more snow after these pictures were taken!

 
 
 
Our sister from Africa especially enjoyed the snow!

The snow fell Sunday afternoon and evening, and here on Tuesday it is still covering a lot of ground, thanks to some freezing weather. Another amazing event! However, the sun has been shining and gradually melting everything, so by tomorrow our extraordinary snow will be most likely be a fond memory. This is probably our last chance for snow this year–but who knows? One year it snowed on Easter–and Easter was at the beginning of April! Let it snow!

 
 
 
 
 

Good Christian Friends, Rejoice!

We’ve been doing a lot of rejoicing around here! And why not? It’s still the Christmas season, and we are still celebrating the wonder of Christ\’s birth. Now, it’s time we shared some of our lovely inside Christmas decorations with you! This is our chapel–the picture was taken from our side of the choir, facing the altar. We are so grateful to the people who donated the tree, the wreaths, and the many poinsettias.

Another beautiful donation: this Christmas arrangement to honor our crucifix

And now, without further ado, the creche scenes!

Our main creche in the chapel. Sister Sacristan did a marvelous job!
If you were able to visit us in person, you saw this one in the outside lobby
The community room
The Chapter Hall
The infirmary kitchen
The infirmary
The Print Shop (where Monastery Bells and our greeting cards are created, among other things)
The Guild, where letters are answered and enrollments are made
The Prioress’ office

The carol mentioned in our title is traditionally attributed to the 14th century Dominican mystic, Blessed Henry Suso. One of the lines in the modern version found in today’s hymnals says, “Christ was born to save!” We never forget that Christmas is a part of the Paschal mystery, and there is certainly an element of sorrow even in our joy (think of the Holy Innocents, for example). But on the whole it is a time when all of us can remember, or consider for the first time, the hope a newborn baby brings with it into this world. Let us rejoice this season as we remember that each one of us was born for a reason!

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!