Welcome to Fr. Ian

Fr. Ian Bordenave, O.P., is our new chaplain! He’s a Dominican priest of Creole descent who grew up mostly in Florida, and he’s been visiting our community now and again for about twenty years. Right now he’s finishing up his doctoral thesis, and needs a quiet place to work–and so we are fortunate enough to get him! We are enjoying his straightforward homilies and quiet manner, and we hope he will find it quiet enough here to get his work done. We’ll have more about Father in our next issue of “Monastery Bells”, coming out this fall.

Welcome, Father Ian, and may you grow closer to God while you are with us.

Farewell to Fr. John

Fr. John Lydon, O.P. has been our chaplain for four years now, and we’re going to miss him as he moves on to a new assignment elsewhere in the province. Father kept us laughing during his homilies and parlor visits (like the one above) with his dry humor and delightful anecdotes. We’ll always remember Father John’s great devotion to Blessed Pier-Giorgio Frassati, O.P., the young Italian Dominican tertiary who died suddenly of polio and left a wonderful legacy of generosity to the poor and simple holiness in his everyday life. Perhaps some of this saintly influence has rubbed off onto Father!

Farewell, Father John! We hope to meet you again some day if you are ever in the Lufkin area!

Father John saying goodbye to us in the parlor. Maybe he’ll miss us, too?

Welcome!

Some of the Dominican nuns who live on Lotus Lane. Well…maybe not!

This is the new Dominican Life on Lotus Lane! After eleven years, we decided it was time to shake things up a little. Although we haven’t deleted our old site, we have moved all our posts over so you can find everything you need right here. If you’re new to our blog, we hope you’ll look around and explore our Dominican cloistered life with us. And if you’re returning, we’re glad you’re here! Please consider subscribing to this blog so you’ll never miss a post.

Retreat with Fr. Vincent Davila, O.P.

There’s one word that sums up our annual retreat: fantastic!

Fr. Vincent Davila, O.P., a friar from St. Albert the Great Province (Central) gave us several great conferences on “The Mystical Body of Christ in St. Paul”. Fr. Vincent was able to blend theology and moral encouragement (that is to say, he gently skewered many of our faults and failings in a way that made us laugh umcomfortably) in a manner that was inspiring to many sisters. In addition to his conferences, Fr. Vincent preached his theme of the Mystical Body during his homilies at Mass, providing further interesting commentary. We contributed by planning hymns for Mass and Benediction to fit his themes, which he appreciated. We’ll have more news about Father and our retreat in the next issue of “Monastery Bells”.

It was hard to return to the everyday world today after such an excellent retreat, but we all feel refreshed, renewed, and ready to pray–and grow in virtue–with greater fervor. Thank you, Fr. Vincent!

Into the Retreat Desert

It\’s that time of year again! Tonight we begin our annual ten-day community retreat. This year our retreat master is Fr. Vincent Davila from St. Albert the Great Province (aka the central province). We\’ll have more to tell you after the retreat. For now, we just want to let you know that our schedule will vary somewhat in order to accommodate our retreat conferences. However, Mass tunes will still be the same: 7:20 Monday-Saturday and 7:00 Sunday. That’s right! Our chapel is finally open to the public for Sunday Mass.

Please pray for us! We\’ll be praying for you!

Eleven Years…And Still Going

This blog has been running for eleven years now! Hard to believe! It seems like only yesterday Sr. Anna Marie, OP (from the Monastery of Mary Queen in Springfield, IL) helped us get started. We’ve had many good times…and we hope there will be many more to come!

May God bless you, and thank you for reading this blog! If you like it, please tell a friend!

Fraternal Visit

The feast of the Visitation has been called a day for religious sisters to get together and, well, visit. This year we had a little twist on this theme–a visit from our brothers, instead!

As you can see, we made quite a group! Most of our sisters were able to be present, and we had seven friars. Four are still in various stages of formation. Two of these four are novices–our own two novices from the province of St. Martin de Porres (aka the southern province)–and two student brothers, one from our province and one from the province of St. Albert the Great (aka the central province). They were accompanied by the novice master for our province and another priest, and our chaplain joined the fun.

And it was fun! We laughed and laughed at our brothers’ stories, adventures, and incidents, all told with characteristically Dominican good humor.

We thank our brothers for honoring us with a visit, and only wish they could have stayed longer! But they could only pray Vespers with us and have a quick dinner before heading back to Irving, TX. Still, that was wonderful. We are praying for you all–and for all our Dominican brothers around the world! Y’all come see us!