Welcome to our “little cloister”
where we
EXPLORE MONASTIC WISDOM FOR EVERY DAY LIVING
Drs. Almut & Chuck with little one
Home of
+The Hildegard Seminar,
+Kierkegaard Masterclass,
+Bach Passionweek Consolations,
+The 12 Days of Christmas Contemplations &
+The “Little School” of Spiritual Formation
All tagged pilgrimage
Today we invite you to take a walk, and be gently and graciously aware of the gifts you carry. Cradle what you find in your heart as it would be a baby child.
Today we invite you to take a New Year’s walk, and be gently and graciously aware of the gifts you carry. Cradle the beginning of the new year as it would be a baby child.
In our journey so far, we have almost rushed from one room to the next in a most un-benedictine manner. But now we have a significant threshold before us: the door into the new year. With half the pilgrimage ahead of us, and on a Sunday, let us take a meditative Sabbath pause.
Our pilgrimage is interrupted by unexpected events. Can obedience to these interruptions be the real journey?
On Monday of last week, we visited a cave in a valley near Subiaco, a one-hour drive directly west of Rome, into the Apennine mountains that run down the center of the peninsula. Benedict’s story begins in this cave where, as a young man he spent 3 years as a hermit, with a local monk lowering him food in a basket.
Pentecost weekend we spent biking into the blue country, the Bavarian country side which has inspired artists of the "Blaue Reiter" (blue rider), a group of early expressionists. Riding on trains and bikes towards the mountains we took in the stunning views and shades of blue and green imaging the excitement of a painter to match them.
For the past month, I have traveled regularly from our apartment in Munich out to rural St. Ottilien Abbey, a Benedictine monastery about an hour’s train ride from us. I go to meet with one of the monks there for spiritual direction. Sometimes I stay for the night, sometimes I return the same day, but every time becomes a pilgrimage.
