The Cistercian Way

I heartily recommend The Cistercian Way, by Andre Louf, to anyone who wants a good introduction into what this charism is all about. I say introduction because no book can ever encapsulate a charism. As part of the process of writing a formation program for our group, I have begun to re-read this book which first opened my eyes to this way of life.

The following quote should help you understand why I think this book is mandatory reading for all people interested in monastic spirituality.

The monastic life is one answer to [the] spiritual quest. It is a valid alternative even to those who do not wish to undertake it.

You have to admit that there is something in that statement which validates our Lay Cistercian calling. We do not exist in a vacuum, apart from the mainstream of monastic associations. While it is easier to define what we are not than what we are, it is statements like the one above that help us, the laity, to put down spiritual roots in the fertile soil of monastic tradition.

As regards certain amounts of resistance from the rank and file of the Cistercian monks and nuns, I offer this quote.

A new and unusual way of life in the community could hardly be unanimously welcomes and approved right from its first appearance.

Of course not. And, admittedly Dom Andre was referring to the hermits as compared to the cenobites. He was not talking about Lay Cistercians, yet the quote does speak a truth regarding our Lay Cistercian charism. The entire reason for writing a formation program is to help the monks and nuns of the order understand what it is we are about. It is valid for them to want to know what are your values? What is your prayer life? What makes you like us?

With God's help through time these answers will come.

And now poetry I did not write.
John Donne
A Litany.
IV.

THE TRINITY.

O blessed glorious Trinity,
Bones to philosophy, but milk to faith,
Which, as wise serpents, diversely
Most slipperiness, yet most entanglings hath,
As you distinguish'd, undistinct,
By power, love, knowledge be,
Give me a such self different instinct,
Of these let all me elemented be,
Of power, to love, to know you unnumbered three.