Always Advent

I finally found a free evening to sit down and watch this amazing film. Throughout the experience, a phrase kept coming to mind: “Only one thing is necessary.” (Luke 10:42) And the brothers have found it, in poverty, silence, and simplicity, at the Grand Chartreuse.

Can I find it in my crazy, mixed-up life?

The brothers live in their own little houses (called “cells”) which have a couple of rooms and a private garden. A brother comes around with a cart and gives them their meals through a little hatch. They eat all their meals alone in their hermitage (except for Sunday lunch). They say all their prayers in solitude (except for some of the prayers of the Divine Office), and they do not speak at all (except during the scheduled time of recreation with the other brothers). They can study, read, work in their gardnes, and they take turns at various jobs around the monastery. Feeding the chickens and so forth. I’m sure a lot of modern, noise-deafened, hectic people (like me) look at that life and think, “I want to be a Carthusian, too!”

No, you don’t. Do not mistake discontent with your current life situation as a call to something as radically different as cloistered monasticism.

A friend of mine wrote, after a profound experience of God on a retreat, that he felt God calling him into the desert and saying, “Will you love me here?” For most of us, the real sand and rock desert is far away and we can’t move there. Nor can we or should we move to the desert of a monastery. (Some of us should because God is calling us there.) The desert — the good kind of desert, where non-essentials are stripped away–is anywhere the thirsty soul finds itself. I live in a non-descript suburb of a standard, large metropolitan area that is devoid of inspiring vistas. My life and my household is busy with children, a job, grad school studies, a faith community, and a to-do list a mile long. But the spirituality of the desert, or the monastery in the Alps, is possible no matter where a person lives and no matter what the circumstances. In a modern, computerized, plugged-in culture you must exert considerable effort to create the desert around you and within you. Strip away the essentials and live with the one necessary thing.

Find the hermitage within your heart and go sit at the feet of Jesus.

Links:

Steven Greydanus:
http://www.decentfilms.com/sections/reviews/intogreatsilence .html

Arts and Faith:
http://artsandfaith.com/index.php?showtopic=13153

Barbara Nicolosi:
http://churchofthemasses.blogspot.com/2007/03/into-great-lon g-silence.html

Jeffrey Overstreet:
http://lookingcloser.blogspot.com/2007/04/new-yorker-on-into -great-silence.html

Where to buy it:
http://www.amazon.com/Into-Great-Silence-Two-Disc-Set/dp/B00 0OYNVOY