February 3 - Red Bird in a Frozen Tree

While the ages come and go, in sun and sleet, when the the soil is warm and when the trees are frozen into the earth, the business of the Abbey is worship.

As new postulants arrive, full of hope and uncertainty, as nuns take their Final Vows, and as caskets fill the little cemetery that belongs to the monastery, the song and the praise, the prayers and the proclamations of the Divine Office continue, unabated. For this the Sisters came, and for this they remain.

Sometimes the choir is so spectacular, it could go on tour, and sometimes coughs and sniffles punctuate the meter and the chant. Whether breathtaking or out of breath, worship never ends.

Sometimes the mail and the Abbey computer bring encouragement, sometimes a plea for help or prayer, sometimes an offer of support, and sometimes the old thing . . . we speak of the computer, not the Sister who tries to wrangle it . . . gags and sputters and doesn't work at all until someone can coax it back to life. No matter; the Abbey may not be online, but the nuns maintain their connection to heaven, and God is praised, seven times a day. Through "recollection," study, private prayer, and Christ-centered fellowship, they endeavor to fill all the intermissions, as well.

If the aim of the heart is to worship and to remember the Lord God when all is well, and to worship and give Him hearty devotion when all is down the well, the doors to Cor Unum are open.

Our perch may be ice-encrusted and our tree frozen solid, but the bird who sings on a bough of ice warms the whole landscape.

"Red Bird in a Frozen Tree"
photo by Kerry