Last year, after my cancer diagnosis, I asked to visit friends at a bruderhof. While they typically schedule visitors for work rotations in my case they didn't. We just came as friends visiting friends, ate the meals at common table and used the river plunge an old sauna. Knowing this kind of visitation is rare, it made it a special gift
A friend of mine became a cloistered nun a few months before the birth of my first daughter. A few years later she sent me a little colored pencil drawing of a rose with a note on the back reminding me of her unceasing prayers for me. I keep it on my fridge.
Last winter, we welcomed our sixth daughter while my friend was caring around the clock for a dying sister in her community. We prayed for each other through our sleepless nights.
A few years ago, I was facing a huge change in my lifestyle as my four close-together kids began to graduate from 17 years of homeschooling. I had tremendous anxiety about what my life was going to look like next.
My husband helped me create the opportunity to go spend eight days at Subiaco Abbey in Subiaco, AR. The guest house room I had to myself costed only $35 a night. I paid extra to have access to three meals a day prepared by the staff. I spent my days attending Masses and chanted Liturgies of the Hours, reading, crocheting, walking the beautiful grounds. Guests were invited to join the monks on Thanksgiving Day in their dining room, with one monk hosting each table.
The entire experience was one of a stranger being welcomed. Every person with whom I interacted was kind and thoughtful and went out of their way for me, from the guest house staff to the dining staff to the monks to the other guests. I left the abbey feeling renewed and connecting to the Source of my strength and wisdom. It was a powerful week of being received.
I read the Dispatch piece: good essay. Homer found the hole in the expect-to-be-the-stranger argument himself: the suitors, young men at the peak of their strength, eating an absent man’s stores, certain the only man who could collect the debt is twenty years dead. Prudence never touches them; what reaches them is the beggar in the hall turning out to be the master of the house, the noble lie coming true at sword-length. The weak need the world you’re describing, its the strong who feed on the lie.
Last year, after my cancer diagnosis, I asked to visit friends at a bruderhof. While they typically schedule visitors for work rotations in my case they didn't. We just came as friends visiting friends, ate the meals at common table and used the river plunge an old sauna. Knowing this kind of visitation is rare, it made it a special gift
That's so wonderful.
A friend of mine became a cloistered nun a few months before the birth of my first daughter. A few years later she sent me a little colored pencil drawing of a rose with a note on the back reminding me of her unceasing prayers for me. I keep it on my fridge.
Last winter, we welcomed our sixth daughter while my friend was caring around the clock for a dying sister in her community. We prayed for each other through our sleepless nights.
<3 <3 <3
A few years ago, I was facing a huge change in my lifestyle as my four close-together kids began to graduate from 17 years of homeschooling. I had tremendous anxiety about what my life was going to look like next.
My husband helped me create the opportunity to go spend eight days at Subiaco Abbey in Subiaco, AR. The guest house room I had to myself costed only $35 a night. I paid extra to have access to three meals a day prepared by the staff. I spent my days attending Masses and chanted Liturgies of the Hours, reading, crocheting, walking the beautiful grounds. Guests were invited to join the monks on Thanksgiving Day in their dining room, with one monk hosting each table.
The entire experience was one of a stranger being welcomed. Every person with whom I interacted was kind and thoughtful and went out of their way for me, from the guest house staff to the dining staff to the monks to the other guests. I left the abbey feeling renewed and connecting to the Source of my strength and wisdom. It was a powerful week of being received.
I read the Dispatch piece: good essay. Homer found the hole in the expect-to-be-the-stranger argument himself: the suitors, young men at the peak of their strength, eating an absent man’s stores, certain the only man who could collect the debt is twenty years dead. Prudence never touches them; what reaches them is the beggar in the hall turning out to be the master of the house, the noble lie coming true at sword-length. The weak need the world you’re describing, its the strong who feed on the lie.
Woohoo for finally meeting in person!!