Chevtogne, Belgium: Bridging East & West

The Benedictine monks of Chevtogne, near the Ardennes, are an international community devoted to the unity of Christians. It is biritual with the western and eastern rite liturgies celebrated daily in separate churches - one is a fully frescoed Byzantine church, the other is a plainer church, after the manner of European Romanesque. The monks of both rites undertake a common monastic formation and choose on profession which liturgy they will celebrate. The community is rooted in Christ’s prayer “that they may all be one” and aims to understand as deeply as possible the Christian soul of both West and East, and thus heal the deep wound of schism at the heart of the Church.

The monastery was founded by Dom Lambert Beauduin (1873- 1960), and builds on the directive in the pontifical letter of Pius XI Equidem Verba. The community publish an ecumenical journal, Irenikon, and in 1992 formed the Chevtogne Group, which seeks to promote values which will testify in today’s world to the transcendence of God and the value of the human person. Twice a year lay leaders in the fields of politics, economics and culture meet with monks and nuns from all over Europe to strengthen spiritual and cultural links.

Chevtogne: Belgium

New Camaldoli: California

Big Sur is surrounded by California chapparal and an oak forest, and overlooks the Pacific ocean. The community emphasise the value of natural beauty to develop the contemplative life and have a number of hermitages available for lay retreatants. They have a three-fold charism - solitude for personal prayer and meditation, communal prayer and work within the monastery, and the promotion of contemplative prayer and spirituality within the world. Their work includes retreats, writing and creative arts. Many of the monks are called to the life as a second career, having been in professions as diverse as clinical psychology, the armed services and performing arts, as well as religious and diocesan priests drawn in their later life to a more contemplative path.

Camaldoli practise all three forms of monastic life, having cenobia and and urban houses as well as hermitages. The of Big Sur also have a house of studies on campus. “Sit in your cell as in paradise...be like a good fisherman watching for fish, the path you must follow is the psalms - never leave it...realise above all that you are in God’s presence, empty yourself completely and sit waiting, content with the grace of God, like the chick who tastes nothing and eats nothing but what his mother brings him.” St. Romuald. 6th. c. founder.

Big Sur: California

Holy Trinity: Massachusetts

Maronite Monks: Eastern Rite Catholic

The Maronite monks of Most Holy Trinity Monastery, Petersham, Massachusetts, live a life of “solitude in community,” liturgical prayer and work. Silence is “indispensable to the contemplative atmosphere.” Their life is centred on Adoration of the Blessed Sacrament, cloister within an eremitical orientation. They emphasise that monastic life is an essential witness to the presence of God, complementing the active life.

In the east “monasticism was not seen merely as a separate condition, proper to a precise category of Christians, but rather as a reference point for all the baptised, according to the gifts offered to each by the Lord; it was presented as a symbolic synthesis of Christianity” Lumen Orientale. Manual work and especially taking one’s share of menial tasks is emphasised as a spiritual practise “to be highly esteemed.” The development of personal gifts of grace and nature is seen as an obligatory stewardship. The community is under the jurisdiction of the Maronite Catholic Eparchy in Brooklyn, and sing the eastern Rite liturgy in English.