In these days of quarantine, many of us are trying to make sense of the self-denial our quarantined lives require. For most of us, living a life of self-denial is somewhat unfamiliar territory. We are a people of hugs and high-fives and celebrations and the regular lives that until just a few weeks ago we used to take for granted.
Nobody chose quarantine as a way to spend our Lent this year ……. but sometimes the sacrifices imposed on us have the most meaning.
So, how do we survive this time of being apart – of being “cloistered”?
Brother Paul Quenon has been a monk for 62 years at the Abbey of Gethsemani in Kentucky, where the famous monk Thomas Merton was his novice master.
His advice to those of us whose homes have become virtual monasteries?
“Being stuck at home is what we do by profession here. Over time, we learn the discipline of structuring our day. It makes the slow and quiet passage of time more tolerable.”
Finding time to just sit and learn to be at peace with our new reality, while difficult, is an important part of the experience. Brother Paul says it this way … “In all this apparent emptiness there is the sense of presence of what cannot be spoken. I am never less alone than when I am alone.”
So, to take advantage of his experience and advice, it would seem that structuring our days – creating a schedule – can help us pass through these times with a little less stress. As too can putting some time in that schedule for us just to sit in stillness.
If you think that having your ‘virtual monastery’ sound more like a real one, then the Dominicans have a youTube channel of Gregorian Chant …. you can find it here