Conversatio

conversatio Volume 14, Issue 1 | 2014

Personal Spirituality

Dean William J. Cahoy Director of Development Grace Ellens Editor Jeannie Kenevan Contributors Abbot John Klassen Dr. William Cahoy Michael Patella, OSB Karen Rose, OSB Patty Weishaar Jessie Bazan Victor Klimoski Mark Rodriguez Carlton Chase Grace Ellens Becky Van Ness Photography Benjamin Clasen Jeannie Kenevan Se-la Catherine Lee Paul Middlestaedt Tommy O’Laughlin Saint John’s Abbey Archives Saint John’s University Archives

BOARD OF OVERSEERS Mark Barder

Patrick Maxwell

John Boyle

Kay Mrachek

Bonita Brever

Len Mrachek

Thomas Brever

Joe Mucha

Msgr. James Dillenburg

Mary Ann Okner

John Erhart

David Pedersen

Jeannie Kenevan jkenevan@csbsju.edu 320-363-2964

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Mindfulness, Praying and Living

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Abott John Klassen, OSB

Spirituality and Institutions

Dean William Cahoy

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Sending Them Forth

Fr. Michael Patella, OSB

Daniel Fazendin

Mary Jo Pedersen

Lynn Fazendin

Karen Rose, OSB

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Jerrad Fenske

Dr. Gene Scapanski

Mark Rodriguez

Rev. Robert Flannery

Marilyn Scapanski

Daniel Frie

Mary Schaffner

Mary Ochsner Haeg

Fr. Mark Scott, OCSO

Marcia Hanson

Dennis Smid

Michael Hemesath

Ernie Stelzer

Bishop Donald Kettler

Mary Stelzer

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Abbot John Klassen, OSB

Paul Steingraeber

Joseph Eichorn

Debra Koop

Connie Suchta

Steven Koop

Stan Suchta

Robert Lee

Dr. Frank Wilderson, Jr.

Thomas Manthey

Idalorraine Wilderson

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Liturgy of the Hours Consider the Raven

Martin Connell

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Pneuma on Death Row

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Carlton Chase and Ron Cauthern

Spirituality in Running the Distance Benedictine Training in Spiritual Direction

Becky Van Ness

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“Ora et Mangia”

Patty Weishaar

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Conversatio is published twice each year.

Comments, questions, corrections, story ideas?

Contents

SAINT JOHN’S SCHOOL OF THEOLOGY AND SEMINARY

Pass the Spirituality

Jessie Bazan

“Through the busy, blurry years of raising young children, I was learning over and over again how sacraments received in church were deepened and strengthened through ordinary life at home…[E]veryday chaos with little ones offers its own rich theology: a thousand chances to ask who is God? and who are we? as we stumble through learning to love each other at home.”

Laura Kelly Fanucci, Everyday Sacrament: The Messy Grace of Parenting (Liturgical Press, 2014)

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Alumni Updates | Milestones | Faculty/Staff Updates

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From the Director of Development

Grace Ellens

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Social Media

Karen Rose, OSB

23 Cover Photo: Tommy O’Laughlin

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FROM THE ABBOT

FROM THE DEAN Spirituality and institutions

Mindfulness, praying, and living Abbot John Klassen, OSB

William Cahoy, Dean

We live in a fast-paced, rapidly changing culture. Even though it has always been a challenge, living mindfully is difficult and more essential than ever. Saint Benedict alludes to it in chapter nineteen of the Rule: “We believe that the divine presence is everywhere and that in every place the eyes of the Lord are watching the good and the wicked. But beyond the least doubt we should believe this to be especially true when we celebrate the divine office… Let us consider, then, how we ought to behave in the presence of God and his angels, and let us stand to sing the psalms in such a way that our minds are in harmony with our voices.” Getting all of ourselves to prayer, to our study, and ministry, this is the human challenge. On any given day, the consequences of “splitting,” of mindlessness can be staggering.

Few things undermine mindfulness more easily than routine. So often we do routine things as if they were a barrier to being able to do what we really want or need to be doing. The Buddhist monk Thich Nhat Hanh has written about the importance of washing the dishes when we are washing the dishes. He writes, “While washing the dishes one should only be washing the dishes, which means one should be completely aware of the fact that one is washing the dishes… Why put so much stress on a simple thing? But that’s precisely the point. The fact that I am standing here and washing these bowls is a wondrous reality.”1 These are some things that help with mindfulness: paying attention to breath; avoiding routine multi-tasking and fragmentation of attention; disciplining one’s schedule (noting the best guess on the time it takes to do things); taking care of a plant or a vegetable patch; observing the change of seasons in trees and plants; taking short breaks at regular intervals of the day; giving one’s full attention to people.

Each one of us has had some fundamental experience of mindfulness, of the unity of being, when we are all together. We experience this unity of mind, voice, body, and heart in a different way and at different times. Athletes, musicians, dancers, and other professionals constantly try to develop methods or habits that allow them to focus their entire being on what is at hand. And they describe it in different ways. When baseball player Joe Mauer is hitting hot, he says that he is seeing the ball well – that is, even a 90 m/h fastball looks slow, big, and fat. Or perhaps you are giving a presentation or a homily and suddenly you are standing right in the middle of it, relaxed, focused and it is all right there: the right words are available when you need them.

Mindfulness ultimately depends on a desire to be mindful. This desire requires our decision and our discipline. Practice, practice, practice.

Breathing attentively, gazing patiently, moving thoughtfully, receiving gratefully, worshipping wholeheartedly, working diligently, i.e., lovingly. We enter more and more deeply into the mystery of God, and God becomes more alive in us.

Thich Nhat Hanh, The Miracle of Mindfulness: A Manual on Meditation (Boston: Beacon Press, 1975), p. 6.

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In a book that deserves to be better known, On Thinking Institutionally, Hugh Heclo makes a case for the importance of institutions to our common life. Institutions are not reducible to bureaucracy or structures to ensure conformity or rule-following. Authentic institutions embody a purpose valued by a community and sustain that purpose beyond the life of any individual or group of individuals. It is from institutions that we have received much of what is important to us: the purposes, virtues, values, and practices that endure and sustain us. Institutions nurture the individual quest for meaning and fulfillment, providing both an understanding of what constitutes fulfillment and practices to achieve it. To think institutionally is to recognize that bequest and take responsibility for passing it on – passing it on not blindly but in a way that is shaped by what we have experienced and learned in putting it to use. Without such a healthy institutional ecosystem, the full flourishing of our lives together and as individuals is imperiled.

This suspicion of institutions is operative in contemporary spirituality and religious practice, particularly in the increasing numbers who identify as spiritual but not religious. The religious they are not is institutional. They do not see and certainly do not experience religious institutions – the institutional church – as helpful in their spiritual quest. For many it is an actual obstacle. They are not experiencing the value of institutions that Heclo describes and are simply walking away.

Understandable as this may be, it is a loss both to the church and the individuals. The church is losing the gifts of these spiritual people, many of whom also give generously of themselves in service to others. To see such people not interested in or actually put off by the church is something we need to take seriously. It is also a loss to these individuals in that for all its failings, the church holds and passes on a collective wisdom about the spiritual life. This is not just a list of doctrines or set of rules but also practices and purposes that feed us as individuals. It offers a kind of apprenticeship in the spiritual life that helps us grow up and get our bearings.

But community should not be confused with institution. Many of those who reject religion are quite communal, even if in ad hoc ways. However, if this community is to be sustained, it needs some institutional form. We may be able to live off the fruits of our institutional heritage for a generation or so without contributing. After all, many of the spiritual but not religious were formed in religious homes and religious institutions. But it’s not clear what happens in the next generation.

Photo courtesy of Saint John’s University Archives

A STU DEN T JOU RN

The School of Theology and Seminary – an institution – is called to provide for those future generations. We seek to offer an alternative to the divide between the spiritual and religious.

We are not naïve about the failings of the institutional church. We would not be credible witnesses if we were. However, we are also not naïve about the importance of the institution to sustain our individual and communal spiritual quests. In the Benedictine spirit, we study and practice a spirituality that is intensely personal while fed by the tradition of the church. In this environment we prepare leaders who cultivate such a spiritual life for themselves and who can contribute to the spiritual quest of all – religious or not. We draw bountifully from the well of institutional wisdom while contributing to it for the next generation.

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AL OF THE OLO GY

2 0 1 4

CO LL EG

Spirituality is very personal, an intimate relation to God. At some point each of us needs to make our own what we have received, to cultivate practices that feed our personal spirituality.

But this need not be at odds with the institutional church. Healthy personal spirituality is also communal. The personal and communal enrich each other, mutually promoting human flourishing. For us at Saint John’s this is a lesson of the monastic rhythm of individual and community prayer.

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O B S C V L T A

EV IL LE

When alumna Lauren L. Murphy first visited Saint John’s School of Theology and Seminary as a prospective student, she asked if a student journal existed.

Lauren, a writer and an editor, was surprised that one did not. After enrolling in the School that year, she worked with fellow students Genevieve Mougey and Kendall Ketterlin to start a journal that was completely written, edited, and published by students of the School of Theology and Seminary.

Obsculta is the opening word of the Rule of Benedict, which has shaped the life and spirituality of Benedictines around the world for over 1,500 years. The full opening phrase of the Rule is “Listen with the ear of your heart.”

After earning her degree, Lauren began working as a copy editor at Liturgical Press; in 2010, she became the managing editor of the academic, trade, and monastic department. Obsculta, the student journal, is now in its eighth year.

In addition to the writing of our students of Saint John’s School of Theology and Seminary, each year the student editorial board offers an alumni category for submissions. One essay or poem written by a graduate of Saint John’s School of Theology and Seminary is selected to be published in the journal. The deadline for alum submissions is February 1, 2015.

Additionally, the School sponsors the Obsculta Essay Contest each year, which is open to college juniors and seniors. One undergraduate essay is selected to be published in the journal. The writer of the winning essay is awarded with $500 cash and a $6,000 scholarship to Saint John’s School of Theology and Seminary, pending accepted application. The deadline for undergrad student submissions is March 1, 2015. Please encourage any college juniors and seniors you know to enter our essay contest. They may use a paper written for a class assignment.

“Obsculta”– this simple admonition shapes the way we do our theology and preparation for ministry. In a world where people too often speak first and ask questions later, we seek to listen – listen for the voice of the Spirit in Scripture, tradition, each other and the world. Out of this listening we speak that Word of God in a way we hope can be heard in, and even inspire, the world in which we live today.

FROM THE RECTOR Sending them forth Fr Michael Patella, OSB

of Vatican II, which brought many challenges to the valued traditions of the abbey. By every account, Hume did a masterful job of guiding his community through the many changes posed by the Council.

In his Rule, Saint Benedict states, “The juniors…should honor their seniors, and the seniors love their juniors” (RB 63:10). It is a verse which forms a bond by which younger monks learn from the older ones, and the older ones set a good example for those younger. Thus, a monk’s personal spirituality grows and flourishes within the tradition to which he has vowed himself. At Saint John’s Seminary, we build upon these monastic practices in the training and forming of monks for priesthood.

Pope Paul VI made Hume the Archbishop of Westminster in 1975, a position he served until his death from cancer in 1999. Those years embraced a period of great social, political, and theological ferment.

Howard’s biography tabulates the opportunities and some crises both large and small that came across Hume’s desk: the first papal visit to Great Britain, the collapse of Prince Charles and Princess Diana’s marriage, Diana’s tragic death, challenges to Humanae Vitae, new thoughts on the participation of women in the Church, questions about the treatment of gays and lesbians in the face of Church teaching, nuclear disarmament, Anglican and Roman Catholic dialogue, and the first stirrings of the sexual abuse crisis.

This fall semester, for example, we used Anthony Howard’s, Basil Hume, The Monk Cardinal (London: Headline Book Publishing, 2005). This biography has engendered many fine discussions in the seminarians’ spiritual formation class. Each of the book’s fifteen chapters focuses on a particular period on Hume’s life and functions as a window into the soul of the man. A highly interesting work of 330 pages, readers view scenes wherein Hume’s intellect, ambition, and humor surface at regular intervals of his life.

Within the spiritual formation class, the monk seminarians and I looked at these events in Basil Hume’s life and applied them to our own time and place. One thing became crystal clear in our eyes: Hume was first and foremost a monk. Anticipating Pope Francis’ move from the papal apartments to the Casa Santa Marta, Basil Hume forsook the grander elements of the Archbishop’s House and made his living space in the simpler and more remote rooms. Moreover, he always made himself aware how any of his decisions would be interpreted by all parties; he saw himself as having a pastoral duty to the whole church, not just to one or the other faction.

Born of an English father and French mother in 1923, George Hume imbibed and displayed the faith of his mother and the mannerisms of his father within the atmosphere of Great Britain between the wars.

He often said that he became determined to enter the seminary after accompanying his parish priest to a Newcastle slum. Because he had intimated a calling to the religious life before the outbreak of World War II, he was able to avoid conscription and enter Ampleforth Abbey in 1941, not a very popular thing to do during the Battle of Britain. It was a decision that haunted him for the rest of his life. Even his best friend called him a coward.

The biography displays Hume’s engaging personality. Everything shows him to be an eminently warm man, who, in a nation with settled class distinctions, always looked out for those beyond its more influential, social circles. And this touch had its effect. When he died, not only English Catholics but the whole the whole of Great Britain and the English-speaking world mourned the loss. He was a figure that cut across the historical breaches of religious history; even Queen Elizabeth would always refer to him as, “My Cardinal.”

Brother Basil, George’s name in religion, found the trials of his two-year novitiate to be, quite honestly, a depressing experience.

Nonetheless, Basil found time to alleviate the drab existence when he, along with another novice, posed as a colonel and his wife interested in sending their son to the boarding school. They duped the Guestmaster, who had invited them into the parlor and offered the two tea. The deception was discovered only when steamed from the cup loosened Hume’s false moustache causing it to fall into his lap.

Our study of this work opened up many questions dealing with faith and doubt, redemption of regrets, proper manner of response to controversial issues, and above all, the love and strength that come from a strong relationship with Christ. Saint Benedict adjures his monks, “To prefer nothing to the love of Christ” (4:21). By his life, the Benedictine, Basil Cardinal Hume, no matter what position he took or whatever burden was placed upon him, exemplifies a monk whose greatness resides in his humility, love, sensitivity, and trust in the Lord. By reading his biography, all of us in the class saw the monk who learned from his seniors and then modelled what he had learned for the younger monks coming after him. Our job is to do the same.

In 1950, at the completion of novitiate and the taking of vows, Hume went first to Oxford and then to Fribourg for theological studies.

With a Licentiate in Sacred Theology, earned magna cum laude, he was assigned to an industrial parish near Ampleforth Abbey, which brought to a full circle his earlier experiences as a youth of visiting the slums with his pastor. From there he was made a house master back at Ampleforth, where in 1963, at 40 years of age, he was elected abbot, the youngest man in the history of the house to come to that post.

Simultaneously, in the background, rose all the interest and excitement

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LITURGY OF THE HOURS Spirituality within Benedictine community

by Mark Rodriguez, candidate for Master of Arts in Liturgical Studies

In his Rule, Benedict tells his spiritual sons and daughters, “Let nothing be preferred to the Work of God” (RB 43:3). Hence, Benedictine tradition has always given pride of place to the Work of God which is Benedict’s favored term for “The Liturgy of the Hours” or “Divine Office.” According to Benedictine teaching, one finds in the Divine Office “the source of genuine spirituality and the central element around which the life of the monastery is structured.”1 And so, for the monks living here at Saint John’s, a steadfast commitment to this central form of prayer is a very high priority in a life devoted to the search for God in community. One cannot miss the sound of ringing bells calling the community and inviting students, guests, and visitors to “arise without delay [and] hasten to arrive at the Work of God” (RB 22:6), Benedictines manifest their authentic vocation when they truly seek God and is zealous for the Work of God (RB 58:7).

Father) but a man of prayer: “In these days he went out to the mountain to pray; and all night he continued in prayer to God” (Lk 6:12). Prior to the fourth century, there is considerable evidence showing that Christians prayed privately or in common at recommended times during the day. After the fourth century, there is a significant increase in information regarding these gatherings. Here, one begins to read about regular meetings taking place on weekends among the solitary desert monks of Upper Egypt.3 In lower Egypt, where Pachomius established communal monastic houses, these gatherings, or synaxes, were daily and took place in both the morning and evening.4 They would become what the Roman Church now calls the “two hinges on which the daily office turns,” that is, Morning and Evening Prayer.5 In them, desert ammas and abbas would come together to hear and ruminate on the psalms and other passages from scripture spoken by heart by soloists while they themselves worked to produce their tradable goods, i.e., baskets and/or ropes among other items.6 These they would in turn sell or trade in order to make their meager living.

Over the many years that have passed since the Rule of Benedict was first penned (c. 540 AD), the Work of God has always remained an unwavering facet of monastic life. But, this is not to say that historically the Work of God has not been marked by great diversity and variety. Monks and nuns have always shown a strong desire “to explore the riches of scripture and liturgical tradition in ever new ways,”2 and the monastic community at Saint John’s is no exception. After the call for liturgical reform at Vatican II, monastic communities throughout the world were encouraged to renew their expressions of the Work of God in inspired and original ways while still remaining faithful to that continuous tradition that hearkens back to the time when hermits and monks would gather together in the Egyptian desert twice a day to pray and meditate on the psalms. The community at Saint John’s responded to this call and in 1967 formed a Committee for the Implementation of the Vernacular Office comprised of Godfrey Diekmann, Michael Marx, Aelred Tegels, Allan Bouley, and other members of the community. I was able to sit down with Fr. Allan in order to discuss the long and challenging journey undertaken by Saint John’s as it strove to renovate its own expression of the Work of God in response to this call from Vatican II. The story he gave clearly shows that this was not some unimportant, random task to be accomplished simply at the drop of a hat. Much hard work, study, and perseverance went into bringing about this great work of love.

The earliest evidence (late 3rd and 4th century AD) for daily communal prayer done at set times throughout the day comes from what we now call the local parish. Here, the worshiping community along with its clergy would gather together each day to pray in both the morning and evening as well as hold vigils prior to Sunday Mass. According to Robert Taft, this cathedral office was a “popular service characterized by symbol and ceremony (light, incense, processions, etc.), by chant (responsories, antiphons, hymns), by diversity of ministries (bishop, presbyter, deacon, reader, psalmist, etc.), and by psalmody that was limited and select rather than current and complete.” 7 Readings from the Scriptures, however, were almost all together removed, for one must remember that “the cathedral office was not designed to instruct but to give public expression to the community’s praise and petition.”8 Hence, emphasis on intercession was very strong.

Later on, these two traditions would meet and produce a hybrid, urban-monastic tradition. This office arose in city churches to which monasteries were attached.9 At this time in Rome, the cycle of hours prayed throughout the day increased from the traditional two, that is, at morning and evening, to eight. To morning and evening prayer, the little hours (i.e., terce, sext, and none), night prayer (compline), vigils, and prime have been added. The Rule of St. Benedict also has this cursus or cycle of hours.10 Leading up to Vatican II, such an office became the norm not only for religious priests, but also for diocesan clergy as well. It was done completely in Latin, for lay involvement by this time had virtually disappeared. The hours had become increasingly complex by way of specific and numerous rubrical additions, and all music with all music having been handed over to specialists. Despite its complexity, however, the prayer of the complete Divine Office or Breviary became obligatory under pain of mortal sin for all clergy to pray. The liturgical reforms called for at Vatican II, however, would catalyze a much needed movement toward revising and updating the Divine Office in order to make it a more accessible and practical form of praying for secular clergy, professed religious, and laity.

Fr. Allan Bouley

Historical Developments In order to fully appreciate the reforms that followed Vatican II, it is important to have a cursory understanding of how the Liturgy of the Hours came to be in the first place. From earliest times Christians have always been aware of their need to pray. Paul tells his community at Thessalonica, “Pray without ceasing; give thanks in all circumstances” (1 Thess 5:17-18), and Christ himself gives us many examples of being not only a teacher of prayer (cf. Mt 6:9-13 where he gives us the Our 8

The Process for Reform Although the official liturgical language of the Roman Church was Latin, after the Council the introduction of the vernacular was allowed to some degree. Many bishops began giving permission to their clergy to recite the Breviary in the vernacular, and though Benedictines throughout the world were still praying the office in Latin, monks from both the American Cassinese and Swiss American congregations petitioned Rome to allow the monastic office to be prayed in the vernacular. In 1967, both congregations received an indult that allowed them to recite the entire office in their mother tongue, and to renew it in accordance with certain norms.

In response to this indult and to the norms it laid down for the reform of the Work of God, Rembert Weakland, former Abbot of Saint Vincent’s Archabbey in Latrobe, PA, then Abbot Primate of the worldwide Benedictine Confederation, called representatives from the entire monastic family in a meeting to address how the Work of God might be revised. The attendees ranged from the most austere and cloistered to the most active and ministerial, and, needless to say, in the face of such diversity it was all together impossible to reach an agreement on even what the new horarium (that is, the schedule for the Divine Office) would be. The idea of producing a newly revised, common Benedictine breviary was dropped. Instead, the Confederation published the Thesaurus Liturgiae Horarum Monasticae in 1977 to serve as a guide in helping congregations or even individual monastic communities renovate the Divine Office in the spirit of the liturgical Constitution Sacrosanctum Concilium.11 The Renovations Take Flight Previously, at Saint John’s, there were eight hours celebrated in the course of a single day, some of which were grouped together while others were anticipated the night before. For example, Lauds and Vigils were celebrated for the next day at 7 p.m.; the little hours were gathered around the community Mass early in the morning; and Vespers and Compline preceded supper. This was a common practice among black Benedictines all around the world. And so, one of the priorities in the reform of the Work of God at Saint John’s was simply to regain the integrity of the hours: Morning prayer needed to be prayed in the morning; Noon Prayer at noon; Evening Prayer in the evening; and Night Prayer at night. In the end, three of the original eight hours were selected to be celebrated in common: Morning, Noon, and Evening, while Compline was made private. A second priority in the revision of the Divine Office at Saint John’s was to separate the Eucharist from any of the liturgical hours. Hence, 5 o’clock Mass became its own integral liturgy.

Led by Fr. Aelred Tegels, OSB, the committee came to agree that the basic structure of each hour would be very simple, i.e., hymn, psalmody, reading(s), and prayer. The Committee for the Implementation of the Vernacular Office also decided to omit all introductory versicles, collects, and antiphons from the daily office with the understanding that over time some of these elements might be reconsidered. According to Fr. Allan, the primary, most basic revision of the Work of God was continued on page 10

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CONSIDER THE RAVEN

Liturgy of the Hours, continued

completed within the first few years after the indult. By the time the Thesaurus Liturgiae Horarum Monasticae was released, the committee was content to see that its work in progress was in compliance with the document’s norms, though the Saint John’s psalm distribution is a local work.12

Stewart, OSB, the committee secretary, kept highly detailed and thorough minutes.” In this current edition, the psalm distribution was slightly adjusted and new psalm titles and texts were provided. Also, the amount of psalm singing was increased. The community adopted The Collegeville Hymnal in 1992, and Fr. Anthony Ruff, OSB, is currently working on restoring antiphons to the sung psalms in the celebration of Feasts and Solemnities. The practice at Saint John’s, however, to omit antiphons (especially if the psalm is not sung) is still the norm.

According to Fr. Allan, “Antiphons rise out of responsorial psalmody.

When used with recited psalms, they are a bit odd.”

On the whole, the evolution of the Saint John’s Office underwent four main phases. The early 1970s saw its first publication in an original two-volume set. In this edition, the psalms were redistributed and voiced. Hence, the tradition of the choir alternately reciting the psalm in set stanzas was set aside in favor of a recitation which assigns sections of the psalm to the traditional two choirs, or to all (both choirs together), or to one or two soloists. This voiced approach respects the original sense of the psalm, can highlight the changes of speakers within the psalm, clarify the thought development within the psalm, as well as help focus the prayers’ attention.

From the beginning the “new” Saint John’s Liturgy of the Hours has made use of generous silent pauses between psalms and after readings.

Prayers end the main hours by way of intercessions (which are locally written) and the Lord’s Prayer which is prayed aloud by all.

Concluding thoughts All in all, the journey toward renovation and revision of the of the Divine Office at Saint John’s Abbey has not been easy, but what else could one expect from a community that prefers nothing to the Work of God (cf. RB 3:3)? Christ promises that “where two or three are gathered in my name, I am there among them” (Mt 18:20). Whenever nuns and monks come together to pray the Hours, the community enjoys the very presence of the Lord. The reformers of the Work of God here at Saint John’s knew this and therefore knew of this prayer’s fundamental importance to the life of their community, and so by spending their time and energy to bring about this effective and good form of public prayer, they showed to their fellow monks what Benedict calls “the pure love of brothers” (RB 72:8): “How good and how pleasant it is, when brothers live in unity!” (Ps. 133:1).

Later, the community moved to ring binders and began its use of the 1982 Hymnal of the Episcopal Church, which was then the best hymnal available. It also included hymns for the Divine Office whereas most Catholic hymnals at the time were intended for use in Mass or public devotions.

The community’s current seven volume edition appeared in print in the early 1990s. through the hard work of Fr. Dunstan Moorse, OSB. Its preparation followed a thorough review of future needs by an ad hoc revision committee chaired by Br. Dietrich Reinhardt, OSB, who was then the abbey liturgy director. In preparation for this edition, this committee met a total of thirty times in order to study everything the community had done since the original indult in 1967. Fr. Columba

Bibliography “Directory for the Celebration of the Work of God.” In The Monastic Hours, edited by Anne M. Field,

20-48. Collegeville, MN: The Liturgical Press, 2000.

“Directory for the Celebration of the Work of God” in The Monastic Hours, ed. Anne M. Field (Collegeville, MN: The Liturgical Press, 2000), 20 (par. 1).

Introduction to Saint John’s Abbey Prayer (Collegeville, MN: The Order of Saint Benedict, 1990), par. 6.

3 Robert Taft, The Liturgy of the Hours in East and West: The Origins of the Divine Office and Its Meaning for Today (Collegeville, MN: Liturgical Press, 1993), 61.

4 Ibid., 63.

5 Sacrosanctum Concilium [The Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy], trans. International Committee on English in the Liturgy, Inc. (ICEL), in The Liturgy Documents: A Parish Resource, ed. Mary Ann Simcoe (Chicago, IL: Liturgy Training Publications, 1985), 7.

6 Taft, 64.

7 Taft, 32.

8 Nathan Mitchell, “The Liturgical Code in the Rule of Benedict,” in RB 1980, ed. Timothy Fry (Collegeville, MN: The Liturgical Press, 1981), 387.

9 Taft, 75.

10 Mitchell, 389.

11 Ruben M. Leikam, introduction to The Monastic Hours, ed. Anne M. Field (Collegeville, MN: The Liturgical Press, 2000), 10.

12 The Thesaurus Liturgiae Horarum Monasticae presents four different psalm distributions for use throughout the worldwide Benedictine community. Saint John’s Abbey, however, opted to retain the use of their own distribution.

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2

Introduction to Saint John’s Abbey Prayer, iii-vi. Collegeville, MN: The Order of Saint Benedict, 1990.

Leikam, Ruben M. Introduction to The Monastic Hours, edited by Anne M. Field, 9-17.

Collegeville, MN: The Liturgical Press, 2000.

Mitchell, Nathan. “The Liturgical Code in the Rule of Benedict.” In RB 1980, edited by Timothy Fry,

379-414. Collegeville, MN: The Liturgical Press, 1981.

Sacrosanctum Concilium [The Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy]. Translated by the International

Committee on English in the Liturgy, Inc. (ICEL). In The Liturgy Documents: A Parish Resource. Edited by Mary Ann Simcoe. Chicago, IL: Liturgy Training Publications, 1985

by Martin Connell

Over a century before my birth in Philadelphia, Edgar Allan Poe wrote one of America’s most famous poems there. As you might remember, if you studied Poe in school, its familiar rhyme begins:

we know little of Saint Benedict’s life from the Rule itself. More is found in the “Life of Saint Benedict” by Saint Gregory the Great (pope 590-604 AD), in which we find a raven’s tale and discover the lost Lenore—why we have ravens on campus.

Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered, weak and weary, Over many a quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore, While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there came a tapping, As of some one gently rapping, rapping at my chamber door.

I don’t know about you, but these lines of “The Raven” sound pretty much as many of us might feel, languishing “in bleak December,” when the poem sets this rhyming tale of the loss of the student’s loved one:

The story goes that a priest who lived near Benedict’s monastery envied the monk’s popularity. Gregory depicts the priest, Father Florentius, as “possessed with diabolical malice.” Jealous of the saint’s virtues, he wanted to back-bite his manner of living, and to lie to as many as he could to keep them from going to visit the saint.

Nonetheless, visitors continued to seek out the holy monk, so Florentius, not to be deterred, laced some bread with lethal poison and coaxed a raven to deliver it to Benedict. Through God’s care, Benedict knew the bread was dangerous and instructed the raven to take it far away: “At length, with much ado, the raven took it up, and flew away, and after three hours, having dropped the loaf, he returned again, and received his usual allowance [of bread] from the man of God.”

Eagerly I wished the morrow; vainly I had sought to borrow From my books surcease of sorrow – sorrow for the lost Lenore...

Florentius didn’t give up after the failed poisoned bread, however; he “sent before the monks’ eyes in the monastery garden seven naked young women, who took one another’s hands, dancing and playing for a long time,” all to “inflame” the minds and “wicked libidos” of the monks. In the end, Benedict’s raven saved Benedict from the murderous wiles of Father Florentius and the rest is history. Despite the multiple images of threat encountered, Brother David-Paul and the pediment artist wisely chose the raven, rather than naked dancing girls to illustrate God’s saving power and spare the inflamed imaginations of those who might find seven naked women attractive.

Poe’s avian protagonist, the creature of the poem’s title, was an unsolicited visitor. By the end of the composition, neither the student, nor we Poe’s readers, know for sure if the raven is a good bird or bad bird: “Prophet!” said I, “thing of evil! – prophet still, if bird or devil! – Whether tempter sent, or whether tempest tossed thee here ashore…

As the student continues to converse with the raven and implores the wingèd entrant about whether or not his love will return – who among us hasn’t been in that place, whether in high school, college, or later-the last lines leave us as readers ­­ hanging in the dark:

While the raven helped Saint Benedict escape death, praise of ravens is somewhat ambiguous in the Bible. You might recall that there is a raven in the first few chapters of the Bible in the Book of Genesis. Noah sends it out to see if the floodwaters had stopped, but the raven doesn’t come back. (Bad raven.) Later in the Old Testament, the wonderful lovepoem of the Song of Songs uses nature to portray human beauty, waxing in praise that “his locks [of hair] are wavy, black as a raven” (5:11). There, then, the raven is likened to a handsome quality in an attractive man. (Good raven.)

And his [the raven’s] eyes have all the seeming Of a demon’s that is dreaming, And the lamp-light o’er him streaming Throws his shadow on the floor; And my soul from out that shadow that lies floating on the floor Shall be lifted – nevermore!

Though we were occupants of the same city and I’ve walked or biked by his house many times, I’m not an enthusiast of Poe’s work. I do think of him and this poem, however, when I see two ravens in sight of one another between The Great Hall and the music building on the SaintJohn’s University campus.

On campus, Benedict’s raven reminds us of God’s providence in the face of an enemy or plotting murderer and support in time of need. As you pass by the metal raven of the Benedict statue, pet the bird, think of Benedict, and say a prayer. Pause to consider the raven (Luke 12:24), and give yourself over to God’s help.

There is a raven carved into the pediment dedicated to Saint Benedict on the Music Building (facing the Quad). The other raven is right in front of you as you stand with your back to the Music Building, chirping forever beside Saint Benedict in the iron statue by art professor Brother David-Paul Lange and apprentice Steven Lemke.

The raven could even become an image for your prayer. Implore God to send you a “raven” in time of need, in the form of a sacrament of the church, a kind roommate, a listening friend or family-member, whatever God might supply in times of trouble and temptation. Just for fun, you might squawk like a raven, even if it is just once. Saint Benedict and God will hear your avian cry and know what you need.

Adapting the biblical command from the Gospel of Luke, “Consider the raven” (12:24), I suggest: Consideramus sancti benedicti corvum nostrum, or in English “Let’s think about our raven, Saint Benedict’s.”

Even though we have Saint Benedict’s Rule that sisters and monks of Saint Benedict’s and Saint John’s follow and still read aloud in community, 10

Gregorius I, Vita S. Benedicti, Chapter 8; original in J.-P. Migne, Patrologia Latina 66: columns 146C-150A; my translation.

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existence, in emptying our certitudes, at the foot of the cross, in the confession we all share, that we are first among sinners [1 Tim 1:15]. In such moments, we are called to act, and we are called to know that how we act will be the eternity “we are and are becoming.” In Kingdoms of God, Kevin Hart points out that Jesus’ use of parable “brackets everyday life and its worldly logic,” in order to invite us to consider “using a divine logic, one based on compassion and forgiveness” – a logic “outside all economy.”1 Jesus commands us: to participate in the presencing of Kingdom, like the father [Lk 15:11-32], who welcomes back the lost son out of a mercy that defies human calculus. Such defiance marks the site of spirituality; it makes the space necessary for the heart to receive the revelation of the Spirit. Such defiance causes what Jean-Luc Marion calls a “lived experience of the invisible,” in which the invisible is shared, by a co-effort of “two gazes concerned each by the other.”2 Prison becomes then a site, not of bracketed punishment, but of bracketing punishment and judgment, to re-gain a sense of dignity in the other, for both persons coming into the encounter, and to re-connect the loving logic of the Spirit, and to re-learn this logic, to re-orient toward this logic, and to move back into the everyday world, thus affected.

A crime occurs in a moment in space-time. And our dignity becomes currency, becomes stolen.

A conviction/sentencing occurs in a moment in space-time. And the dignity we all possess is converted into currency, to be weighed in the economy of what we have come to term justice.

A moment in space-time and all of the metaphorical will not erase the literalness of the pain caused to a victim.

A moment of stupid non-thought, of seeing red, of too much drugs in the bloodstream, and biographies are derailed, and history permanently goes off on unforeseen trajectories, with a co-opted momentum.

PNEUMA ON DEATH ROW Making use of spirited space

by Carlton Chase M.A. in Theology, ThM candidate and Ron Cauthern, prisoner on Death Row

Or – as has been shown again and again – a moment of botched forensics, of the lies of a liar on a stand, of the stratagems of an ambitious prosecutor, of a prejudiced police force, of a tired judge, of an incompetent public defender, and a man, an innocent who never did the crime with which he has been stigmatized for decades, this man waits for a death he does not deserve: a collateral that society, in its efficiency, has deemed acceptable.

In this absurdity, in this hopelessness, Jesus tells us to “find our way” to him, and to the Father, through the “wear on our very soul,” moving beyond the explicitness of the anxiety that is the horizon of human

Kevin Hart, Kingdoms of God (Bloomington and Indianapolis: Indiana University Press, 2014), 124–131.

Jean-Luc Marion and Kevin Hart, “The Intentionality of Love,” in The Essential Writings (New York: Fordham University Press, 2013), 372–3.

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by Ron Cauthern

For each of us, there are very personal beliefs to guide us and build a solid foundation for the years ahead. And then there are the years of wear on our very soul that lead to simple notions to let us know we are still human.

by Carlton Chase

Ron is a man who has been on the inside for a very long time, ever since he was a teenager. I have known him only for about four years.

Ron came up to me early in my work with the prison, and asked if I wouldn’t mind being his sponsor for his baptism and confirmation into the Catholic Church. I said I would, and that began a relationship that would become a friendship in Christ.

because he, among others, has taught me much, by his example. I should let it be known, that in choosing to enter into prison, into the lives of men trapped there, I choose not to pry into their biographies, their trials, the crimes of which they have been convicted. I choose this, because I do not believe it benefits my ability to be present.

I endure this environment, because I am enjoined by Jesus to do just that [Mt 5:31-46], not to the exclusion of other compassionate acts of engagement, but in addition to the lonely, the sick, the homeless children, in a shelter, trying to focus on homework at the same time. I enter, because I was invited; and, once within the walls, I “stay in the present moment,” Ron’s words. If I remain attentive, as such, I honor Bergson’s notion of time, and I am open to responding authentically to the immanent presence of Christ, in the suffering flesh of the prisoner waiting to be stripped of life – society’s manmade payback for the life or lives he has been convicted of snuffing out.

Can you befriend a man behind razor wire, whom society has convicted of a crime, whom a judge and jury has declared unfit for life? Can you trust a man of whom they say took a life? What about the innocents?

What about the victims? Why waste time on a man who is not getting out any time soon, if at all? Could not time be better spent elsewhere?

Should one forfeit the poor, the sick, the homeless, or innocent children struggling in school?

I endure being bodily searched every day I enter the prison, in order to go into a sealed world of cinderblocks and surveillance equipment.

I go in to be present to men, stuck between sentencing and death, in a limbo of anxiety, in a system that will never allow them into a process of public confession, public regret, apology, ownership, reconciliation, and redemption. I enter the confines of a system, built upon bracketed punishment, the maintenance of hateful distance, and a distrust of the central tenet of Christ – repentance and the kenotic act. Prison does not exist to allow men to grow, by “living as we are meant to live – with purpose, direction, and your hand extended to lift up those around you.” I choose to cite Ron’s words, to write from such inspiration,

Entering into this environment becomes a spiritual exercise, like entering into a parable, according to the instructions of Saint Ignatius.

One enters with presumptions. One attends to those at hand: prisoners, correction officers, nurses, wardens, comissioners. One attends to those absent: jurors, attorneys, politicians, victims, and friends who work in emergency rooms, who piece together the effects of unbridled violence, and friends who give their lives in service to under-funded public schools, trying hard to stop indifference that moves innocents to lives that end up behind bars.

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away and trust that God will use His will to create the setting for us to return and do our work at a later date. We have all been in a situation when our work alone is not enough. It’s then we have to know with all that we have become, we are merely messengers, waiting to receive our next delivery to be distributed.

My journey has reached the highest of heights because of some very basic beliefs. The first came to me only after I felt the uncertainty of what the future could hold for a person waiting to die on death row.

I realized it was to time to start living as we are all meant to live – with purpose, direction, and your hand extended to lift up those around you.

Lessons multiply as the fears pass, and the burdens we felt early on disappear and become an archive of opportunities we successfully navigated. Our regrets from the past lessen and gradually leave our memory. We don’t hold on to the baggage from the past because we have to make room for the gentle wisdom poured into our heart.

The second lesson was to let others be led to enlightenment – not dragged kicking and screaming; to allow the divine to touch us all and invite us to share this grace-filled touch with others. Only those who seek more out of their life can truly appreciate anything they achieve.

The steps in our life become wonderful memories of lessons learned, of faith growing deeply, and of reflections we can look upon to urge us along each path we take.

I have always believed in taking a practical approach to as much of life’s encounters as possible. In most people’s lives, they want to feel understood, and the biggest barrier for them is feeling like someone sits in judgment of them, or looks down on their life choices. This shuts them off to any new ideas out of a fear of these ideas, in the end, being critical of them.

Of course, even with the most perfect intentions, we will still face moments so unsettling that we question the very grace that has guided us. When I view the crumbling protections once cherished for a commitment toward dignity and the human decency of a civilized world, I fall short in my faith of our existence. I question how much longer we can survive doing what we do.

To eliminate being considered as judgmental, one should stay in the present moment. Our immediate condition is plenty for us to focus on and work with. The worst thing we can do to ourselves, and to others, is let negative thoughts of the past, and negative thoughts of the future, dictate our present.

I believe we are better than we act toward each other, and I know if we could hold Jesus’ hand and seek His guidance, he would tell us very lovingly that we need to find our way. His eyes would look deeply into our souls and see what we’re really made of. He would see what we are truly capable of and he would expect it of us.

One of my most profound moments in life has been the “Ah-ha!” moments I share with others when I try to empower them. The very second they find a new way to view their life and the direction they can take it. The toughest lesson along this path is to know when to back

What we should fear is someday facing our God and having Him ask us what lessons have we learned with the time we’ve been given. This is what has led to my own transformation, and my personal relationship with Him. 13

trails. Trails often allow for more time of introspection than road courses because the majority of the time trails are quiet and tranquil. The runner encounters nature through the peaceful solitude that comes with running alone on trails. Road running has a repetitious rhythm that often does not change from road to road, but trails force the runner to find varying rhythms, as terrain and elevation change more frequently.

For me, trail running is analogous to the rhythms of life.

gave in to a ‘bad’ race day and hobbled my way to the finish line feeling really disappointed. I was standing less than two blocks from the finish line when that disappointment quickly turned to terror.

Details need not be recounted, but that day changed my perspective on running and the community of runners that make the sport what it is.

The long distance running community came together around the tragedy at Boston 2013, and I came to realize that running is more than just a physical activity. Running also can be a way for a person to encounter God spiritually. Encounters with God are not solely found in peaceful moments of solitude achieved through a life of meditation or contemplation. Surely those are viable ways in which to encounter God, but encountering God in our everyday lives in the things we do that often seem ‘mundane’ or ‘arbitrary’ can be a profound way of living a spiritual life found in the ordinary – not always the extraordinary. This desire and search for God motivates me to continue running, and it led me to the trails rather than the roads.

SPIRITUALITY IN RUNNING THE DISTANCE A life changed

Leading up to my first 100K (62 miles) race attempt in October 2014, I often contemplated what seemed like the question everyone asked me. “Why?” When people ask that question they are often thinking of the physical aspect related to fatigue, hunger, weariness, motivation, muscle strength, etc., and they often are not thinking about the spiritual component that is indispensible to why runners do what I attempt to do. Trail running gives something back to me that is often hard to describe. There is something profoundly real about my experience of trail running that I cannot describe in any other way than as a spiritual experience. All persons experience God in varying ways throughout their lives, and for me running helps me to connect more fully. It may not be the same experience that other people gain from running, but I have found a community of runners that, at times, share similar experiences. I often think about – but do not have the answer to – how my spiritual running journey connects to my liturgical, theological and prayer life. As a full-time student in the School of Theology, and with miles of run-able trails in the arboretum, I have plenty of opportunity to seek God through my passion for running. One thing I can say with certainty is that trail running is a major part of my spiritual journey in search of God, and I do not plan to stop anytime soon.

Spirituality and Long Distance Running –Wild Duluth 100K

Photo: Eric Fought

by Joseph Eichorn

At some point during my sophomore year of high school, I stepped onto a scale at the doctor’s office and the nurse read off to me 300something pounds. Being less than my current height of 5’9”, such a weight at 16 years of age was obviously not healthy. The culture where I grew up, South Louisiana – a culture which often centers on really good food – was not, and is often not, a healthy place to live. I was a baseball player for most of my adolescent years until I injured my arm pitching, and at that point my exercise level decreased tremendously and the pounds increased. I was always a big kid, and I continued to get bigger. My father – also an obese man – had to lose weight so as to have a viable future with us as a family. At this crucial juncture for us, he simultaneously was hit with a reality check, and the whole family subsequently went on a diet. These circumstances gave us a reason to do it together. We chose to journey on a spiritual path towards healthier bodies with our loved ones along for the ride – not just watching from the sidelines.

Between my sophomore year of high school and this point I had lost over 75 pounds. It was not good enough for me. I was still hoping for more. I looked at my friend, an avid runner and triathlete, and asked, “When are you going to teach me to run like you?” That question changed the course of my life.

Boston Marathon – April 15, 2013

After asking that life changing question, my friend ran with me along my next spiritual journey. He taught me how to run long distances, and I have yet to stop. When I started running in October of 2007, I had a goal of not only losing more weight but living a healthier life that translates over to a healthier spiritual life. Within six months I ran my first 5K (3.1 miles), and another eight months later I was trained for my first marathon (26.2 miles), the Disney marathon. My friend and I trained throughout our senior year of seminary college to complete that race in January of 2009. Running became transformative for me not only on a physical level, but it slowly became a way for me to grow spiritually.

Including that first marathon, I now have finished six marathon road races and two ultra-marathon trail races. After my three years in seminary college I joined a Benedictine monastery in Louisiana for the next three years of my life, and during this time running remained a constant activity in my daily life.

Calling our family journey a spiritual one is a reflection of how my mother – a devout Catholic – raised me. She loves to tell stories from my childhood about how we would go to Mass on Sundays, return home and I would, out of my own volition, watch another Mass being celebrated on television. A sign of times to come? It is not much of a surprise that being raised a cradle Catholic and possessing a certain personality and temperament that I began to discern the priesthood.

At some point towards the end of my freshman year of high school, I decided that the priesthood was something to which I felt strongly called. I decided to give it a chance. Through high school I focused my life on the spiritual journey towards the priesthood, and it is within this mindset of vocational discernment towards diocesan priesthood that my weight loss journey is situated.

It is sometimes hard for non-runners to really understand what motivates someone to run long distances. Despite the seeming lack of overall understanding of ‘why’ to run such distances a heightened understanding emerged after the Boston Marathon in 2013. On that day I was not having a good race. My training had gone really well; near perfect in my eyes. I had hit all my workouts. I was feeling great. I had no injuries.

However, ultimately it was just not my day. Some things went wrong from the start of the race, and I hit the half-marathon mark slower than I should have been. Then somewhere around mile 15 I knew in the back of my mind that my race was foiled, and from that point on I

Fast forward five years, and I am sitting at a table during my junior year of seminary college with one of my best friends sitting across from me.

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Since the 2013 Boston Marathon I have not run another traditional road marathon; I found another kind of running that I love more deeply. In July of 2013 I entered the world of ultra-marathon running when I completed my first 50K (31 mile) trail race. Trail running is different than road running in many ways. There is no set pace at which to run trails; you run the pace the trails will let you run. Roads are usually not obstacle courses in disguise – as are some systems like the Superior Hiking Trail in Duluth, Minnesota. It is a new experience that I came to love because of the spiritual connection that I feel while navigating

BENEDICTINE TRAINING IN SPIRITUAL DIRECTION Cultivating presence in the midst of distractions

by Becky Van Ness

My hunch is that if we suddenly found ourselves face-to-face with the living Christ, we’d drop our phones and fall to our knees in awe and love. Yet, Benedict tells us that we daily come face-to-face with the living Christ in our brothers, sisters, guests, spouse, children or co-workers. Are we willing to set our phones aside long enough to give him welcome?

Surprising as it may seem, many graduates of spiritual direction programs never actually become directors. Why would someone enroll in a program like our new graduate certificate in spiritual direction here at the Saint John’s School of Theology and Seminary if not to learn to companion others? Student comments offer an answer: “Even if I never am a spiritual director, this experience has been so personally valuable, stretching me to grow in new ways. I would not trade it for anything.”

Much of that personal growth comes through exploring contemplative presence, the unifying theme of the spiritual direction coursework.

Contemplative presence as a way of being in the world is very countercultural, especially today. Yet on a deep level we do long to be present to the people we encounter, to all that life brings. We do long to sense God’s presence in the stuff of everyday life. The many distractions of our digital age make us forgetful of these deep desires. As Colleen McGrane, OSB. has said: “We cannot simultaneously keep the presence of God always, constantly and continually before our eyes and remain constantly connected, never deaf, and everywhere present to our smartphones.”1

The practice of hospitality offers an antidote to the temptation to let distractions divert our attention from the gifts God offers in the here and now. By practicing hospitality within the sacred space of spiritual direction, student directors also grow in the ability to be present to daily life. They seek to listen as God listens, fully awake to God’s presence in the directee and – in turn – to how God is present in each moment of life. No wonder the training to become a spiritual director is highly valued, even if never practiced in a formal sense. The increased awareness of God’s presence is reason enough to explore hospitality as a way to listen deeply.

The Rule of Saint Benedict presents hospitality as a spiritual discipline that nurtures the ability to be present in the midst of these distractions.

Benedict counsels us to receive the other as Christ, like Abraham, to entertain others as angels unaware. McGrane continues:

Colleen Maura McGrane, OSB, “Practicing Presence: Wisdom from the Rule on Finding Balance in a Digital Age,” American Benedictine Academy Convention (August 3, 2012).

1

Ibid.

2

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“ORA ET MANGIA” Prayer and table sustain us

by Patty Weishaar

And What Amazing “Mangia!”

The Pasta Explosion Breakfast-For-Lunch Soup’s On

Hearty Soups and Breads

Chinese New Year Feast (with chopsticks for all)

Mardi Gras Feast

(featuring Chicken Sausage Gumbo, Vegetarian Jambalaya, and King Cakes)

The Star Wars Lunch

(featuring Darth Vader Taters, Yoda Soda, and Wookie Cookies)

Bachelor Food Lunch Iowa Comfort Food Saint Paddy’s Day Irish Wonders (featuring Bailey’s Ice Cream and Guinness Brownies)

The Polish Excursion Caribbean Islands Delights A Taste of Mexico A Taste of Hungary A Taste of Korea A Taste of India Danke, Deutchland Ooh la-la: Parisian Cuisine MREs: Not Just for Soldiers The Moroccan Tour Cincinnati Chili Hot Dish Heaven and Bars

At Saint John’s School of Theology and Seminary our Benedictine roots run deep. We study theology and prepare for ministry in this place where the daily prayer, deep attention to God’s word, and the community life of Saint John’s Abbey (and just down the road, Saint Benedict’s Monastery) surround and sustain and embrace us. We also reap the benefits of embracing Benedictine mottos: Ora et labora (pray and work, or prayer and action), although not rooted in the Rule of Benedict, is one such theme. Balancing prayer and work (and reflection) surely is a call to wisdom for graduate students!

But – schools breed creative minds. And so to play with this motto: we are people who follow Ora et Labora – Pray and Work – but even more we follow Ora et Mangia – Pray and Eat. And we do this every week. On Thursday. At 11:30 AM. In Emmaus Hall Chapel and Dining Room.

And we call this “Thursday Convivium.”

From the Oxford Latin Dictionary: “Convivium”– to be alive at the same time, be contemporary; to spend one’s time in company, live together; to dine together.

Photo: Paul Middlestaedt

A Little Convivium History Up through the 1990s our diocesan seminary program had a regular horarium of prayer and meals, and often the Seminary community extended an invitation to the lay graduate students and faculty and staff to Mass, dinner, and evening prayer on Thursday evenings. “Seminary Guest Night” was a practice until 1992.

PASS THE SPIRITUALITY

In 1992 Fr. Dale Launderville, OSB as dean invited the School of Theology and Seminary Student Government to create a liturgy committee to begin to share in the planning and liturgical ministries of these Thursday night gatherings. For the next several years there were several incarnations of this Thursday night gathering: we experimented with having Mass, supper, and evening prayer, then Mass and supper, then supper and evening prayer. To figure out what worked, we rode the waves of some ebb-and-flow drama over the years.

by Jessie Bazan, Masters of Divinity candidate

Liturgy is a beacon for and a gauge of the life of the community; we moved over time to Liturgy-of-theHours prayer for our big weekly gathering. We named our gathering “Thursday Convivium” and settled into an Evening Prayer + Supper weekly event in 1996. The Saint John’s Dining Service provided the meals.

And then we changed our class schedule: away from the University 6-day rotating schedule we created a space in the middle of every day for meetings, small group events, and worship; we moved the “Thursday Convivium” to mid-day in 1998 to better serve the faculty, staff and students with families and evening commitments. Mid-Day Prayer/Lunch Convivium on Thursdays has been our practice for over 15 years now. And about 10 years ago we began experimenting with students cooking the mid-day meal.

Schools grow and change over the years; traditions form. Some are quite by circumstance, while others are set up with initial and eventually ultimate goals in mind. Our weekly Thursday Convivium is a best practice and a tradition at the School of Theology and Seminary that both forms us and offers opportunity to celebrate who we are: in a steady, weekly, balanced way, combining “ora” (prayer) and “mangia” (eating), the Benedictine values of awareness of God, community living, hospitality, listening, the common good, and respect for all persons, have ample opportunity to take root in our graduate school lives. We pray, we gather to eat. We tell stories. We laugh. We learn from each other. We welcome strangers and make new friends. We become the School of Theology and Seminary through our Ora et Mangia.

This is our best practice now: Mid-Day Prayer, followed by Lunch.

Ora et Mangia.

Thursday Convivium at the School of Theology and Seminary.

JOIN US!

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How food and fellowship bring busy students closer to God The most spiritually-invigorating hour of my week took place over burritos and chocolate milk. During my senior year of college, my friend Andrew and I met for lunch every Thursday in the student union cafeteria. The scene around us many days resembled something out of Animal House. Lone fries strewn about the tables. An aroma of burgers and bleach wafted through the air. Sitting just three feet away from each other, Andrew and I often had to shout to be heard over the escalating hum of rowdy frat brothers and giggly freshmen.

are filled with stories of Jesus dining with all kinds of people. Some of his greatest lessons were taught over meals. Jesus welcomed a dinner invitation from a Pharisee, demonstrating a spirituality of acceptance and love. He multiplied loaves and fishes, showing the faithful that God is the true provider, the bread of life. Jesus spent his final evening on earth gathered around the dinner table with his twelve apostles. Bread and wine – common food and drink – became Christ’s body and blood.

The Eucharist is a community meal, and that meal is at the core of the Christian faith.

It wasn’t your typical place of prayer, but that hour in the cafeteria satisfied my appetite in more ways than one. Our conversations moved quickly from class updates to deeper matters. How’s your heart feeling these days? Where are you experiencing God? What might God be calling you to do next year? We shared it all, listening and supporting one another as we wrestled with our faith’s biggest questions. When the last of the chocolate milk had been slurped, Andrew and I zipped up our backpacks and headed off to the next dates on our demanding calendars sustained by the nourishment of food and faithful fellowship.

Meal-time opportunities for hearty food and rich conversation have brought Christians together for centuries. These continue to be great chances to ignite the spirituality of Christians today, especially for busy students who struggle to find a spare moment for reflection. This year on Thursdays, I’ve transitioned from a spirited lunch with one to a spirited lunch with 50. The School of Theology and Seminary’s Convivium tradition is a cornerstone of the graduate school experience. The Latin word Convivium means “to dine together, to be alive at the same time.”

The school community gathers together for prayer and a homemade lunch each week. While sitting around the Emmaus dining room, we share stories about our lives, our formation programs and what we’re learning in class. We attempt to solve the world’s problems and dream about better tomorrows. Over lasagna and garlic bread, we build up the Christian community.

Sacred space and time aren’t always easy to come by in college. The demands of classes, internships, and extracurricular commitments barely leave time for students to have a social life, much less a spiritual life. But growing in relationship with God does not have to be viewed as a separate activity on the to-do list. Spirituality can be experienced outside the walls of a church and outside the realm of the individual mind and heart. It can be experienced within our daily lives. Andrew and I carved out our own time for spiritual renewal over the one constant activity in our schedules – eating.

That’s why I savor the meal time ritual. The ritual of breaking bread together does not take place removed from the chaos of my life. It instead offers a brief break to digest what’s going on, to deepen my spirituality, to learn and grow with others who are taking their own brief breaks.

In the comradery, in the cutting and clinking, in the simple act of gathering together, my community and I are creating sacred time and space for refreshment – both the bodily and spiritual kind.

The traditional meal cycle gives us three chances a day – plus snack times and coffee breaks – to chomp into conversation with fellow diners.

Why not turn the topic to spirituality? Jesus certainly did. The Gospels 17

ALUMNI & FRIENDS UPDATE BIRTHS

FACULTY– STAFF UPDATES WEDDINGS

Mason William McKay, grandson to Jennifer and Bill Cahoy, born Saturday, July 12, 2014.

Danielle A. Knott ‘04 married Brian M. Noe on October 11, 2014. Latisse A. Heerwig ‘04 was the maid of honor. The couple reside in Naperville, IL.

Clare Mercedes Bohannon, daughter to Anna Mercedes and Rick Bohannon, born born 4:03 am, Saturday August 30 weighing 7 lbs. 3 oz.

Rebecca Spanier ’14 married Chris Calderone, ’13 on Oct 11, 2014 at Saint John’s Abbey Church. The couple reside in Maple Grove, MN.

MILESTONES December Graduates, 2014

Nicholas Kleespie, OSB ordained transitional deacon Dec. 6, 2014 at Saint John’s Abbey.

Ben Caduff, Master of Arts in Theology – Systematics

in addition to previously earned Master of Divinity, 2010

Ruth Lindstedt, Master of Divinity

Molly Sagerhorn, Master of Arts in Pastoral Ministry

Shaun Crumb, 2007 Maryknoll Seminarian, ordained transitional deacon on Dec 13, 2014 at his home parish of Sacred Heart in Glenwood, MN.

Christine Pinto, Master of Arts in Pastoral Ministry

Laura Kelly Fanucci, 2009 author of Everyday Sacrament: The Messy Grace of Parenting. Fanucci sees the Catholic sacraments through the smudged and sticky lens of life with little ones. From dinnertime chaos to bath-time giggles to never-ending loads of laundry, Laura stumbles into the surprising truth of what the seven sacraments really mean: that God is present always, even in the messes of motherhood. A spiritual memoir of parenting’s early years and a sacramental theology rooted in family life, Everyday Sacrament offers an honest, humorous, and hopeful look at ordinary moments as full of grace.

Greg Spofford, Master of Divinity

Sr. Marie Zita Wenker, OSB, 1986 celebrated her Golden Jubilee of Monastic Profession in August 2013. She served as delegate to Congregation of Benedictines of Jesus Crucified General Chapter, Fall 2013, where she was elected to the General Council which brings her to France for meetings three times per year. She presented a paper, “The Blessed Virgin at the Foot of the Cross,” at the Motherhouse in France.

Germaine Smith, 1988 author of Between Lost and Found.

Recovering from abuse can be painfully lonely and feel utterly hopeless. From her own experience, Germaine Smith reaches out to other survivors who seek understanding, hope, and – above all – wholeness. She guides readers toward healing in all areas of being: physical, emotional, mental, and spiritual. Between Lost and Found, written in a poetic yet plainspoken style, offers courage for emerging from darkness.

Kendall Ketterlin, 2009 professed first vows with the Order of Carmelites (The Brothers of the Blessed Virgin Mary of Mount Carmel) on June 9, 2014.

Gerardo Rodriguez, 2006 is now Assistant Professor at Carroll College.

Alums

Relatives and Friends

DEATHS

Rev. Raymond J. Deisch - SJU ’58

(relatives of donors and donors and SOTF designations)

Rev. James D. Hahn - SOT 1961 Vincent Morrison - SOT 1953 Rev. Alvin J. Quade - SOT 1954 Rev. Michael Richel - SOT 1987 S. Maria Tasto - SOT 1973 S. Cabrini Walch - SOT 1973 Rev. Richard Walz - SOT 1988

James P. Cassidy Norbert Vos John “Jack” Schneider Tony Ament William J. (Bill) Anderson Honora Benda Janet Bender Patricia Wahl Bitzan Charlotte Canton Brenda Coleman

& SOT ’62

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Dorothy C. Dirksen James M. Duffy Mary Eoloff Sister Mary Frances Gebhardt Irene M. Graham Robert Kaster Rita Krych Fr. Charles William Kunkel Frank Ladner Edith Lingle Sister Jean Osterfeld

Bill Quarfot Lilian Rivers John J. Schmitt Alan Schmitz Lora Steil Janet Sivanich-Thull Lawrence Toth, Jr. Dennis Warner Helen Wiechmann Hildegard Wiechmann Helen Wiener

Kathleen Calahan, continured

Rebecca Berru Davis, PhD is new on our faculty this year as a Louisville Institute Postdoctoral Fellow. She completed her PhD in Art and Religion at the Graduate Theological Union in Berkeley, California. Rebecca is interested in the intersection of art, faith, and justice as a way to understand the spiritual and religious expressions of those located on the margins of society. Her research is focused on women, particularly Latin American and U.S. Latina women’s creative activity evidenced in the home, the church and the community. With over twenty years of teaching, museum, and arts advocacy experience she continues to explore ways in which the arts are illuminative, inspirational and prophetic.

and Learning in Theological Education”; “Spiritual Practice for the Sake of Practical Wisdom: On Discernment, Humility, and Unknowing” “Roman Catholic Pastoral Theology,” in Opening the Field of Practical Theology, eds. Kathleen A. Cahalan and Gordon Mikoski.

Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc., 2014.

School of lectio divina, retreat leader, St. Paul Monastery, St. Paul, Minnesota Member, Advisory Board, Basic Issues, Changing Times, Candler School of Theology

Charles Bobertz Published: “The Gospel According to Mark,” 2015 Sourcebook for Sundays, Seasons and Weekdays: The Almanac for Pastoral Liturgy (Chicago: Liturgy Training Publications, 2014) vi-viii.

Member, Advisory Board, Wabash Center for the Teaching and Learning of Theology and Religion Jeff Kaster, PhD Kaster, Jeffrey & Gould, Craig. “Lost and Found: Catechesis on the Care of Creation.” New Theology Review, 26(2), 88-95. 2014.

Conference paper: “The Liturgical Purpose of Mark’s Gospel,” Catholic Biblical Association Annual Meeting in Providence RI, August 2013.

“Sustaining Christian Discipleship,” Presentation at Princeton Forum on Youth Ministry, Princeton Theological Seminary, April 29-May 1, 2014, Princeton, NJ.

Presentations: “Catholics and the Bible,” Third Annual Catholic Answers Conference, Glenwood, MN, August 2014.

“The Secret Lives of Gay Catholic Youth Ministers,” Catholic Association for Lesbian and Gay Ministry Conference, September 12-13, 2013, New Orleans, LA.

“Where Does the Bible Come From,” Msgr. James Supple Lecture, Iowa State University, September 15, 2014.

“The Synoptic Gospels,” St. Katherine Drexel Parish Formation Program, October 26 and 29, 2014.

Fr. Michael Patella, OSB Theology Day presentations: “Mary in history and theology” five presentations 2014-2015).

“An Overview of Church History,” RCIA Program, Basilica of Saint Mary, October 28, 2014.

Presented: “Titian’s Madonna and Child with Cherries as an interpretation of Luke 1:5-80 and 2:1-40,” at the July meeting of the International Society of Biblical Literature meeting, Vienna, Austria.

“The Deacon as Preacher,” Keynote Address on Preaching and the Diaconate Sponsored by the Dioceses of Orlando and St. Petersburg Florida, Sharing the Stage with Bishop Robert Lynch of St. Petersburg, October 2014.

Most recent book, Word and Image: the Hermeneutics of The Saint John’s Bible (Collegeville; The Liturgical Press, 2013), won the Catholic Press Association’s award in Biblical-Academic.

Theology Day presentations, Saint John’s School of Theology, The Liturgical Reading of the Gospel of Mark (five presentations 20142015).

Selected to be part of the team revising the New Testament for the New American Bible. Work will begin in early 2015.

Kathleen Calahan, PhD Published: Opening the Field of Practical Theology, eds. Kathleen A. Cahalan and Gordon Mikoski.

Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc., 2014.

Chair of the Ad hoc Committee on the annual meeting for the Catholic Biblical Association.

Fr. Columba Stewart, OSB “Re-thinking the History of Monasticism East and West: A Modest Tour d’Horizon,” for Prayer and Thought in Monastic Tradition.

Essays in Honour of Benedicta Ward SLG, ed. Santha Bhattacharji, Rowan Williams, and Dominic Mattos (London: Bloomsbury) 3-16.

Co-authored Bryan Froehle, “A Developing Discipline: The Catholic Voice in Practical Theology” in Invitation to Practical Theology: Catholic Voices and Vision, ed. Claire E. Wolfteich. Mahwah: Paulist Press, 2014.

Virginia Stillwell “A Eucharistic Spirituality for Lay Ecclesial Ministry,” Emerging from the Vineyard: Essays by Lay Ecclesial Ministers, Maureen O’Brien and Susan Yanos, editors. Florida: Fortuity Press, 2014.

Presentations: Smythe Lectures, Columbia Theological Seminary, October 28-30, 2014: “Called to Profess: Why Vocation Matters in the Work We Do”; “Toward Practical Wisdom: Integrative Teaching

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FROM THE DIRECTOR OF DEVELOPMENT Grace Ellens Director of Development

“Saint John’s School of Theology and Seminary is the best place for our future leaders to get the training and formation they need. That’s why we included the School of Theology and Seminary in our estate plans and why we are Fellow Society donors.

We consider it a privilege and a responsibility to offer our support.”

Students at Saint John’s School of Theology and Seminary are formed for academic excellence and pastoral leadership in a community of prayer and service. Our students learn from the monks of Saint John’s Abbey and the sisters of Saint Benedict’s Monastery how to balance work and prayer, an important aspect of Benedictine spirituality. This lesson is one that not only colors our students’ days while here at Saint John’s but which they also carry on with them as they leave Saint John’s to study and serve elsewhere. On Thursdays, our Convivium prayer services in the Mary, Mother of Our Redeemer Chapel in Emmaus Hall is followed by a communal lunch downstairs, planned and served by students willing to share favorite family meals and staples of their cultural cuisines with the School of Theology community. These times to get together punctuate the school week and offer us an opportunity to recognize our gifts of service to one another as especially blessed. Our students grow spiritually, too, as they meet with individual spiritual directors or perceive the Spirit at work in their lives as part of a group discernment process which, under the leadership of alums and senior students, often features illuminations from the Saint John’s Bible with which to engage in visio divina.

Praise the LORD from the earth, sea creatures and all ocean depths, fire and hail, snow and mist, stormy winds that fulfill his command;

Mountains and all hills, fruit trees and all cedars, beasts, both wild and tame, reptiles and birds on the wing…

However, Saint John’s is uniquely situated to nourish the spiritual lives of our students in other ways, as well. One important way it does so is simply through its natural setting. Not only do opportunities for communal prayer mean our students can get a daily dose of psalms in the Abbey Church, but walking through the grounds surrounding the Church and university or taking a hike to Stella Maris Chapel by skirting Lake Sagatagan can also allow our students special times of solitary reflection or conversation with a friend, enriching their experiences of nature and its Creator. Indeed, enough times spent enjoying the woods of Saint John’s Abbey like this can give one a new and deeper appreciation of how the psalms may be prayed, so that one ends up with a very specific context for praying verses such as these from Psalm 148:

Your gift to Saint John’s School of Theology and Seminary makes it possible for us to continue to provide students with generous scholarships to study in Collegeville. Your gift makes it possible for us to share our faculty resources and wisdom with members of parishes and their friends both nearby and far away through the communities formed by participants during our Theology Days. Finally, your gift makes it possible for us to serve and praise God to the best of our ability as we, like his stormy winds, “fulfill his command.” This winter may you, too, be blessed with the knowledge that your gifts, as a cherished donor to Saint John’s School of Theology and Seminary, are deeply appreciated and continue to make a world of difference to our students as they mature and grow into the spiritual leaders and servants they are and will be wherever God leads them.

I know we are not alone in valuing the spiritual formation of our students. I know that you, too, understand the singular gift that Saint John’s Abbey is to the School of Theology, and vice versa. I know that our donors recognize and appreciate the difference that ministerial and academic formation in a praying community can make on a seminarian and a scholar. We need future leaders and ministers in the Church and world who have been transformed by the community of challenge, support, and compassion found at Saint John’s, so that they can go forth from Collegeville, providing leadership for the building and sustaining of such communities elsewhere.

Daniel and Lynn Fazendin

Perhaps you have appreciated stock and want to avoid capital gains taxes or you are at least 70 ½ years of age, and have an IRA for which you have a required minimum distribution, you are eligible to make a tax-free charitable contribution to Saint John’s School of Theology and Seminary as part of your annual required minimum distribution.

Photo: Se-la Catherine Lee

For information on ways to give, contact Grace Ellens at 320-363-2551 or gellens@csbsju.edu.

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Give online at www.csbsju.edu/sot.

SOCIAL MEDIA Four lessons in spiritual growth Karen Rose, OSB, Communications Director, Saint Benedict’s Monastery Member of the Board of Overseers, Saint John’s School of Theology and Seminary

Social Media at the Monastery Five years ago, Saint Benedict’s Monastery began a Facebook page. We’ve added Twitter, blogs, and Youtube videos. It’s a community endeavor and a small team* keeps things going. Why do we do it? Because it’s a way to share Benedictine life and spirituality with the wider world. In this article, the focus is on Facebook, but each medium has a place. None is good or bad per se; it’s how we choose to use them that counts.

I noticed on Facebook that as we began to post consistently, we gathered more and more page “likes” and some of the people started to comment, really quite regularly. Looming on the horizon was Lesson #2: Social media can help form community.

Every once in a while, I hear myself going on far too long and surely making less and less sense with each wave of words.

Words upon words flow, fill the room to its brim until noses, pressed against the ceiling, search desperately for fresh air.

Benedictine Hospitality in Cyber-Space Once I became aware that social media had the power to build community, I focused my thoughts and asked questions such as: “What sort of people make up the community out there? What can the monastery offer them?”

There isn’t a simple answer to who is part of the monastery cyber-community. We now have approximately 1900 followers. Some are Catholic, some practicing, some unchurched. They are more likely to be women (78%), to be young or middle-aged (25 - 54) and, although they’re most likely to come from Minnesota, our audience is worldwide. The age range is particularly significant. As our community is becoming smaller in number, fewer sisters now teach in schools or work in parishes, health care, etc., so many of our friends and supporters made their connection with us some years ago. Yet, through social media, we appear be reaching younger people. Lesson #3: Social media offers a way to extend Benedictine hospitality internationally to a new generation.

What Is It For? The question: “What is the purpose of our community’s social media?” should have been my starting point. However, in my first weeks, I set a very basic goal: to post something (pretty much anything as long as it related to the monastery) on Facebook. My slightly wooly purpose was to let people out there get to know a little more about the monastery and

Community of Prayer To find out what our Facebook followers are looking for, I researched some statistics on posts. Comments, likes and shares showed that what is most appreciated is that the page adds a spiritual dimension to people’s lives whether through calls to prayer or sharing our monastic life.

I happily use my copy of Give Us This Day each day, with much gratitude for the spiritual insights and the clear expression of thought.

Abbot Gregory Polan, OSB Conception Abbey

www.GiveUsThisDay.org 1-888-259-8470

The Virtues of Silence

This discovery reminds me of the ancient wisdom about silence and also poet Marilyn McEntyre’s concern about the “care for words” in a culture where blather substitutes for conversation.

the lives of the sisters.

Social Media – Oh, no!

Just over two years ago, I followed in one of the finest traditions of monastic life, taking on a job for which I had neither qualifications nor experience. Before entering Saint Benedict’s Monastery in 2007, I had worked in healthcare research. The job assigned to me after making perpetual profession in 2012? Director of Communications! I was excited by the challenge, but some aspects appealed less than others – social media being one. I viewed social media as superficial and distinctly not what monastic life should be about. However, I attempted (if grudgingly) to be Benedictine about this and apply myself to making something work on behalf of the community which I wasn’t very keen on. Lesson #1 in social media and Spirituality: Social media can be a means of conversatio morum.

FREE SAMPLES! Request one or up to 100 copies

Poetry by Victor Klimoski

COMING SOON APP

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2015 SPRING SEMESTER COURSES SPOTLIGHT Trinity, Faith, Revelation Shawn Colberg 3 credits • DOCT 407 01A Wednesdays 8:00–11:10 AM

Liturgy of the Hours Annie McGowan 3 credits • LTGY 423 01A ONLINE CLASS (no campus meetings)

Ecclesiology Kristin Colberg 3 credits • DOCT 408 01A Mondays 6:00–9:15 pm

Pathways to the Sacred: Art, Beauty, Spirituality, Worship Rebecca Berru Davis 3 credits • LTGY 468 01A / SPIR 468 02A Thursdays 1:15–4:25 pm

Patristics Charles Bobertz 3 credits • HHTH 400 01A Tuesdays 1:15–4:25 pm Monastic History II Mary Forman, OSB 3 credits • HHTH 415 01A / MONS 404 Mondays / Wednesdays 1:15–2:45 pm

A New Benedictine Outreach Some two years later, I have a clear intention regarding the monastery’s Facebook page. It’s a means to share interactively our Benedictine spirituality and life of prayer with others. As I see it, there’s no need to worry about whether millenials will like this or baby boomers that. Our Facebook community remains stable and grows because we offer a 21st century way to engage with the philosophy and practices of a 1500 year old tradition, the Rule of St. Benedict.

Our followers continue to respond to his timeless wisdom.

Rites of Vocation Annie McGowan 3 credits • LTGY 420 01A Wednesdays 8:00–11:10 am

*Thanks to team members present and past: Jennifer Morrissette-Hesse, Mariterese Woida, OSB, Kate Ritger, OblSB, PatriciaRuether, OSB, Nina Lasceski, OSB, Susan Sink, Colleen Hollinger-Petters, Trish Dick, OSB

The truth lies elsewhere, hidden in the long pause as the heart first listens and then distills a thought it says softly, slowly, before returning to silence.

What might be lost in such meager exchange matters less than what is gained when speech is servant to contemplation and learning the handmaid of attention.

For example, on Black Friday, we posted: “If it’s been a busy day for you and you’re feeling tired, take a look at this photograph of our chapel dome by Sister Nancy Bauer. What does it say to you?

Peace, calm, aspiration, stability, endurance? Allow your thoughts to wander into a realm beyond the everyday world and let you spirit be soothed.” It reached about 1800 people and 115 were actively engaged. Lesson #4: We are a monastery. People come to a monastery Facebook page because they are seeking something spiritual. Social media is a way to share our awareness of God.

iOS and Android

Somewhere, someone spun a myth about the merit of words by the bushel, a measure heaped up, pressed down, as though volume wins the point.

History of Christian Prayer Mary Forman, OSB 3 credits • HHTH 468 01A / SPIR 468 01A Tuesdays / Thursdays 9:45–11:10 am

Word and Worship in the Liturgical Year Martin Connell 3 credits • LTGY 421 01A Mondays 1:15–4:25 pm

Catholic Social Teaching: Today’s Moral Lens Bernie Evans 3 credits • MORL 422 01A Wednesdays 6:00–9:15 pm Survey of Moral Topics Kathy Lilla Cox 3 credits • MORL 428 01A Wednesdays 1:15–4:25 pm Evangelization and Catechetics Jeff Kaster 3 credits • PTHM 401 01A Mondays 8:00–11:10 am Leadership in Christian Community Robert McCarty 3 credits • PTHM 411 01A Weekend Class: January 16–17, February 20–21, and March 20–21; Fridays 6:30–9:30 pm / Saturdays 8:00 am–3:00 pm Introduction to Ecclesial Law Amy Tadlock 3 credits • PTHM 420 01A Tuesdays 6:00–9:15 pm 23

The Practice of Discernment in Prayer Becky Van Ness 1 credit • SPIR 437 01A *ONLINE CLASS (No campus meetings) January through March; REQUIRED Campus Meetings Saturday, June 13, 1:30–4:30 pm, and Sunday, June 14, 1:30–4:30 pm New Testament Greek II Jason Schlude 3 credits • SSNT 402 01A Mondays / Wednesdays / Fridays 3:00–3:55 pm Tuesdays / Thursdays 2:20–3:40 pm Gospel of Matthew Charles Bobertz 3 credits • SSNT 417 01A Thursdays 1:15–4:25 pm Prophets Corrine Carvalho 3 credits • SSOT 412 01A Thursdays 6:00–9:15 pm Wisdom Tradition Irene Nowell, OSB 3 credits • SSOT 414 01A ONLINE CLASS (no campus meetings) Introduction to Christian Tradition II Shawn Colberg 3 credits • THY 404 01A Tuesdays / Thursdays 9:45–11:10 am More info: www.collegevilleMN.com e-mail: gradschool@csbsju.edu

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Saint John’s University

P.O. Box 5866 Collegeville, MN 56321 Change Service Requested

UPCOMING EVENTS: FRIDAY– SATURDAY, JANUARY 23–24, 2015 Association of Theological Field Educators, Santa Fe, New Mexico.

Keynote Speaker Kathleen Cahalan presenting “Learning Ministry I: From Novice to Competent Practitioners,” and “Learning Ministry II: Toward Practical Wisdom” and a workshop on “Designing a Course for Integrative Teaching and Learning Friday.”

For more info or to register, call (404) 556-6726 FRIDAY, JANUARY 30, 2015 | 8:30 a.m. – 1 p.m.

Theology Day: Mary in History and Theology Presenter: Father Michael Patella, OSB | Emmaus Hall, Saint John’s University, Collegeville MN SUNDAY, FEBRUARY 1, 2015 | 11 a.m. – 3 p.m.

Theology Day: Responsibility, Leadership, and Change: Co-Workers in the Vineyard and the Adult Church Presenter, Bill Cahoy, PhD | Saint John Vianney Parish, Omaha, NE SATURDAY FEBRUARY 7, 2015 | 5:30–7:30 PM YTM Benefit Dinner | Pax Christi Church, Rochester, MN Email YTM@CSBSJU.EDU for more info or to register FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 13, 2015 | 8:30 a.m. – 1 p.m.

Theology Day: Mary in History and Theology Presenter: Father Michael Patella, OSB | The Community of the Blessed Sacrament in Scottsdale, AZ FRIDAY, MARCH 20, 2015 | 8:30 a.m.–1 p.m.

Theology Day: The Changing Seasons of the Moral Life Presenter: Kathy Lilla Cox, PhD | Emmaus Hall, Saint John’s University, Collegeville MN

THURSDAY, MARCH 19, 2015 Vatican II + Ecumenism Series – Dei Verbum 3:30 pm Bar Jonah presentation by Charles Bobertz, PhD 5:00 pm Mass in the Abbey Church 5:30 pm Wine and cheese social 6:00 pm Dinner ($10) and presentation 7:30 pm Keynote Harry Attridge, PhD – Yale Divinity School Come for any part or all. RSVP required: www.vaticanIItalks.org / 320-363-2622 THURSDAY, MARCH 26, 2015 | 6 p.m.– 9 p.m.

Theology Day: The Changing Seasons of the Moral Life Presenter: Kathy Lilla Cox, PhD | Christ Cathedral, Garden Grove, CA SATURDAY, MARCH 28, 2015 | 8:30 a.m.–1 p.m.

Theology Day: The Changing Seasons of the Moral Life Presenter: Kathy Lilla Cox, PhD | Saint Paul the Apostle Parish, Los Angeles, CA THURSDAY, APRIL 9, 2015 | 6 p.m.– 9 p.m.

Theology Day: Mary in History and Theology Presenter: Father Michael Patella, OSB | Church of Saint Mary in Alexandria, MN FRIDAY, APRIL 17 | 8:30 a.m. – 1 p.m.

Theology Day: The Changing Seasons of the Moral Life Presenter: Kathy Lilla Cox, PhD | Emmaus Hall, Saint John’s University, Collegeville MN TUESDAY, APRIL 28 | 6 p.m.– 9 p.m.

Theology Day: The Changing Seasons of the Moral Life Saint Joseph the Worker Catholic Church, Maple Grove THURSDAY, MAY 7, 2015 | 6 p.m.– 9 p.m.

Theology Day: Mary in History and Theology Presenter: Father Michael Patella, OSB | Basilica of Saint Mary, Minneapolis

For full details, go to www.collegevilleMN.com