What Changed?
Trusting Providence
by Br. Jean-Marie Hogan
by Br. Vladimir Barrett
The other day a confrere said something that annoyed me. Afterwards, I went and talked with him about it. We had a great conversation: he was receptive and helpful, and I came away with the sense that we had built up friendship. I’m not sure I could have approached the conversation that way six months ago. This experience prompted me to ask myself the question: what changed? One thing I have been learning since I came to the monastery is how to pray well. Specifically, St. Benedict suggests lectio divina, prayerful reading of scripture. I have found doing lectio divina well requires listening to God. Some days, I walk through the process of lectio, only to ask myself: Have I actually prayed? Or have I simply muscled my way through by thinking about God, rather than listening to Him? On the best days, though, I have been surprised by the direction in which God led me. I may have thought I knew where I was going to go during that period of lectio, but he seemed to have something else in mind. In lectio, I have learned how important it is to have a specific word or resolution at the end. If my resolution is something like, “Today, I am going to trust God more,” then, good as that is, I can’t really ask myself at the end of the day whether I have accomplished it. It’s too vague. Lectio has proven more fruitful when I have a word or phrase that I can come back to. I have also discovered how to pray during the moments of silence during the Liturgy of the Hours. At first, I was using these times to address God in an unspecified way, but what I have found is that these are opportunities for me to mull over the psalm we have just recited. Sometimes I do this by returning to a specific word or phrase from that psalm, much in the manner of lectio divina. Another major lesson has been the art of having difficult conversations. Perhaps a brother and I disagree about a topic, but I want him to be able to say what he thinks about it, without being afraid that I might judge him. In this, all the other things that I have been learning about prayer come into play. If I remain in Christ, I will be more able to approach that confrere with a spirit of charity and calm. This is by no means a skill I have perfected, but one that I am still very much in the process of learning.
One of the greatest blessings I’ve received during my novitiate is the growth in my own awareness of and trust in Divine Providence. I still have a long way to go, but the effects of this new mindset are already evident and bearing fruit. My hope and prayer is that, as I continue to grow in this regard, it will lead me to deeper levels of piety wherever my life may take me. Before joining the Abbey, I found it easy to describe to another person how Divine Providence works and would advise them to entrust themselves to the Lord in all areas of their lives. However, an honest examination reveals to me that I would lose sight of this ideal in myself all too often. Work, family problems, the ministry I was doing back home, and my own personal failures all weighed heavily on me, and I rarely was able to listen to the voice of the Lord amidst all of the noise coming from these stressors. I’ve noticed that since I have arrived at the Abbey, however, I have been more able to see how the Lord is acting in adverse circumstances, or at least trust that he is doing so without me knowing how. My vision of living in the Abbey before I joined was perhaps too idyllic, and I imagined it as a perfect peaceful place. Even though this is indeed a peaceful place, the cause isn’t that the monks never have any conflicts, but that the community is truly seeking to see the face of Christ in the person with whom we are experiencing tension. In the Novitiate, we have received formation on this topic, but the best instruction has come from the example of other monks – an example far more influential on me than any class. Learning about surrender to Divine Providence is beautiful, but seeing it lived out is what has really led me to try and open my eyes to how God is manifesting Himself in the brother I’m upset with, in the correction I’m receiving, in the plan I had that isn’t being acted on, in the weather not being ideal, or in any of the other thousands of things that can go wrong or that pull me away from keeping my focus on God throughout my day. This mindfulness of how God is acting throughout the day – in ways I like and especially in ways I wouldn’t choose for myself – has given me a much deeper sense of peace, unity with my brothers, ability to tolerate the wrongs I feel, and a greater desire to let him work more fully through me.
18
Kansas Monks
