This July 21-28 we entered into our annual eight-day retreat, directed by Fr Thomas Davis, OCSO of the Abbey or New Clairvaux in Vina, California.
The main theme of the retreat was the abasement of Christ as our way into the life of the Trinity. Here are some reflections by Mother Maureen on the retreat experience:
"This retreat was one of those graces of full circle for me---the circle of why I came to the Cistercian life and why I stayed. As I shared in my vocation story two years ago, when my spiritual director asked me why I wanted to enter the Cistercians I answered, “Because of Philippians 2.8: ‘He emptied himself taking the form of a servant…and being found in human form he humbled himself and became obedient unto death, even death on a cross.’” At that time I knew only that these words drew me powerfully to the contemplative life, but it would take forty five years of monastic living to experience how deeply they drew me into the abasement of Christ and how this abasement of Christ, as Fr. Thomas said, is at the very heart of the Trinity and keeps us, as well, in the heart of the Trinity.
But how can abasement have anything to do with the life of the Trinity? Olivier Clement, in his beautiful book “The Roots of Christian Mysticism,” speaks of a joyful kenosis, that is, a joyful self-emptying of one Person of the Trinity to the Other in utterly selfless love. And the love of each is reciprocated by the other infinitely. The kenosis of the Son in history is the extension of the kenosis of the Trinity and allows us to share in it, but the kenosis of the Son, as we know, was not joyfully reciprocated by human beings, but was even reviled, refused and killed. Yet such love cannot die. It cannot stop loving, and in so doing it took on the form of crucified love. And here is where we come into the picture. In our vocation to the humility of Christ, so carefully planned by St. Benedict, our lives too will take on the form of crucified love, the form of his abasement.
Of all the words in all of the Church documents I have read, I love these words from the document “Fraternal Life in Community” best: “Christ gives a person two basic certainties: the certainty of being infinitely loved and the certainty of being capable of loving without limits. Nothing except the Cross of Christ can give in a full and definitive way these two certainties and the freedom they bring.” We are called to this absolutely limitless love. It will take all of our self, all that we have, but if we enter into the process that the Cistercian life offers us of dying to self, we will enter more and more deeply into the hidden secret of the Trinity.
I want to share with you something about Mother Agnes now, something about the depths of her humility and selflessness when she consciously approached the end of her human abilities and faced only failure on the human level. She has left us a profound witness to Christlike humility and abasement. The following passages are taken from her journal when she was about to return to us from the monastery of Hinojo, Argentina in 2008, six months after her resignation as Abbess:
Dec. 1 I haven’t kept up with this notebook---not for lack of time, but for lack of ability. The Lord has given me a desert time, because (I think) I needed to be reduced to real poverty of spirit. Dry, crumbly, empty—no great experience of prayer, no bright lights, no fire in the heart. Lots of blundering, stupidity, forgetfulness, etc. But I am grateful---it is what I needed and probably won’t get at home. I do trust my Lord absolutely and believe in His love and His care for me.
Dec. 5 Thank you, dearest Lord Jesus, for making your plan of loving care so clear to me—the inability to do creative writing, the loneliness, the inner emptiness, the inability to learn Spanish well, the problems with my hands and feet, the difficult relationship, the millions of mistakes, the feeling of stupidity, my bumps and bruises from stupid mistakes, etc. It is really clear to me today how much I needed to become aware of my lingering self-love and lack of humility! And what a treasure it will be if I can understand more and more clearly the obstacles that are diminished or removed by this suffering. I am truly poor---oh joy! If I can learn this lesson my old age will be a very joyful time, as I lose one ability after another and grow smaller and weaker and at the same time more delicately aware of God’s wonderful design and personal care for me. When I read this over, I may not understand again, but I know Jesus’ love beyond any doubt or difficulty, whether I feel it or not. Lord, do with me what you will, and I will know whatever it is, it is a gift of love.
Let us cherish her message to us and follow her example of trust and poverty and humility."