Print Issue: May 30, 2002

Second International Encounter of Lay Cistercians Attracts Worldwide Participation

By Dewey Weiss Kramer, Special To The Bulletin

CONYERS - From April 24 through 30 the usually peaceful West Scriptorium of Holy Spirit Monastery bustled with the look of a general chapter meeting of the Cistercian Order. From three booths came the subdued murmur of simultaneous translating from and to English, French and Spanish. The familiar habits of the Conyers monks were complemented by those with slightly different details, denoting monks and nuns from other houses and nations.

About 100 representatives of 26 lay communities from 10 countries and four continents convene at the Abbey of Our Lady of Holy Spirit for the second international Encounter of lay cistercian Associates. They are talking about how they are applying the Rule of St. Benedict and the Cistercian charism to their lives in the outside world. Spanish, French and English translations were given through the use of headsets.

This was not, however, an international gathering of Cistercian monks and nuns of the Strict Observance but rather the Second International Encounter of "Lay Cistercian Associates." And the real business of the meeting was being carried out by some 100 representatives of 26 lay communities from 10 countries and four continents, men and women committed to applying the Rule of St. Benedict and the Cistercian charism to their lives in the world, outside the monastic enclosure.

The movement for lay Cistercian associates began in the mid-1980s. Small groups of laity who frequented the monasteries of Gethsemani in Kentucky and Holy Spirit in Conyers felt called to form more organized groupings of like-minded persons who had an affection for their particular monastic community, desired some identification with it, and believed that its spirituality could, with adaptation to their secular lives, further their own road to closer union with God. The Gethsemani group drew up a "Plan of Life" for their community, the Cistercian Lay Contemplatives; the Holy Spirit group organized themselves more formally as Lay-Cistercians of Our Lady of Holy Spirit and participated in two years of formation. In March 1990 they formalized their commitment when five made "promises" to then Abbot Armand Veilleux based on the vows made by cloistered Cistercian monastics.

During the next several years, groups associated with other U.S. and international Cistercian houses sought contact with the Holy Spirit group and formed similar associations, though each with its own emphases. Since 1994 there have been periodic meetings among groups in some countries to share information and build community. The first international exchange took place in Chile in January 2000 with the participation of 12 communities. Growth has been great, and the Conyers encounter just two years later included attendees from Canada, Chile, France, Ireland, Nigeria, Norway, Spain, Switzerland, the United States and Venezuela. Abbot General Bernardo Olivera represented associate groups from Mexico, and the delegates estimated that they represent some thousand or more associates worldwide.

The 27 communities present for this Encounter (including Mexico's) represent diversity in size, specific observances, group make-up, processes of formation and stronger or looser ties to their "home" monasteries. Yet as they stated in their letter to the abbots and abbesses of the Order formulated during the meeting, they all have experienced the call to be "seekers of God within the Cistercian tradition, to accept the Rule of St. Benedict as their guide for living the Gospel of Jesus Christ," and they are united by similar values and practices: lectio divina (prayerful reading of Scripture); individual, communal and liturgical prayer; simplicity of life; "conversatio morum" (ongoing effort to conform one's life to Christ); interior silence and contemplation (to open oneself to the voice of God); work as a way to holiness (i.e., the world outside monastic walls constitutes quite as legitimately Benedict's "workshop of the Lord's Service" as does monastic enclosure).

The order, as stated in its Constitutions, is "a monastic institute wholly ordered to contemplation," to the communion of each person with God. Dom Bernardo dwelt on this charism in his address to the delegates by drawing on the words of Pope John Paul II in an Apostolic Letter which stressed contemplative union's possibility for all Christians. The mystery of the Church, as Bride of Christ, becomes true and incarnate in those who experience prayer as affective fervor. This contemplative experience of intimate union with Christ is not only for a privileged few. It is a heritage common to all Christians. Thus, as Dom Armand stressed, the Cistercian monks and nuns of today "do not own the Cistercian charism; they are its stewards." And he firmly believes, from what he has observed over the past decades, that "the Holy Spirit wants to give a new expression of that charism in our days, in the life of lay people."

The delegates came together for several reasons. They sought information about each others' communities; thus the first order of business was each group's introduction of themselves to their colleagues. Community building was crucial, furthered by shared prayer and meditation, participation in the Divine Office, and fellowship at meals. Interchange between monastic and lay Cistercians abounded, with some 20 monks and nuns in attendance as well as monks of Holy Spirit. Formation in Cistercian spirituality was furthered by the addresses given by the abbot general, by Mother Gail of Our Lady of the Mississippi and by Dom Bernard Johnson, former abbot of Holy Spirit, on essential aspects of Cistercian spirituality and practice relevant to laity living outside monastic enclosure and involved in secular occupations. The matter of formation of Associates posed a particular problem for the discussants.

Finally, consideration of the question of the relationship of the lay associations to the monastic foundations occupied the delegates, who intended to draft a document on this subject for consideration by the abbots and abbesses of the entire order at their General Chapter to be held later this year. Of the 26 monasteries represented, two (Holy Spirit and Genesee, N.Y.) have officially recognized the associate community as part of their monastic family

The Lay Associates' recognition of their dependence on monastics reflected, however, a reciprocal attitude on the part of monastics toward their lay associates. Dom Bernardo caught this relationship nicely when he quipped that the monks talk of "our" associates. But, he continued, "we should quite as correctly say that we are your monks."

Dewey Weiss Kramer is former professor of German and Humanities at Georgia Perimeter College and writes and lectures on monasticism and spirituality.