Ecumenism is defined as “the principle or aim of promoting unity among the world’s Christian Churches.” Led by this strive for unity, Holy Wisdom Monastery has long been welcoming people of a variety of denominations and religions.

Therefore, it made sense to sit down for a deeper look with the women who have led us here.

Thus, this first episode of The Holy Wisdom Podcast features Sister Mary David Walgenbach and Sister Joanne Kollasch. They begin by sharing their early memories of meeting people from other denominations. Then, they regale some of the early stories that led to the monastery becoming a retreat center.

One of these stories may involve some horses and some startled Monks of Taize.

Where to Listen?

You can listen to The Holy Wisdom Podcast at any of these online locations:

Our Blog, under the “Podcast” Category

Anchor.fm

Breaker

Google Podcasts

Spotify

RadioPublic

PocketCasts

The post ‘Becoming Ecumenical: Bringing Christians Together,’ The Holy Wisdom Podcast appeared first on Holy Wisdom Monastery.

Sister Paz Vital, standing, welcomes the staff from Centro Hispano to the monastery.

The sisters at Holy Wisdom have received a lot of guests recently. We greet the groups who come to use our space for their meetings and retreats. We get to know personal retreatants over meals in the community dining room. When I first came to the monastery, as an introvert, I found it taxing to have new people with us at every meal. Now I look forward to meeting them.

Saint Benedict says that a monastery is never without guests. Indeed, we wouldn’t really be a Benedictine monastery without guests. We are called to provide hospitality and serve others. Benedict also writes in his Rule that guests bring a blessing. We have been blessed richly by the guests we have gotten to know recently.

For two days at the end of April we hosted 200 people for a Mindful Self-Compassion training brought to Madison by UW Integrative Health. Our coworkers worked hard to provide for the needs of the guests. People from around the country and as far away as Hawaii attended. The presenters and many of the participants expressed their appreciation for the beauty of the space, for the nourishing food, for our hospitality, openness and care for the earth.

The following week we hosted the staff from Centro Hispano where Sister Paz is doing her ministry practicum for her studies in Hispanic theology and ministry. The staff was excited to learn about Holy Wisdom Monastery and the opportunities for prayer, retreats and walking the trails. Many plan to return.

That same week we provided the morning program for the Servant Leadership class from the UW Extension. Toby Grabs, one of our coworkers, gave them a tour of our facility, and I offered a presentation on how the values of listening and collaboration have guided the sisters’ leadership over the years. This group holds its classes at the monastery every semester because of their resonance with the values here.

Two of Sister Joanne’s nieces visited us for a few days of relaxation. We received a number of new members at Sunday Assembly and have gotten to know personal retreatants (Baptist, Episcopal, Evangelical, Presbyterian, Methodist and others) from Madison, Middleton, Appleton, Chicago, Champaign, IL and other places.

At the May Sacred Citizenship event we learned about the Wisconsin Farmers’ Union and the efforts family farmers in Wisconsin to advocate for sustainable prices for themselves in a market dominated by corporate farming. We hosted about 75 people at the reception for Lisa Seidman’s photography exhibit entitled Beneath the Surface.

When people ask what we do at the monastery, one of the things we tell them is that we provide hospitality and receive guests. That often doesn’t sound much like “work.” However, it is surprising how much energy hospitality takes on the part of the sisters, the coworkers and many volunteers. I have come to think of our hospitality as holding the space for others to do the inner or outer work that brings them to the monastery.

Occasionally our guests will tell us of the work they do while here. They write or paint or dream. They grieve or celebrate or sleep. They walk or sit or work on the prairie and woods. They plan for change or recover from too much change. They come home to themselves and to the love that holds us all. They bless us with their presence. I am grateful for our guests. I hope to see you at the monastery!

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The hospitality of Abraham and Sarah
– icons by Peter Pearson which grace the sisters’ dining room

In preparing some thoughts on hospitality to share with our Benedictine Women of Madison Board, I came across an article Sister Joanne Kollasch wrote in 1984 for a meeting of the American Benedictine Academy. She includes a quote from a conference by the late Demetrius Dumm, OSB, a monk and Scripture scholar from St. Vincent Archabbey, Latrobe, PA. It sent my thinking about hospitality in a new direction. Here is what Demetrius Dumm said:

In Scripture, the entertaining of guests and the entertaining of strangers is the entertaining of mystery; this is to make room for that which is not known, for that which is potentially threatening for the future, ultimately for God. The greatest stranger is the future. Primary characteristics of anyone with authentic faith is their attitude toward the future. Not because it is so promising but because it is from God. God gives us the future. The trademark of the monastic witness is a positive attitude about the future.

“The greatest stranger is the future.” This is the line that caught my attention. It adds another layer to a Benedictine understanding of hospitality. It also provides an intriguing and life-giving way to think about the future. With all that is happening in the world, some days the future seems quite intimidating. The future is certainly always an unknown mystery.

It hadn’t occurred to me that entertaining the stranger was a practice that opens me to entertain the future, but of course, that is exactly what happens in the biblical stories of entertaining strangers. Abraham and Sarah provide a meal for three guests who come in from the desert one afternoon and Abraham and Sarah’s future opens up with the promise of a son.

Pharaoh’s daughter welcomes the stranger as a Hebrew baby boy when she draws Moses out of the water and decides to raise him. With that act of hospitality the future of the Hebrew people (as well as the Egyptians) changes.

Of course, the ultimate act of receiving a stranger is humanity receiving Jesus as God incarnate. Whenever and wherever people have received him, their lives and futures are changed. In calling forth this act of hospitality God provides the opening for newness, change, challenge and growth in human life.

Novices and novice directors gathered in one group, including Lynne Smith (back row, 2nd from right), Paz Vital (front row, left) and Denise West (front row, right)

At the Novice and Director’s Institute that novices Paz Vital, Denise West and I attended in May, each of the novices was asked to make a presentation about their communities. One of the items they were to address was some community plans for the future.  As Paz and Denise prepared their presentation, we had a conversation together in the sisters’ community about how we all saw the future. Mary David and Joanne, who have the most experience among us of welcoming the future, talked about how our community has moved into the future through welcoming and listening to others.

They shared their experience of receiving the Lutheran missionaries for seventeen summers, praying with them, eating with them, talking together and sharing life those years. Through this and other experiences, Mary David and Joanne were stretched. Their hearts were changed. This became one of the experiences that led to their openness to welcome women of any Christian denomination into our community making our community the first ecumenical Benedictine women’s community in North America. The Spirit led them into the future through their exercise of hospitality and the monastic practice of conversatio – fidelity to the monastic way of life and openness to change.

Mary David and Joanne told other stories of welcoming immigrants from India, Vietnam, Guatemala, China and welcoming Missionary Benedictine sisters from many countries. Their hospitality went deep, beyond just providing food and shelter. It extended to opening their community living space and their personal lives to these strangers who brought blessings from the Spirit. Through this opening, their future took a turn in ways they could not have foretold when they joined the community fifty and sixty years ago.

When Paz and Denise gave their presentation and spoke about the community’s future, they said, “We don’t know what the future holds for our community, but we know how we will get there:

• Listen and dialogue with people of faith from all different backgrounds
• Maintain a commitment to prayer and excellence in liturgy
• Change with the times and respond to the needs of the world
• Continue to work for justice and a reverence and care for all creation
• Seek help in leadership; we can’t do it alone!”

Joan Chittister, OSB, has written that if we live the present well, we will be prepared for the future. So I am encouraged to renew my practice of hospitality with an openness to what God is doing among our community of communities that will open up a future I don’t have to control because I can trust God will lead us as God has done in the past.

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