Dear friends,

As we approach the celebration of Easter, we hope that you are all safe! Many people have contacted us to inquire as to how we are doing. Thank-you for reaching out, and for your friendship and support. We are all healthy, and haven taken measures to stay that way. To protect ourselves and others, we’ve had to close our chapel—we’re simply not able to clean well enough after each visitor to make sure you’d stay safe.

Meanwhile, life in the monastery goes on. Our schedule, with its ebb and flow of prayer, study, work and community life continues as usual and helps us to focus on the essential. We are very aware of how fortunate we are to have a priest with us until after Easter. We will live this Holy Week in intense communion with and for you. We are holding all the needs of the world as we hold you and your loved ones in our hearts and prayer. Even though we are all celebrating the Paschal Mystery in a different way this year visibly, we are always invisibly united in the Body of Christ. When one member suffers, we all suffer; and when one member rejoices, we get to share that joy. As we celebrate together Jesus’s victory over death, let us pray in a particular way for those who have suffered death or loss as a result of this pandemic.

We will try to share with you what we can of our liturgy during this week. We don’t have the capacity to livestream, but what we are able to record, we will try to share with you!

Beginning with Palm Sunday…