VIRIDITAS: SOUL GREENING
The contemplative lifestyle
As Trappists, we have the three pillars of the Divine Office, manual labor and lectio divina that create the contemplative lifestyle that supports us. Whether I am in choir or in the orchard, by myself or in community, all throughout the day and night, time is punctuated with prayer. Having a schedule like this helps me grow spiritually.
We begin every day at 3:30 a.m. with Vigils during which we pray some psalms. I love praying the psalms as you can really come to know God’s love for us through them — his forgiveness, his faithfulness, his provision in all our needs, everything is there. Following Vigils there is Lauds-Morning Prayer and Mass at 6:30 am. Between Vigils and Lauds we can take breakfast at any time. I find that time of day the quietest prayer period of all; spirituality is there. When I walk outside and see the stars shining, I just say, “Thank you, Lord.”
At that time, I also go back to my room for lectio divina, divine reading. There are certain indications on whether one will last in the contemplative life or not based on how faithful he is to lectio divina, or whether he goes back to bed. It is said that if one neglects lectio for a month, he will be okay as he came back to the practice. If he stays away from it for a few months, he will still be okay, although he is living more dangerously. If he goes a year without doing lectio, he is not going to stay. We have 40,000 books in our library. We do a lot of spiritual reading. One of my favorite saints is Julian of Norwich. Her writings are wonderful, and some of them I use as my own prayers.
An important prayer that we use in our spiritual practice centers on the power of the name of Jesus, the Jesus Prayer: “Lord Jesus Christ, have mercy on me a sinner.” To me, the Jesus prayer helps us to develop our personal relationship with Jesus. I simply pray “Jesus, mercy” with each inhalation and exhalation. As I breathe, I do not do so just for myself, but for the world. That is what our monastic way of life is to be — for the whole church.
We support ourselves at the abbey through the planting, maintaining and harvesting of our two vineyards, St. James Block and the Poor Souls Block, so named because it needs more maintenance; and our walnut and prune orchards. Coming from Hawaii, I knew nothing of growing prunes and walnuts, but I learned quickly. Manual labor, especially orchard work, is quiet work. It is mostly done by oneself or with equipment in the pruning of the trees or irrigating the orchards. I often go out at night, or after Vigils about 4:30 a.m., to make the change of the water and other proper checks.
In manual labor we can get too busy to remember God. But when we have the Divine Office that calls us several times a day to come back to pray together, manual labor is made holy in the presence of God. There are also other breaks that we keep that make the whole day prayerful. Our labor thus becomes a labor of love with our contemplative lifestyle providing the opportunity for that.
Father Harold Meyer, a native of Kalae, Molokai, is a monk at the Abby of New Clairvaux in Vina, California. He has been a Trappist for 41 years. The monks have joined the Sunsweet Prune and Diamond Walnut Cooperatives.
