|
Volume 34 |
Richardton, ND 58652 |
Chronicle 2006 |
January
Chronicle
Fr. Thomas has been busy in his new job as development director. One of his recent
productions is a handsome self-
These visitors are always welcome, of course. It is partly for them that we went to the great trouble and expense of renovating the great church these past several years. But visitors are also something of a burden to us since it is not always possible for us to provide guided tours for groups that ask. Therefore, the new brochure will help lighten our load as well as enlighten our visitors.
One of the many monks who work quietly behind the scenes hereabouts is Bro. Nicholas
Erickson. In his role as Assistant Infirmarian, he assists the sick and elderly of
the community. At the present time we happen to have a goodly number of these folks,
so Bro. Nick is especially busy. Fr. Robert has moved full-
Fr. Terrence continues his work with the Dakota Resource Council, a grassroots group for rural justice and environmental protection. This year he is secretary of the board of directors, a post he has filled about ten times in the past thirty years. This work requires attendance at board meetings in Bismarck, Jamestown and Minot, so a good deal of time and effort are involved. The old monks were told to “stay in your cell and your cell will teach you everything.” Nowadays, one has to venture out of one’s cell occasionally to find out what is going on.
Then there is this from the local police blotter: An elderly monk confided that he and a confrere were stopped recently by the cops while driving in Dickinson. When asked who the driver was, the monk said he could not remember his name, but “he’s the one who runs this place.” “You mean the Abbot?” “Yes, that’s his name.” “But what had he done? Speeding? Drunk driving?” “Oh no, it was a case of mistaken identity!”
Well, we should hope so.
How does a cow keep warm in winter? By eating a lot, that’s how! And keeping them fed is the task of Brothers Placid, Jacob, Louie and Aelred. This winter was fairly warm, so we saved on hay.
Keeping the roofs on our buildings in good condition is the work of our maintenance crew. For the actual roofing, though, we hire local professionals. Nowadays much of the roofing is done with a crane, making it much safer.
February
Chronicle
This winter the monks are watching another set of videos on emotional maturity. This set, which involves lectures by psychologists, talks about the ethics and dynamics of counselor/client relationships. Although a lot of what these folks have to tell us seems dictated by common sense, they emphasize that the role of the church person in these matters is somewhat different than for any other professional. These videos are produced by the Conference of Major Superiors of Men. Last year we watched the set on working with children and adolescents.
The big bell is having some trouble. Since we installed it last spring, it has been ringing before all of our services. Or at least most of the services. It seems that it ceases swinging when the temperature dips down towards zero (Fahrenheit). The technician from the company has been out to inspect it. But one wonders if the problem might lie on another level. After all, “Tibati” (the big bell) was cast in the Netherlands, where it does not get as cold as North Dakota. Maybe it just can’t take it? Tried antifreeze?
Recently our tailor, Bro. Bertrand, has been making some new vestments. We already have a lot of them, but some of them are wearing out. For example, we bought a quantity of raw silk on the Tokyo market in the early 1960s. We had this lovely material sewed up by the vestment departments at Hankinson, Yankton and St. Meinrad. Raw silk is not shiny, and it wears like iron. But in this transient world nothing lasts forever, and the chasubles (especially the green ones) are now fit for the ragbag. So far Bertrand has turned out an exquisite new cope; we await more of his craft.
Over the weekend of February 17-
March
Chronicle
Fr. Daniel was at the monastery on the weekend of March 18-
During the week of March 3-
The community meeting of March 14 focused on the Abbey courtyard. It seems that some kind of renovation is needed in that interior garden, since the vines have died and the great pine tree also appears to be moribund. Like all open meetings, this one brought forth all sorts of ideas, suggestions and emotions. One monk declared that tons of sand must be brought in to rework the lawn. Another declared that the courtyard cats are a nuisance. Some people feel that the night crawlers have ruined the lawn and therefore must be poisoned. And so forth. The courtyard is photogenic, but it is rarely used by the monks.
It was a sort of cold and dreary March hereabouts, but at least two of the monks managed to find some relief from winter. Fr. Thomas traveled to Phoenix, Arizona, for a week of contacts with our benefactors. He was the guest of Ann Kryzanauskas, the cousin of the deceased Bro. Juan Diego. Ann donated the “Joe Torre” bronze archangel in the vestibule of our church.
Bro. Alban got even further south when he flew to Puerto Rico at the end of the month. He is serving as secretary of the Abbot President’s Council, which held its semiannual meeting at the Abbey of San Antonio Abad in Humacao. This community is a foundation of St. John’s that runs a day school for some 400 students. There are about fifteen monks at San Antonio, and Bro. Alban reports that their spirit and their observance is very good. So he was edified as well as sun tanned.
This yellow pine has graced our courtyard for almost a century. It is the largest yellow pine in the state, but it is showing signs of mortality.
April
Chronicle
When the parents of this infant, Rick and Jen Padilla, were making their commitment
as oblates of our monastery, Bro. Aelred provided baby-
April is often a fairly cold and nasty month hereabouts, but this year was an exception.
Balmy temperatures were common, and the seventy degree days during Holy Week were
almost unheard-
Around Easter, the kitchen is always the scene of a lot of activity. Our spring open house in April drew very good crowds and so the hard labor of Fr. Thomas and Bro. Alban paid off in good bake sales. Bro. Basil sold a lot of gifts in his shop and Bro. Elias’ wine supply was sharply reduced. For Holy Thursday supper the cooks always purchase lambs from a local farmer and we enjoy this welcome variation in our diet. Why don’t people around here eat more lamb? We raise it; why not eat it?
Well, anyway, there was frantic activity over in the kitchen where Bro. Aelred set
up a little well with running water, presumably as a reminder of baptism. And the
long tables where we eat were reconfigured in a cruciform shape. The annual egg dying
party ran into a bit of a problem, however. After they were done coloring the eggs,
Bro. Nicholas decided to break one open to see if the color penetrated the shells.
Much to his surprise, he found that they had not been hard-
Because our printing business has been closed down, we have started to sell off our presses. But there is a problem. There is still a market out there for our presses, because they are good ones, even if they are old ones. The difficulty is getting them out of the basement where our shop is located. To do so requires a good deal of skill and effort—so much that we don’t know if the big press can be disposed of. We could tear down the building, but this newsletter is being written on the top floor.
May
Chronicle
The Diocese of Cheyenne, Wyoming, has announced that our confrere, Fr. Hugo L. Blotsky, has been transferred from Pine Bluffs to Buffalo. This means that he will soon move from the southeastern corner of the state to a spot in the foothills just east of the Big Horn Mountains. As Pastor of Buffalo, Fr. Hugo will also have care of the mission churches of Kaycee and Clearmont. Buffalo is about two hours south of Billings, MT, so Hugo will be considerably closer to the monastery than previously.
Fr. Terrence attended the Medieval Congress in Kalamazoo, MI, during the five days
of May 3-
At the beginning of May, Fr. Lawrence returned to the monastery from Colorado. Since November 2 he had been serving as chaplain to St. Walburga Monastery, which is a group of contemplative nuns. Since St. Walburga is very far from population, Fr. Lawrence had trouble finding partners for a pinochle game. Of course, he had ample time for contemplation and lectio divina, but, as they say, enough is enough.
Our community retreat this year took place from May 28 to June 1. The leader was Abbot Placid Solari of Belmont Abbey in North Carolina. Belmont Abbey is within a few miles of Charlotte, which is now a big city. Abbot Placid is a highly trained scholar, with a doctorate from the Augustinianum (Rome) in Patristics. Patristics is the study of the theology of the Fathers of the Early Church. That sounds like ancient history, but in fact much of the renewal of Vatican II amounted to a return to patristics sources.
During the period of May 11-
Eight of the monks who have served in our priory in Bogotá, Colombia, pose for the camera. Left to right: Bro. John Seiler, Fr. Sebastian Schmidt, Fr. Geral Ruelle, Fr. Philip Vanderlin, Fr. John Odermann, Fr. Lawrence Wagner, Fr. Denis Fournier, and Fr. Valerian Odermann.
June
Chronicle
Fr. Valerian combined business with pleasure during the first weeks of June when he drove to Mother of God Monastery, Watertown, SD, to give the Sisters a retreat. Then he continued down to North Platte, NE, for a visit to his sister and her family. Watertown is not near Richardton (about 400 miles), but we are very familiar with those Sisters. After all, they taught at St. Mary’s School here in Richardton for many years. As for Valerian, his idea of a vacation is pretty strenuous.
Bro. Pius has suffered from arthritis for many years, but doesn’t take it lying down. Instead, he moves up and down the halls on his walker and crutches, keeping his body limber. Lately he has taken to picking bits of stuff off the floor to stretch his back and legs. Well, one day he found a squashed pea, and then another one and another. What was going on? The Case of the Squashed Peas! Turns out that somebody was using a pack of frozen peas for a cold pack—and they got away.
Bro. Anthony was busy during the middle weeks of June at Camp ReCreation here in Richardton. He is on the board of directors of this camp for disadvantaged citizens which meets at Richardton High School. This year some of the events were held here at the monastery, in the north lounge below the cafeteria. During its first 20 or so years, the Camp was centered at the Abbey so it is good to see some of the monks still involved in its activities.
The White House has been torn down! No, not the one in Washington but the slightly smaller one east of the Abbey. This was once a convent for our cooking Sisters, and then it was a guest house for our friends and other groups. It was as comfortable as an old shoe, but unfortunately it lacked even the basic safety features so it could not be economically insured. We moved out of it two years ago thinking that a Dickinson party would move it up there for further occupancy. But finally it was torn down by the Dakota Construction Company of Dickinson, in exchange for the lumber. It leaves an ugly hole in our landscape that we will have to fill.
A customer at the recent Open House makes up her mind as Fr. James waits to take her order.
July
Chronicle
The high point of July and of the summer hereabouts occurred on the 15th. On that Saturday, which featured intense heat, we auctioned off a lot of the chattels that have been accumulating around here for years and years. A couple of hundred people descended on the place and bought up most of the stuff we put out at auction. There was so much material that some of it was on display in front of the gym and the rest was sold in the North Lounge of the cafeteria building.
If we didn’t know it before, we know now that an auction takes a great deal of preparatory
work. Under the guidance of CMT auctioneers of Richardton, the monks spent weeks
and months locating and getting things into order for the great day. Fr. James was
in charge of the whole operation, and he deserves to take the rest of the summer
off. He won’t. Bro. Anthony was his main assistant, but Brothers Michael, Aelred
and Jacob did a lot of the hauling. Finally, on the last day before the auction,
an all-
Fr. Francis was home for his vacation from South America this July. It is a special year for him, since this is his fiftieth jubilee of profession. He celebrated with the community in Bogota, but he still got in on a golden jubilee in the U.S.A. This is also the fiftieth anniversary of his blood sister, Sr. Matthew Wehri, of Sacred Heart Monastery, Yankton, SD. So Francis drove down there with Fr. Thomas, a close friend of Sr. Matthew.
On Sunday, July 30, a delegation of monks headed for St. Anthony’s Mission at Mandaree for a special event. That afternoon, Bishop Paul Zipfel dedicated the new parish church, with Abbot Brian functioning as one of the liturgical ministers and Bro. Bertrand chanting the Litany of the Saints. For many years the pastor, Fr. Stephen, has been working toward this new edifice and finally it has become a reality. The new church is built like an Indian earth lodge. It is a low dome set into the side of the hill, with soil covering most of the wall. The inside has wooden framing exactly like an earth lodge. The Stations of the Cross were executed by our confrere, Fr. John, who ministered at Mandaree for some years as a young priest.
Photo: James Kilzer
You can see 20 miles out our dining room window. Her Bro. Elias (right) points out a distant feature to Fr. Victor.
August
Chronicle
On August 16, Bro. Anthony departed for St. Meinrad, Indiana, where he will begin
seminary training. More precisely, this will be a year of pre-
Lately Abbot Brian has been busy writing books. He has produced a study of the seven deadly sins entitled The Seven Evil Servants. Fr. Abbot obtained a degree in spirituality at Duquesne University many years ago, and now he finally has a little time to develop some of his thoughts in book form. Of course, the book is useful to us monks, since we are all sinners. But it is written in an accessible style that anyone can grasp.
The new work is a large-
This has turned out to be a truly desert-
Br. Aelred has been launching out into the retreat ministry lately. During the week
of August 22-
Prior Basil sent Br. Elias out to photograph these deer in the east yard. They ran away before he could get much closer to them.
September
Chronicle
During the fall, Bro. Jacob found himself performing an unusual chore, namely, helping
to transport hay from a distant field to the Abbey farm. Because we got such a poor
hay crop here at Richardton, Fr. Stephen arranged for the purchase of some hay from
the CRP land at St. Anthony’s Mission, Mandaree. But this hay was not exactly free
since the mission is 87 miles one way from the Abbey. It took eight trips with a
semi-
The Abbey does not have a semi, so we hired Hoff Farms of Richardton to do the hauling, but Bro. Jacob did the tractor work on either end. Over the years, we have rarely, if ever, purchased hay. But this is an unusual year and Bro. Placid, the boss, is worried that his cows may not make it through the winter with what we have on hand.
The community meeting of September 6 was devoted to initial preparation for the monastic
Visitation that will take place here next summer. Fr. Lawrence gave a brief position
paper to prime the pump, and then we broke up into small groups for discussion. Fr.
Lawrence is well-
Saturday, September 16, was a day some of the monks will not soon forget. They drove to Bismarck to pick up a conference table donated to the Abbey by a law firm that no longer needed it. Weren’t they surprised when they found out that it was 14 ft. long and weighs maybe 500 pounds? What is more, it cannot be taken apart. They were assisted by a crew of husky guys from the University of Mary, but even then it was a Herculean labor getting it into the trailer.
But when they got it back to the Abbey, things really got out of hand. The only place they could think of putting it was in a basement meeting room. Unfortunately, they got it wedged in the door of the Centennial Room and there it sat—for three hours, while the crew pushed and twisted and cussed and sweated. Finally, a way was found and the monster was put in place. Prediction: it will never leave that room until the building is torn down.
Br. Pius' "go cart" is parked by the cafeteria window on a rainy fall afternoon.
October Chronicle
On October 1st, the local community celebrated the one-
Abbot Brian engaged in a good deal of pastoral ministry this fall. On October 1-
Fr. Robert has moved to the Richardton Health Center where he can receive full-
During the period October 26-
Over the weekend of October 14-
A fine foggy fall morning greets the monks at breakfast. Most were standing, looking out the window on the glory that God had made.
November
Chronicle
On November 8, Bro. Michael drove to Sidney, MT, with Sr. Rita of Sacred Heart Monastery to give a CCD retreat in the local parish. Bro. Michael has taken over Fr. Thomas’ old job as vocation director, and like Fr. Thomas he is cooperating with the Sisters in this work. Often in the past members of both communities have combined in presenting programs in the parishes of the area.
Another joint effort this year is a book discussion club that meets once a week. Half a dozen members of the two communities are reading a book called Desert Christians by William Harmless. Book clubs serve several purposes: they keep us reading material we might not tackle alone; they put us in dialogue with other monks and nuns on serious topics; they keep our minds from atrophying before we reach senility.
Fr. Thomas spent the months of October and November on a sabbatical leave at Sacred
Heart Monastery, Yankton, SD. He was feeling the fatigue and strain of many years
of fund-
This being an election time, someone came up with a proposal that would save us a lot of time. Before the election, we could ask the monks how they are going to vote. If ten say Republican and seven say Democrat, then we could simply send the three Republicans down to vote. The other fourteen could stay home because they would cancel each other out anyway. Those who heard this proposal voted against it.
At our Priory of Tibatí in South America, Fr. Nicolas Cano has been named rector of San Benito. Although this secondary school is run by the monks in the nearby barrio, Fr. Nicolas is the first monastic rector of that school. He has recently received his master’s degree in educational administration, so he is ready for the job. In recent weeks Fr. Francis Wehri was hospitalized with severe nosebleeds.
In mid-
Photo: Br. Aelred Reid
Bishop Paul Zipfel of Bismarck is shown here consecrating the altar of St. Anthony's Church, Mandaree. Several monks attended the blessing of this church, which is served by our confrere, Fr. Stephen Kranz. The church is built in a Native American style.
December
Chronicle
This was a painful month for Fr. David, who had a knee replacement at St. Joseph’s Hospital in Dickinson. After about 10 days in the hospital, he returned home to the Abbey and has been recuperating ever since.
Abbot Brian announced a personnel change on December 19: Bro. Michael will replace Fr. Thomas as Director of Development. On his recent sabbatical, Fr. Thomas realized that he can no longer do this important work in the way it should be done. Bro. Michael, of course, has no training at this work; none of us do! Perhaps, though, his training as a psychologist will be of some help?
On December 30, Bishop Paul Zipfel came out from Bismarck to ordain Bro. Benedict
Fischer to the deaconate. He is currently a third-
Recently there came across our coffee table a deluxe volume entitled Los Atajos No Existen. Translated, this means “There are no shortcuts.” It is apparently a favorite saying of Fr. Francis Wehri, who is featured elsewhere in this issue. This book, which commemorates 45 years of history for Colegio San Carlos, our school in Colombia, is entirely the product of the alumni. To judge from its highly sophisticated layout and texts, we have some very talented graduates! The book contains some wonderful vignettes of the monks who have been key figures in that school. For example, Fr. Sebastian is quoted as saying: “Much of what I did and said, I’m afraid, was paja (baloney), but there must be some grain of truth. …“
