I’ve been tinkering with the design of the blog and wonder what folks think. If you’ve got a moment leave a comment and let me know if you like this theme or the previous theme. This one is the WP-Andreas01 1.3 by Andreas Viklund. I’ve changed the header image, applying a tweaked image from the Abbey of the Genesee web site, which depicts the monks in procession during their yearly blessing of the fields. I used Photoshop for the edit.

Since we recently celebrated St. Bernard of Clairvaux’s feast day, here is a thought from the great Cisterciain abbot for your meditation:

Gladness and Thanksgiving

My advise to you my friends, is to turn aside occasionally from troubled and anxious pondering on the paths you may be treading, and to travel on smoother ways where the gifts of God are quietly savored. So that the thoughts of Him may give breathing space to you whose consciences are worried. I should like you to experience for yourselves the truth of the words: Make the Lord your joy and He will give you what your heart desires. Sorrow for sin is necessary, but it should not be endless in preoccupation. You must dwell also on the glad remembrance of God’s loving kindness, otherwise sadness will harden the heart and lead it more deeply into despair.

You must fix your attention on the ways of “God, see how He mitigates the bitterness of the heart that is crushed, how He wins back the timid soul from the abyss of despair, how He consoles the grief-stricken and strengthens the wavering with the sweet caress of His faithful love.

His loving mercy is greater than all iniquity. Think of the Lord with goodness, seek Him in simplicity of heart. You will all the more easily achieve this if you let your minds dwell frequently on the memory of God’s bountifulness.

Love without measure: extracts from the writings of St. Bernard of Clairvaux, Introduced and arranged by Paul Diemer. Cistercian Publications, 1990.

If our post-modern minds can account for the flowery 12 Century language, what we read here is a beautiful meditation on the love and generosity of God for His creation, humanity. There is nothing here of that sometimes excessive Christian tendency to a sense of guilt that not surprisingly repels the non-Christian. God is greater than our sad and tragic self-hatefulness, which, often, even the greatest Christian saints suffered from.

Bernard’s monastic life allowed him to dwell frequently on the memory of God’s bountifulness thus simplifying his vision of life, allowing him to be forgiven time and time again by his Lord. He suggests that we all take time to turn aside occasionally from troubled and anxious pondering on the paths you may be treading, and to travel on smoother ways where the gifts of God are quietly savored.

One of the great monastic gifts to the world is the practice of hospitality, which takes the form of offering retreat houses for those who want to get away and reassess life, a place to listen to the still small voice within. The Abbey of the Genesee and other Cistercian monasteries throughout the world can be contacted to make a reservation for such a retreat. Give it a chance, you may be surprised at the results. God bless.