Christmas Message – 12.24.2020

Dear CIB Sisters all,

On the 2nd Saturday of Advent I sent to you the Advent/Pandemic issue of the CIB Newsletter. Here I send a simple, heartfelt Christmas greeting.

One of the things I have been thinking about and praying with during these months of pandemic is how blessed we are to live in community, to have our round of prayer together, to be able to share meals together (even if more distanced), and to meet together (even masked). So many have lived these months in isolation. Perhaps some of us have also been isolated for periods of time if we have been exposed to someone with COVID or if we ourselves have had COVID. But it is for a limited time usually – a few weeks at most. I know people, and I’m sure you do, too, who have been isolated from everyone except through phone calls or online communication for months on end.

So, for me, I am especially grateful this year for the gift of community, for our cenobitic life to which we have been called “to toil faithfully in the monastery until death.” And I give thanks for the witness of fidelity to prayer in community of all of you are in your monasteries. Deo gratias!

A blessed Christmas season to you and your communities.

With love from my monastery in Cullman, Alabama in the southeastern USA