http://www.monastics.org/english/engl001.htm THE CAMALDOLESE BENEDICTINES The identity of the Camaldolese Benedictine monk/nun has its beginning and its end in the subsistent relations of God, which by faith we call Father, Word, and Holy Spirit [cf. Jn 1:1 ff]. We are sharers in the divine nature [cf. I Pt 1:4] thanks to the incarnate Word, the one mediator Jesus Christ [cf. I Tm 2:5], a human being like us in all things but sin [cf. Hb 4:15]. In him and in his body we contemplate the fullness of the Godhead [cf. Col 2:9] and we find our full identity as God's sons and daughters. By the gift of the Holy Spirit we have been called to the monastic life in the Church, with whom we journey as pilgrims in the company of the women and men of this last year of the millennium, whose joys, hopes, anguish, and pain we share [cf. Vatican II, The Church in the Modern World]. In the Church we rejoice in the fellowship of the holy men and women who have lived according to the Rule of Saint Benedict and according to the example of his life [see Saint Gregory the Great, Dialogues, book two]. Among the saints of the Benedictine Order shines Master Romuald, father of the Camaldolese monks and nuns. In the fall of 1999, gathering for our general chapter, we saw the assembly of our brothers and sisters as a workshop, a building site, an artist's studio, where we let our Teacher, the Holy Spirit, guide our hand. Our task was to paint a new icon of Saint Romuald. The two saints who told his story - Bruno Boniface and Peter Damian - described him as a person filled with the Holy Spirit, his warm and serene face lit by a gentle smile. As his image slowly took form under our contemplative gaze, we were filled with wonder. We did not view the image possessively, but seeing it as a grace we gave thanks. The icon is still a work in progress, but we can already make out the features of Romuald's face, revealing his gentleness and strength and reflecting the face of today's monks and nuns. The shape of his and our identity is clearer now, with lines drawn from our memory and our future. We have begun our work, trusting in Saint Romuald's help and prayers like all the sick and needy who during his lifetime came to his cell. We intend to keep working on the new icon until our time comes to an end, and then other hands and other awestruck and contemplative gazes will gather around the unfinished image of Saint Romuald. The final brushstrokes will be applied to the golden background by the last monk and nun in the iconographer's studio. Together with the image of Master Romuald, his first disciples also sketched a global vision of the monastic vocation, one in its source and manifold in its ramifications. The reference to the "threefold good" (triplex bonum, tripla commoda, tria maxima bona), from chapter four of The Life of the Five Brothers by Saint Bruno Boniface, is understood in a more dynamic sense today, as an efficacious symbol of a deep and rich mystery: "a threefold advantage: the life of the monastery, which is what novices want; golden solitude, for those who are mature and thirst for the living God; and the preaching of the Gospel to the pagans, for those who long to be set free and to be with Christ" [in: The Mystery of Romuald and the Five Brothers (Big Sur: Hermitage Books, 1994), p. 95]. The distinction between a spiritual value (fellowship, solitude, martyrdom of love) and a place (cenobium, hermitage, mission) is essential. A value is not to be identified with a place, nor do they exactly overlap; yet they are related, and the one evokes and expresses the other. The three terms are not structured as a scale of values, nor do they follow one after the other in the monastic's personal journey, which can begin and end with any one of the three. The three terms are equal in dignity, in the sense that each one is able to lead the monastic to the fulfillment of his or her spiritual calling. Bruno Boniface reminds us of this in chapter seven of The Life of the Five Brothers: "the three highest goods, any one of which is sufficient unto salvation: the monastic habit, the solitary life, and martyrdom" [in: The Mystery of Romuald and the Five Brothers, p. 111]. However, the three terms differ among themselves in ways that must be kept in mind, in order to give each of them its full value. Today as in the past, the common life and the solitary life take on institutional forms as, respectively, monastery and hermitage. The third element - witnessing love for Christ to the point of shedding one's blood in the service of the Gospel - is a pure grace. As an expression of unconditional love, it underlies and profoundly animates the other two elements. It is ordinarily expressed within the monastery or hermitage through what we call "monastic presence." But it can also find expression in the personal vocation of an individual monk or nun even outside monastic institutions. The three goods thus relate to, and interact with one another, and they cannot be reduced to a rigid institutional scheme. The age-old pedagogical wisdom of monastic tradition has shown us that solitude can become "golden," that is, it can be lived as the expression and source of authentic vitality, only if the monastic has experienced life together for a long period and thus has been formed and trained for the single-handed spiritual combat that is the challenge, more demanding than any other, of the solitary life. The threefold good is also experienced and expressed through a life of elected simplicity. Since Saint Romuald's charism is characterized by an intrinsic dynamism, we should distinguish between his personal charism, its evolution in subsequent history, and the institutions which the Camaldolese have created in order to give the charism a concrete form. Romuald's charismatic experience never could and never can be totally translated into an institutional structure. Every time it has been so translated, in so far as the structure is unable to convey its entire meaning, the charism has in some way been betrayed. Thus the institution must continually return to, and draw from, the source out of which it sprang. Within this horizon, the identity that comes to us from Romuald and the origins of Camaldoli remains relative, dynamic, and open. In the light of its origins and its possibilities of future development, our identity is always broader and deeper than anything we can express within a given historical moment and a particular cultural context. Its ramifications extend back into the remembered past, sink deep into the present, and reach far into a future waiting to be lived, explored, and known. A faithfulness both dynamic and creative is the only way we can respond to the One who says, "Behold! I am making the whole creation new" [Rev 21:5]. We can live faithfully only if we acknowledge our roots, our temporality, and our limitations, with humility and with a grateful joy. Here there is no room for arrogance or for competition with brothers and sisters who acknowledge the same father, although they have made different journeys in history (the Camaldolese hermits of Monte Corona, the Camaldolese nuns, etc.). The horizon before us is one of reconciled and complementary diversities. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ THE THREEFOLD GOOD Living together as brothers and sisters is the first good. It is founded on personal relationships, through understanding, mutual acceptance, dialogue, and service. This fellowship culminates in the community's celebration of the sacred liturgy. Solitude, the second good, indicates both an external environment and an inner disposition. The monastic seeks to cultivate a spirit of silence and attention aimed at quies, that is, hesychia, which must accompany the monastic's entire existence. The solitude of the cell offers the favorable context for listening to God's Word and uniting intimately with God through personal prayer. In turn the practice of lectio divina and personal prayer enrich the monastic's silence (cf. Constitutions of Bd. Rudolph 44). Finally, the third good, which is called evangelium paganorum or martyrium (The Life of the Five Brothers, chapters 4 and 7), expresses the radicality of monastic dedication and the fullness of Romuald's charism. The chief characteristic of the third good consists in unconditional love or total self-giving. This is manifested in different ways, such as reclusion and the martyrium amoris that takes on the many forms of everyday living. Every monastic is called to live the three goods in a particular place - a monastery or a hermitage -, but the third good can go beyond institutional structures and find new expression under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit. The threefold good is also experienced and expressed through a life of elected simplicity. A synthesis of the triplex bonum can be seen also in the life of Jesus: his fellowship with the disciples based on the law of love and mutual friendship, his frequent withdrawing into lonely places for prayer and silent listening, his total dedication to the proclamation of God's reign to the point of giving his life on the cross. The life of Jesus, guided by the Holy Spirit, thus presents us an excellent example of the threefold monastic good. Both the idea of the monastery as a school and the understanding of the triplex bonum as a spiritual journey require that the Camaldolese monastic formation be an open-ended process. Rather than marking the end of a journey, solemn profession is a new starting point for a spiritual itinerary that a monastic follows until death. To keep on this path, one must be committed to re-reading the monastic sources, especially those of the Camaldolese tradition, and to deepening a lived experience of our charism. Today the monastic communities that make up the Camaldolese Benedictine Congregation are facing a growing complexity in areas of culture, social life, and the church. In setting up its formation program, each community should consider its concrete context. Its formation program must be focused on our monastic charism within its own peculiar social, cultural, and religious situation. Those charged with the delicate task of monastic initiation must adapt the formative process to each person's needs and capacities, giving particular attention to the time they need in order to reach maturity as monastics. ------------------------------ MONASTIC PRESENCE One aspect of our identity that makes it open and dynamic is our relationship with the world in which we live, so different in each epoch, country, and culture. The one Spirit disseminates the endless variety of gifts in the church, in the hearts of men and women of every time and place, and in the whole created universe. We are all inwardly driven by this effusion of love, that we might learn to live no longer centered on ourselves, but eccentrically, open to the trinitarian life, to the Christ who lives in us. The monastic community, a fragment of that immense life, is intent on incarnating and communicating, by its very presence, the good news of the hospitable and trustworthy love of God [cf. Constitutions 122-126]. Hospitality and witness are exercised chiefly through the celebration of God's mystery and the great and humble power of the human heart. Free and heartfelt closeness to our brothers and sisters, cordial hospitality to our joys and our brokenness, simple, everyday service, sober delight in celebrating the liturgy, divine presence in silent prayer, ever-new wonder of faith, passionate retelling of the stories of Jesus, of his dying and rising -- these are the threads that weave our fragile history. Monastic hospitality is the trait that typifies our being in the world. Especially today, with the changes that affect our consciousness and our history, we are called and challenged from all sides to make room for hospitality and dialogue. In this way, and with humble courage, we can become seeds of prophecy in the various countries and cultures where we live. We are convinced that it is not a matter of "doing" many things, but of fostering sensitivity, a qualitatively new attitude of receptivity, discernment, and understanding of the forms of human living that are emerging, new forms that the Spirit is bringing forth from within the deeds, the hearts, and the language of human beings. Great are the speed and the complexity of the changes taking place, with all the ambivalence, lights and shadows, creative thrust and resistance to the Good that flow through the human body. In the light of these changes, each monastic community, in its own way, is called to become: A place of contemplation that enables contemporary humanity to feel that all life, pulsating, growing, and transforming itself, channels the inexhaustible flow of a greater mystery that wells up in the fountain of our adoration. Guests will find in our monasteries a reminder that the closer we are to the Presence, the deeper our silent adoration. Like Elijah at Horeb, we experience God in a still, small breath. An environment of friendship and fellowship, where we listen openly to each other. While human exchange is often no more than a means of individual advantage, utility, competition, possessiveness, indifference, and conformism, a monastery can be a sacramental symbol of another way of being together, a climate where friends have much to give each other, and much to receive. A space for creativity, wisdom, and beauty, a space that fosters, discreetly, passionately, and intensely the dynamics of research, experimentation, and elaboration of new languages in the arts, in music, in poetry, or in science that best express contemporary humanity's consciousness. A place on the margin of society, where we can draw back from the haste and complexity of processes that threaten to overwhelm us, where we can refine our senses and acquire a better and broader view of the underlying movement of change. A way of belonging to the world that gives us the viewpoint of the stranger, the pilgrim with no fixed abode. A space of reconciliation where God works through our gestures of welcome and forgiveness, where we make ready to share the burden of evil, sin, resistance, and violence, the wounds of this broken world. Thus we let the compassionate God work through us the reconciliation and healing of our past and present, our collective history as individuals and as a community. An environment for new forms of holiness. Simone Weil saw that ours is an epoch without precedent, which today calls for an explicit language of universality -- a universality in the face of human wisdom, religions, and culture that must permeate our existence. "Today it is not enough to be a saint; a saint today must be holy in a way that the present moment demands, a new and unprecedented form of holiness ... a new kind of sanctity that springs forth suddenly, a discovery. The new holiness strips away the thick pall of dust that has up to now covered large areas of truth." We thank God and our brothers and sisters for all the current forms of monastic presence, and expressly: - The shared journey of monks and nuns as expressed today in many ways. - The ecumenical and interreligious dialogue in all the forms our communities have developed. - The experimental monasticism of affiliated communities, whether of monks, nuns, or lay persons, in various eremitical and cenobitical forms, with manual, intellectual, and artistic activities within the community, the church, and civil society. - The welcoming of persons who desire to live some form of temporary monasticism. - The availability for an ongoing dialogue with brothers and sisters who have left the monastic community. - Various ways that numerous non-monastics relate to our communities, whether as oblates or simply as friends, united in sharing our monastic spirituality. - All the activities in our monasteries and guest facilities aimed at deepening understanding of spiritual, cultural, liturgical, and artistic values. - The service of the poor who need our help. - Pastoral, teaching, and social ministries in their many forms. - The communication and sharing of values through publications and other cultural contributions authored by our monks and nuns. - Availability for exchanges and dialogue with local cultural organizations that are interested in dialogue with us. - The exchange of information and ideas through the internet and other media, as a service to creative imagination and shared discovery. - The possibility of international and multiethnic communities. - The openness to multiple liturgical rites in our communities. ---------------------------------- MONASTIC INITIATION The initiation into monastic life is a process of heartfelt acceptance and joyful celebration of the divine grace that precedes us and in which the Lord makes us sharers by faith. Every monk and nun, touched by the Gospel of the unconditional love of the Father in Jesus, consents in the Spirit to the opening of the heart, a process of lifelong transfiguration that embraces the whole experience of the person. A useful instrument both for initial and ongoing formation can be Saint Romuald's "little rule" transmitted by his disciples, which sums up his spirit and his teaching method: "Sit in your cell as in paradise. Forget the world and cast it all behind you. Keep watch over your thoughts like a good fisher watching for fish. The one way for you is in the Psalms; never stray from it. If you have just come to the monastic life, and in spite of your first fervor you do not succeed in praying as you would like, keep trying, now here, now there, to sing the Psalms in your heart to understand them with your mind. If some thought distracts you, do not stop reading; hurry back to the page and apply your mind to it again. Above all place yourself in God's presence and stand there with the humble mien of one who stands before the emperor. Empty yourself completely and sit like a little chick, content with God's grace; for if God, like a mother, does not feed you, you will have nothing to taste, nothing to eat" [In: The Mystery of Romuald and the Five Brothers (Big Sur: Hermitage Books, 1994), p. 158]. To be a Camaldolese Benedictine, one must first of all "become a monk." In Christian monastic tradition the term "monk" means especially the person who is simplified and united, that is, without duplicity and division. "To have an undivided heart" is the chief characteristic of a monastic person. In harmony with this understanding, the general chapter delineates the monk as a person who is "unified in oneself and centered on Christ in the Spirit." This description implies a global formation. To become a unified person, psychological and human maturity is necessary. But by itself this is insufficient. To be truly united in oneself, the monastic must be centered on Christ, who is the center of gravitation for our personal integration. In this process, the action of the Holy Spirit is indispensable, for the Spirit is the one who unites us to Christ. When Saint Benedict exhorts us to "prefer nothing to the love of Christ" (RB 4:21), he brings to light the relationship that defines monastic formation. Since Saint Romuald's charism has its roots in the age-old Benedictine monastic tradition, we need to deepen our understanding of it by reading the Fathers of the Church and by renewing our spiritual and theological understanding of all monastic sources, while keeping an openness to the challenges of contemporary history and the changes taking place in today's culture. In the prologue to the Rule of Saint Benedict (RB prol. 45), the monastic community is called "a school for God's service." Thus the whole community forms its own members; at the same time it has continual need of formation. To this end the community sets up a program for initiation into monastic life and for ongoing formation according to a yearly or several-year cycle. Chapter 7 of the Camaldolese Constitutions is the basis for this program, whose main principles are: the primacy of love, the centrality of the person, the Word of God prayed and meditated, and openness to ecumenical and interreligious dialogue. These are fundamental elements of Camaldolese life and Camaldolese formation. During initiation into monastic life, the candidates put down roots in the community and strengthen their sense of belonging. The community offers candidates the vital environment and the natural support for their journey, which must first form in them a sound personal conscience, for only thus can they acquire a sense of community. Masters of postulants, novices, and junior monks are called to play the role of "mystagogues" who introduce the candidates into the grace of monastic living and into the life-style of the community. They unite the application of fixed programs with attention to the gifts the Holy Spirit places in every heart and to the seeds the Spirit scatters in the new realities that are emerging. In view of the close link between identity and formation, the "threefold good" that is characteristic of the Camaldolese charism must also be the pattern for our formation program. In fact this triplex bonum is a spiritual journey every monastic is called to make, in the koinonia of life together, in the experience of solitude, until full maturity is achieved in total self-giving. --------------------- ELECTED SIMPLICITY In a climate of renewed sensitivity and awareness of our being an integral part of the immense web of life, inseparably linked with our natural environment, we are all summoned to promote life attitudes inspired by simplicity [sobrietas]. We realize that today more than ever, humankind is challenged by a savage exploitation of natural and human resources, by the risk of a destructive relationship with nature, by the neuroses of daily life. The Jewish-Christian tradition teaches that we all share in the creative work of God by fostering life in all its many forms. Monastic tradition admonishes us to simplify our lives and to use resources and tools with reverence (see Rule of Saint Benedict 31:10). The story of Saint Romuald (Life of Blessed Romuald, chapter nine) also suggests a way of daily living inspired by elected simplicity. A special summons goes out to our monks and nuns living in countries that enjoy greater material prosperity, that they may assume a life style of elected simplicity as individuals and as communities, thereby bearing witness to their authentic search for God above all else and their concrete love of neighbor. The natural environment of our houses is a gift of God that invites our commitment to respecting and safeguarding life as manifested in the little corner of the cosmos where we live. Hence it is appropriate that monks and nuns collaborate to this end with other individuals and groups locally and globally. The physical plant and furnishings
of our monasteries and hermitages, both those of recent date and those inherited
from past eras, are often of considerable artistic and cultural value. They
should be seen as an opportunity for service to individuals and society, and
hence they must be maintained with the care and taste for beauty that also bear
witness to the elected simplicity of monastics. ------------------------ http://www.camaldolese.com/rule.htm 
Introduction to the Rule for Camaldolese Benedictine Oblates(adapted from the Camaldolese Constitutions)Long before the coming of Christ, humanity's quest for the Absolute gave rise in various religious traditions to expressions of monastic life. The many different forms of monastic and ascetical life throughout the centuries bear witness to the divine destiny of the human person and to the presence of the Spirit in the hearts of all who seek to know what is true and ultimately real. There is a "monastic" dimension in every human life which the monk witnesses and affirms, just as every Christian call witnesses to that dimension present interiorly in every other Christian. In the early Church, ascetics and virgins followed the Spirit's call to a more intense life of prayer. During the third and fourth centuries, with the exodus to the desert, Christian monasticism began to take on those forms of community life and solitude which would determine its later development. This tradition at its best always deeply esteemed marriage and single life in the world as ways to holiness in rich complementary to monasticism. St. Benedict (+547), as author of the Rule for Monks, has always been considered the Western Church's lawgiver and master of monastic living. St. Romuald (+1027) and his disciples (Camaldolese) also profess this rule. The Rule of St. Benedict is a synthesis of Christian spirituality including key elements of scripture and the fruit of the first centuries of monastic experience. Drawing on these directives, norms, and precepts found in the Gospel, the Rule wisely blends them with the historical and cultural context of its time. Thus the Rule of St. Benedict unites the purity of timeless teachings and the characteristics of the author's own holiness and prudence with spiritual and juridical elements that are linked to his time and so are subject to modification as they are reinterpreted for each age. St. Romuald lived and worked during the late tenth and early eleventh centuries. He fully realized in his own life the spirit of the Rule, and he wisely reinterpreted it, emphasizing the solitude of the hermitage. St. Romuald wanted the hermitage to be characterized by a greater simplicity and a more intense penitential and contemplative practice. Therefore he freely adapted some juridicial and material structures of the cenobitic (communal) and anchoritic (hermit) life as they were lived before him, in order to respond to the spiritual needs of his contemporaries and to the "voice of the Holy Spirit, who presided over his conscience." (from Life of Blessed Romuald by St. Peter Damian, #53). The Camaldolese hermitage is a special fruit of St. Romuald's broad and varied monastic experience as a reformer and founder. The hermitage retains elements of cenobitic (communal) living, at the same time offering the possibility of greater solitude and freedom in the inner life. The Camaldolese Congregation (of the Order of St. Benedict) takes its name from the Holy Hermitage of Camaldoli, founded by St. Romuald. Quite early on, in the eleventh and twelfth centuries, the congregation was formed with the founding or aggregation of other hermitages and monasteries. Today those include, besides New Camaldoli and Incarnation Priory, several ancient houses in Italy, and foundations in India and Brazil. There are Camaldolese nuns in the United States, Italy, France and Tanzania. Our congregation looks to Sts. Benedict and Romuald with filial devotion and regards our holy teachers' doctrine and spirit as perennially valid. Today as in the past, the Holy Hermitage of Camaldoli (Italy) is considered to be the head and mother of the congregation. For each age the Rule of St. Benedict is interpreted by the Camaldolese Constitutions and the entire Camaldolese tradition. In both the hermitages and monasteries which characterize Camaldolese life, the monks attend to the contemplative life above all else, which is seeking and communing with God in a very deep way throughout one's daily life by a sharing in the Paschal mystery of Christ. New Camaldoli (Immaculate Heart), Big Sur, was founded from the Holy Hermitage of Camaldoli, Italy, in 1958. New Camaldoli's daughter house, Incarnation Priory, Berkeley, was founded in 1979 with an ecumenical bond with Holy Cross Monks of the Anglican Communion. Incarnation Priory is also the seat of the St. Benedict Monastic Institute and serves as the house of studies for New Camaldoli. Camaldolese Benedictine Oblates are a group of Christians who experience an attraction of the Holy Spirit to deep prayer and experience a bond of friendship with our monastic community and its long spiritual tradition. In fact friendship is an important value cherished by the Camldolese family and therefore encouraged between monks and those living outside our houses. Oblates are extended members of the Camaldolese Benedictine family, seeking to share, in their own special way, in its way of living the Christian life. Tot his end, the Rule of St. Benedict, the Camaldolese Constitutions and the rich and ancient Camaldolese tradition want to be adapted to the life of oblates living their own Christian vocation. For both monks and oblates, the heart of our life is the seeking of God, the following of Christ's twofold command of love in the natural rhythms of daily life. Scripture, Liturgy of the Eucharist and the Hours, silence, solitude, deep interior prayer of quiet, work, shared life with others -- these are the means which enable us to seek and find God with a pure heart. The oblate faces the challenge of setting up his/her own structure of life animated by key elements of the Camaldolese charism in order to live and grow in the life of Christ. Of course active participation in the local Christian community remains important for rootedness in the Christian life. Oblate spirituality seeks above all else a loving union with God through a full, prayful life; a life which is at the same time both deeply interior and outwardly expansive in love and service of neighbor. It is a spirituality which is particularly nurtured through solitude and silence as well as through warm community. The Rule for Oblates attempts to take the principal elements of the Camaldolese charism and apply them in general to the life of oblates without many of the structures of life here at the Hermitage. It is up to each oblate, according to the circumstances of their life, to set up their own structures for living the basic elements of Camaldolese spirituality, which are rooted simply in the Christian Gospel.
Rule for Camaldolese Benedictine Oblates
PRAYER |
