Abbot's Notebook

The Abbot's Notebook for September 13, 2017 My sisters and brothers in Christ, Blessings to you!  Here I am back at Christ in the Desert, thanks be to God.  This trip to Texas was important for the community at the Monastery of Thien Tam and for me.  In Thien Tam, the...

The Abbot's Notebook for September 6, 2017 My sisters and brothers in Christ, Blessings to you!  I have ventured forth on a small trip away from the monastery, with my doctor’s permission.  Today I am at the Monastery of Thien Tam, south of Dallas.  This community was...

The Abbot's Notebook for August 30, 2017 My sisters and brothers in Christ, Blessings to you!  We have had some rain—but when I think of those who live in the southern parts of Texas, it seems like we have perfect weather here.  When I moved to this monastery some 43...

The Abbot's Notebook for August 23, 2017 My sisters and brothers in Christ, Blessings to you!  As I begin to write this Notebook, there is thunder, lightning and a bit of rain in the air.  Always in the desert we hope for rain.  We never have enough, even when a...

The Abbot's Notebook for August 16, 2017 My sisters and brothers in Christ, Blessings to you!  It continues to be fairly warm here at Christ in the Desert.  August is always the month in which we have a lot of flies.  Sometime we purchase fly paper to put in the...

The Abbot's Notebook for August 9, 2017 My sisters and brothers in Christ, Blessings to you!  The big news here this past week was the death of our Father Odon Nguyen Van Tho, OSB, on August 2, 2017.  In fairly recent Notebooks, I had mentioned that he was close to...

The Abbot's Notebook for August 2, 2017 My sisters and brothers in Christ, Blessings to you!  By now you know that I will be writing to you from my own office in my own monastery regularly.  Although I may be able to make some smaller, shorter trips occasionally, I...

The Abbot's Notebook for July 26, 2017 My sisters and brothers in Christ, Blessings to you!  It continues to be very hot here at the Monastery and we have changed our afternoon schedule slightly to accommodate the needs of the brothers.  Many of the brothers are not...

The Abbot's Notebook for July 19, 2017 My sisters and brothers in Christ, Blessings to you!  Finally some rain has come to our area.  Not much yet, but the temperatures have cooled down a bit.  Most of my life, I have been able to live in hot or cold temperatures...

The Abbot's Notebook for July 12, 2017 My sisters and brothers in Christ, Blessings to you!  The former Abbot Primate of our Benedictine Confederation arrived here on Monday and was able to preside at the Conventual Mass here in the Monastery on Tuesday, July 11th,...

The Abbot's Notebook for July 5, 2017 My sisters and brothers in Christ, Blessings to you!  Always there are surprises in monastic life, even if the general rhythm is the same day after day.  In our monastic tradition, we tend to avoid too many surprises but we also...

The Abbot's Notebook for June 28, 2017 My sisters and brothers in Christ, Blessings to you! Sitting at my desk, even with the best of chairs, sometimes causes me a lot of pain right now. There are days when both of my legs hurt so much that I want to do nothing! Yet I...

The Abbot's Notebook for June 21, 2017 My sisters and brothers in Christ, Blessings to you!  Learning to slow down is a real challenge for me.  I think that I have done it well and then comes a day and I seem to work all day and the next day I have to have even more...

The Abbot's Notebook for June 14, 2017 My sisters and brothers in Christ, Blessings to you!  So I have been back in the Monastery just over a week and I continue to recover from the surgery.  Cutting the breastbone in half always causes a challenge of recovery.  Most...

The Abbot's Notebook for June 7, 2017 My sisters and brothers in Christ, Blessings to you!  Today Mother Hilda, the Prioress of Our Lady of the Desert, is having surgery to remove a fibroid tumor from her uterus.  Clearly it is time of surgery for our communities!  My...

The Abbot's Notebook for May 31, 2017 Blessings to you!  Here it is the day before my surgery and all seems to be going well.  I feel pretty good overall and it is still a bit difficult to imagine that I have this tumor in my chest and tomorrow the doctors will open...

The Abbot's Notebook for May 24, 2017 Blessings to you!  Spring seems to come and go this year.  There are days which are almost hot and yet not quite.  Other days, it seems like it might snow again.  We have had snow this late in May before so it is possible that it...

The Abbot's Notebook for May 17, 2017 Blessings to you!  Blessings to you!  Although I am still in my own rooms, it is a very different experience not to be the superior of the house.  I was first appointed superior of our community in October of 1976, over forty...

The Abbot's Notebook for May 10, 2017 Blessings to you!  Easter Season continues and is fill with Alleluia.  Here in the community it is a time of joy and peace.  Father Benedict has been named Prior and now functions as the superior of the community so that I can...

The Abbot's Notebook for May 3, 2017 Blessings to you!  Christ is risen!  Alleluia!  Well, it turns out that I do have cancer but it is not as bad as it sounds.  I have a tumor with the name “thymoma” and the cancer is, apparently, still totally contained in the tumor...