WebAssist

About A Monk

This author has not yet filled in any details.
So far A Monk has created 62 blog entries.

Easter 2025

2025-05-20T16:33:01-05:00April 20th, 2025|Homilies of Father Abbot|

At that time: Mary Magdalen, and Mary the mother of James and Salome…entering into the sepulcher saw a young man sitting on the right side, clothed with a white robe…who saith to them: Be not afraid; you seek Jesus of Nazareth, who was crucified: he is risen, he is not here…

Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ,
My very dear sons,

We live in tumultuous times. Despite a recent change in the mood of the nation (mostly for the better), the culture that destroys rather than builds is still with us. However, on Easter morning the most remarkable tumult is that, so to speak, of the Roman soldiers guarding the tomb. Something has upset their world.

Truly, ever since a certain Easter morning, when the unthinkable, the unspeakable, the unimaginable victory of life over death […]

Maundy Thursday

2025-05-20T16:17:09-05:00April 17th, 2025|Homilies of Father Abbot|

Before the festival day of the pasch, Jesus knowing that his hour was come, that he should pass out of this world to the Father: having loved his own who were in the world, he loved them unto the end (Jn 13:1)

Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ,
My very dear sons,

This verse, taken from the Gospel according to Saint John, says it all. The entire mystery of Maundy Thursday is contained as if in a spiritual seed in these few words: the washing of the feet, the institution of the Most Holy Eucharist, Christ’s painful awareness of Judas’ betrayal, and the beginning of the Passion. It is all there. “He loved them until the end,” that is to say, to the utmost, until the last moment, until His human physical and spiritual […]

Annunciation 2025

2025-04-12T15:22:14-05:00March 25th, 2025|Homilies of Father Abbot|

Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ,
My very dear sons,

From all eternity God spoke His Word. From the first day of creation, from the beginning of time, God pronounced many words; God announced to angels and men what men and angels needed to know. Even before there were angels or men, God spoke to Himself, saying “Let there be light, let there be a firmament, fiat lux” (Gen. 1: 3,6). And the announcements and pronouncements continued down through the centuries. Many were God’s winged messengers bearing Divine tidings to earth; many were His prophets, who walked upon its face, spreading knowledge of the Word of God throughout the world below. But the greatest of these pronouncements, the greatest of annunciations was the one made in the fullness of time to the Blessed Virgin Mary, […]

There and Back Again (prehistory)

2025-03-24T17:38:56-05:00March 24th, 2025|Letters to the Friends|

Dear Friend of Clear Creek,

In the context of our current Silver Jubilee celebrations, the thought came to me to retrace for those less familiar with our history the main events that led to our coming to Oklahoma in late 1999 in order to establish a new monastery on the banks of Clear Creek.

Many of you were part of those very early years and will need no reminder of it all, but our younger friends may find the story of some interest. Several people outside the monastery have suggested to me the title “there and back again” (a literary allusion many may recognize) as a way of evoking the “prehistory,” as it were, of our abbey. This corresponds roughly to the years 1975 to 2000.

In fact, the origins of […]

St. Benedict Transitus 2025

2025-03-29T12:47:16-05:00March 21st, 2025|Homilies of Father Abbot|

Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ,
My Very Dear Sons,

It is our privilege and our joy to celebrate each year two major feasts in honor of Our Blessed Father Saint Benedict: this first one occurs during the Lenten season, and the second beneath the ardent rays of the July sun. Today’s feast commemorates the holy death of the Patriarch of monks; the second originally celebrated the transfer of the relics of Saint Benedict from Italy to France, but has now become for the universal Church the principal celebration honoring Saint Benedict. Given the penitential character of Lent, we generally reserve more solemnity for the feast in July. It is nevertheless only fitting to say a few words about the holy death of a great saint.

“Precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of his […]

Epiphany 2025

2025-01-21T15:41:54-06:00January 6th, 2025|Homilies of Father Abbot|

All they from Saba shall come, bringing gold and frankincense, and showing forth praise. (Isaiah 60)

Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ,
My very Dear Sons,

The Epiphany is a feast of attraction: the Incarnate Word irradiates the world, and the humble of heart are attracted to the spiritual light emanating from the Stable of Bethlehem. At the same time the tiny Messiah is more or less ignored by the world of men, except by King Herod, who perceives a possible threat to his power. This attraction is on a very grand scale, bringing the Magi from great distances, but it is selective at the beginning, as only a handful of souls benefit from this new radiance that has shined forth upon the earth. Nevertheless, this attraction will grow in intensity and extension over […]

Christmas 2025

2025-01-21T15:50:24-06:00December 25th, 2024|Homilies of Father Abbot|

And [Mary] brought forth her first-born son, and wrapped him up in swaddling clothes, and laid him in a manger…(Lk. 2)

Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ,
My very dear sons,

Despite the harshness of the times for believers and in spite of the fact that so many in our society have lost all sense of God and of the Christian faith, Christmas continues to inspire the world on many levels, ranging from the ridiculous to the sublime. What is the power of Christmas, what is its secret?

Is this secret to be found in the poverty of Saint Joseph and of Our Lady, who sought in vain for a place at the inn at the very moment, the dramatic moment, when the Mother was on the point of bringing forth her Child? […]

The Abbreviated Word

2025-02-14T15:47:45-06:00December 23rd, 2024|Letters to the Friends|

Dear Friend of Clear Creek Abbey,

From all eternity the Word of God, which is the Second Person of the Most Holy Trinity, proceeds from the Father as His beloved Son in the loving breath, the Ghost, the Divine Spirit, of God common to both Father and Son. Holy Scripture teaches us these great things that surpass our understanding but which enlighten and charm our souls, especially at Christmas. And there is more—much more—because the Son, the Word, somehow, by some manner that God alone could contrive, was made small, a Child, an abridged version, an abbreviated Word, so small that He could fit into a Manger-Crib in an obscure town of Palestine. Holy Family Nativity IconAnd this diminutive Word Jesus, came […]

Immaculate Conception 2024

2024-12-21T16:52:52-06:00December 8th, 2024|Homilies of Father Abbot|

The Lord possessed me in the beginning of his ways, before he made anything from the beginning (Wisdom 8).

Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ,
My Very Dear Sons,

As with every solemnity of the Holy Roman Catholic Church, this one too, feast of the Immaculate Conception, is about God—entirely about God. In His infinite wisdom and goodness God deigned to create a world; to place in it human creatures made in His own image and likeness; and to send a Savior to redeem those same human beings, once through sin they had plunged themselves into spiritual death. The Blessed Virgin Mary is a most holy and beautiful witness to God, a flower growing as it were at the foot of this great work of God in the world.

Better yet, it was […]

All Saints 2024

2024-11-08T15:58:49-06:00November 1st, 2024|Homilies of Father Abbot|

After this I saw a great multitude which no man could number, of all nations, and tribes, and peoples, and tongues, standing before the throne and in the sight of the Lamb, clothed with white robes, and palms in their hands; and they cried with a loud voice saying: Salvation to our God, who sitteth upon the throne, and to the Lamb. (Apoc. 7)

Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ,
My very dear sons,

Today we celebrate All Saints’ Day, the feast, not of just one Saint, but of the entire heavenly court. Saint John, in his Apocalypse, sees them as a “great multitude which no man could number” (7:9). In every age God has raised up these heroes of the Faith, both to do battle with the powers of darkness that deceive the […]

Go to Top