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Passiontide Chant: If only the lover sings…

2024-03-14T12:39:26-05:00March 14th, 2024|News|

If only the lover sings, listen to the song, and you may catch a secret about the beloved.  The song of the Church, our mother, is marvelously expressed in Gregorian chant, and its quality rises to a unique pitch during these last two weeks of Lent, wherein the Church’s heart and mind are entirely preoccupied with Christ’s suffering.  Where better listen to her song than with monks, whose sole treasured heirloom is the liturgy?

Those unable to visit a monastery have now an opportunity to listen to a part of our family heritage with the recent album of these Passiontide chants by our motherhouse, the Abbey of Fontgombault.  Including the propers for the Masses of Passiontide and Holy Thursday as well as the Improperia of Good Friday and several responsories for Tenebrae, this recording […]

Refectory Reading: A Saint in the Slave Trade: Peter Claver

2024-03-14T12:30:13-05:00March 13th, 2024|Refectory Readings|

At the evening meal in the refectory, the monks have just finished reading A Saint in the Slave Trade: Peter Claver (1581–1684) by Arnold Lunn, originally published in 1935 and reprinted in 2021.
Reflecting on humanistic outrages from Roman times to recent years, A Saint in the Slave Trade offers philosophical and spiritual insights on how the power of Christian charity revolutionizes and liberates souls in the direst situations.

Captured and separated from all he loved, fettered down in a ship amid relentless waves and disease, Peter Claver lived at the mercy of his captors. Water and food were scarce, prisoners were tortured and tormented, and the heat and decrepitude were intolerable. Many succumbed to death, while others committed suicide or were killed.

This is the desperate situation into which St. Peter Claver (1581–1684) voluntarily […]

Symposium on Blessed Charles of Austria

2024-03-07T16:27:11-06:00March 7th, 2024|News|

Father Abbot will give a conference at the symposium Blessed Charles von Habsburg, the husband of the Servant of God Empress Zita, whose cause this Abbey promotes.  He will be speaking on Blessed Charles and his wife, and will elaborate the Benedictine-Habsburg connection.  The symposium will be held in Dallas on Saturday, April 13th, and feature conferences and interviews by others, like Archduke Eduard, Archduke Paul, Princess Maria-Anna von Habsburg Galitzine, Suzanne Pearson and Charles Coulombe, the last of whom wrote the biography on Blessed Charles featured at the monastic table and is writing another biography on Empress Zita. Discover more and reserve a ticket by clicking here Learn more about Blessed Charles here… Learn more about Servant of God Empress Zita in Father Abbot’s letter here…

Refectory Reading: The Good, the Bad, and the Beautiful

2024-02-12T15:45:17-06:00February 12th, 2024|Refectory Readings|

At the evening meal in the refectory, the monks have just finished reading The Good, the Bad, and the Beautiful: History in Three Dimensions by Joseph Pearce, published in 2023.
Inspired by Pope Benedict XVI’s vision of the history of the Church, Joseph Pearce traces three strands interwoven in Church History: The Good Saints, The Bad Persecutors, and The Beautiful Art.

Christ is “the way, and the truth, and the life”, but fallen mankind, although made in Christ’s image, is not so pure. Human history—including Church history—is a tapestry woven of three threads: the good, the bad, and the beautiful. This book tells the story of Christendom over two millennia, focusing on what was good, bad, and beautiful in […]

Learn Gregorian Chant – Laus in Ecclesia Level One & Two & Three Courses 2024

2024-01-30T17:14:32-06:00January 30th, 2024|News|

Clear Creek Abbey will host three classes in Gregorian chant:

Laus In Ecclesia, level 1, taking the complete beginner or amateur in Gregorian chant to the level of being able to sing the chant with a certain competence

Laus in Ecclesia, level 2, building on the first degree, sharpening skills in reading notation, and rhythm, with an emphasis on the singing of the Divine Office in Gregorian chant.

Laus in Ecclesia, level 3, bringing all the previous levels to completion: this level is aimed primarily at directors of scholas, with a concentration on interpretation of bigger pieces and chironomy (direction).

The classes will be held from July 15th until the 19th, 2024. Find out more about it and register at clearcreekmonks.org/learnChant .

Dom Guéranger on the Blessing of Candles at Candlemas

2024-01-30T12:22:08-06:00January 30th, 2024|Dom Guéranger's Liturgical Year|

The Blessing of Candles at Candlemas

by Dom Prosper Guéranger, founding Abbot of the Congregation of Solesmes, taken from his treatment of February 2: The Purification of the Blessed Virgin in Volume 3 of his Liturgical Year.

The mystery of to-day’s ceremony of the blessing of candles has frequently been explained by liturgists, dating from the 7th century. According to St. Ivo of Chartres, the wax which is formed from the juice of flowers by the bee, (which has always been considered as the emblem of virginity,) signifies the virginal flesh of the Divine Infant, who diminished not, either by his conception or his birth, the spotless purity of his Blessed Mother. The same holy Bishop would have us […]

Refectory Reading: Blessed Charles of Austria

2024-01-26T14:03:24-06:00January 15th, 2024|Refectory Readings|

Blessed Charles of Austria: A Holy Emperor and His Legacy tells the story of Karl or Charles Hapsburg, the last of the Holy Roman Emperors, who died in 1922 and was beatified in 2004.
Charles Coulombe expertly traces the idea of empire and Catholic monarchy throughout the centuries, as well as the lineage of both Charles and his wife, Zita of Bourbon-Parma, whose cause for beatification Clear Creek Abbey is promoting. Charles’s deep Catholic faith and devotion to his family come to the fore in the narrative, in addition to his skill and wisdom in statecraft and generalship.

From the foreword by Archduke Karl von Hapsburg, grandson of Blessed Karl:

Thinking about Blessed Emperor Karl, three principal roles of the man present themselves: the soldier, the politician, and the family man. The most […]

The Wind in the Wilderness

2024-02-23T17:48:11-06:00January 13th, 2024|Letters to the Friends|

Dear Friend of Clear Creek Abbey,

Poised on the threshold of a new year of God’s grace, while we prayerfully consider the challenges that confront us, whether in the world in general, in our American society (on the brink of mental, if not material civil war), or even in the Church, we are tempted by discouragement. Is our world not going to be ripped apart? As Catholic Christians, we are taught to cultivate the theological virtue of hope, but the human landscape that surrounds us seems very much to be taking the shape of a wilderness. How shall we manage?

Well, in fact, if we can free ourselves for a moment from the cultural shallows, where all things tend to descend into mud and muck, if we can lift our heads again like […]

Dom Guéranger on the Epiphany

2024-01-05T16:20:13-06:00January 5th, 2024|Dom Guéranger's Liturgical Year|

Epiphany Meditation

by Dom Prosper Guéranger, founding Abbot of the Congregation of Solesmes, taken from the chapter entitled “The Epiphany of Our Lord” in Volume 3 of his Liturgical Year.

The Feast of the Epiphany is the continuation of the mystery of Christmas; but it appears on the Calendar of the Church with its own special character. Its very name, which signifies Manifestation, implies that it celebrates the apparition of God to his creatures. The Epiphany is indeed great Feast, and the joy caused us by the Birth of our Jesus must be renewed on it, for, as though it were a second Christmas Day, it shows us our Incarnate God in a new light. It leaves us all the sweetness of […]

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