Enclosed contemplative life and culture shock

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BarbaraTherese

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Our Sth. Australian television here is currently broadcasting a documentary about a few women (roughly 6 or 8 I think, can’t recall)I think it was who are enclosed (by their choice) in a Benedictine contemplative monastery (Catholic) here in Australia for 33 days, representing each year of the life of Jesus. We saw the first viewing last Sunday and the second tonight. It is really interesting to get their view of strictly contemplative monastic living as they meet daily and discuss their day and experiences and having come straight from secular 21st century living. The strain already is beginning to tell in a big way and I smiled as we saw part of their journey by bus to the monastery with wondrous expectations of 33 days of “sheer peace and quiet”. Of course one of the strains that is appearing is simply the strain of living shoulder to shoulder a community life.
The nun who is their novice mistress type figure I thought was a very unusual, insightful nun and very skilled at explaining reasons behind the actual details of monastic life. She struck me too as very insightful into being human. And though this is most helpful to them, along with a couple of nuns assigned as ‘best mate’ type figures (known as “angels” on some cloisters)…the absolute stress of it all is coming through. I recall when on a cloister a novice introduced herself about a week into my stay as “I am your angel”…I was dreadfully confused and it crossed my mind she was loosing it!!!😃 She very quickly picked up I was totally confused and explained.
Nowadays of course usually monasteries (unsure about convents) that I know of will give an applicant a number of weeks and usually around 6weeks to experience the life prior to making up their minds. After the 6 weeks an applicant can go home and make the final decision. This is surely better than when a postulant immediately was introduced to full monastic living and went totally, in many instances, into culture shock.
I am looking forward to tonight’s screening. Will keep this thread filled in.

Blessings…regards - Barb:)
 
I’m not a big fan of reality shows, and although this one sounds intriguing, there is simply no way that you can give a realistic picture of religous life in such a short time with so little preperation.

Of course these girls would have trouble here. Was there any preperation given to them, or were any of them discerning a religous life? Or did they just think it would be a fun thing to do? It’s no different than when these reality shows put their contestents in a military boot camp or something similar, and if they pass, they think they know what it is to be in the Army! Well, know they don’t, because they are not actually living the life and calling of a soldier. I fear the same thing is going on here.

I’m afraid that this instant gratification society we’re living in will never let us give the proper time and discernment to a calling, which can be considerable. We need quick answers today, and monastic life especially will not give us that…
 
Sounds like that show would be interesting indeed.🙂 'Course, I suppose, it could be used negatively, but it also sounds like it might be helpful to some viewers. I’d like to see something like that up here - on second thought, I don’t have TV (video, yes), so I guess it wouldn’t make any difference to me, but possibly it would be helpful to others in the area.😉
 
Sounds like that show would be interesting indeed.🙂 'Course, I suppose, it could be used negatively, but it also sounds like it might be helpful to some viewers. I’d like to see something like that up here - on second thought, I don’t have TV (video, yes), so I guess it wouldn’t make any difference to me, but possibly it would be helpful to others in the area.😉
 
They had a show like that in the States. It was five women and they were going to stay with Benedictine sisters in Indiana for 40 days and 40 nights. TLC was the one who was to air it. It was supposed to be the female twin to TLC’s “Monastery” where 5 men stayed at Christ in the Desert Benedictine Monastery for forty days and forty nights. Perhaps that is where they got the idea for the reality show?

They actually did the women’s show, but never aired it. They were suppose to this Spring, but it never happened. It was too bad to because I was really looking foward to it. It sounds intersting. It is very cool that they have something like it airing “Down Under”.
 
Apologies - I am not going to be around much for the next few days but will eventually catch up with posts. Barb
 
daughterofmary said:
They had a show like that in the States. It was five women and they were going to stay with Benedictine sisters in Indiana for 40 days and 40 nights. TLC was the one who was to air it. It was supposed to be the female twin to TLC’s “Monastery” where 5 men stayed at Christ in the Desert Benedictine Monastery for forty days and forty nights. Perhaps that is where they got the idea for the reality show?
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TLC actually borrowed the idea from the BBC, which had run, to good reviews, a series called The Convent. Sadly, The Convent is not available on DVD or on the web.

The TLC show was filmed at Our Lady of the Mississippi Abbey. But as you mention, the show was never aired. OLMA once had a mention of the program on their website, asking for people to contact TLC to urge its airing. But that notice was recently taken down. 😦

Thank you, Barb, for mentioning this program. It sounds very interesting. I wonder if it will be made available for viewing outside of Australia?
 
Actually it was five women who went into Jamberoo Abbey here in Australia. We have now seen two of the three part series. In short, all of the five women broke through the defenses of their “ego selves” to their vulnerability - and silence and prayer can do this… and it was entirely expected by the nun in charge. All five too found that within this vulnerability was some expectation and experience of God…and this is all an entirely contemplative experience too. Often we will put up our defenses (ego self) as our vulnerability is frightening to us and is apprehended as a threat to one.
It was all extremely well done I thought and all of the women feel that they are benefiting from the experience even though it has been painful. In the main their expectations of 33 days of peace and quiet has been shattered, and their image of contemplative nuns corrected. Last week they had a BBQ in the enclosure and for the first time the five were permitted to chat quite freely with all the nuns and they found them very very human people and quite humanly joyful people who chatted away with happy abandon.

The final part of the series is this coming Sunday and all will be leaving Jamberoo with a corrected notion of contemplative living and of contemplative nuns…and the knowledge that contemplative living is no bed of roses. It can be a struggle but the prize is apprehended as worthwhile.
I doubt any one of the five would have a desire to become a contemplative nun, although this is to be revealed in this final episode.

It has been extremely well done I thought and a real feather in the cap of the BBC. Interestingly I noted that the one showing of the five women at private prayer was a meditation group using Centering Prayer with music.

Blessings and regards…Barb:)
 
BarbaraTherese said:
I doubt any one of the five would have a desire to become a contemplative nun, although this is to be revealed in this final episode.
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And there-in lies my problem with such reality shows.

There is no commitment on the part of the “contestants”, for lack of a better word. They have an out and they know that going in, so they don’t give it the full commitment that such an endeavor requires. Do you believe that if there decision to join a contemplative monastery wasn’t being televised, that they would have thought long and hard before making such a move and that they would have taken the move with much more commitment? It sounds as though they were looking for their 15 minutes of fame to me.

TV distorts everything and everybody. Sounds like another bad “reality” show to me…
 
jimcav said:
And there-in lies my problem with such reality shows.

There is no commitment on the part of the “contestants”, for lack of a better word. They have an out and they know that going in, so they don’t give it the full commitment that such an endeavor requires. Do you believe that if there decision to join a contemplative monastery wasn’t being televised, that they would have thought long and hard before making such a move and that they would have taken the move with much more commitment? It sounds as though they were looking for their 15 minutes of fame to me.

TV distorts everything and everybody. Sounds like another bad “reality” show to me…
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Hi Jim…thanks for the comments…there was never intended to be any sort of committment anticipated. It was merely the experience (chosen out of 1,000 applicants) of five modern women in a contemplative living experience in a religious order…and the camera followed their journey.

They knew at the end of 33 days they would be back to their normal everyday lives, or so they thought. The documentary revealed that even 33 days of contemplative living changes people or rather, takes them into the centre of themselves beyond their normal defenses. It was freely advertised when looking for women to go on this journey that there was no commitment involved other than to strive to commit for those 33 days and then back to normal life. There was nothing false about it, in fact it was very moving to be with these women as their defenses came down - but not in a brutal unfeeling way of many, even all, reality shows. The nun in charge, their sort of ‘novice mistress’ for 33 days was a very insightful and sensitive director (and director is the word)…they actually went on a journey that is probably going to change their lives forever.

The opinion of the documentary of course is open to any and all assessments…mine is entirely positive and I am looking forward to the final episode. In some ways, I think I journeyed with them. We got to see a postulant clothed in the habit which is normally a private ceremony in the enclosure - we got to see the realities of being in choir for prayer at 4.30am with a few novices and nuns stifling yawns. We got to see one of the contests at 4.30am in choir accidentally bang her seat and be covered in as much confusion and apology as any nun. We got to see one of the women struggle with having to work in the garden, including picking up cow droppings, when she hated being in the garden at the best of times. We got to see the contestants at prayer a little into their journey and totally engrossed. The nun in charge of them expressed her complete suprise that she had anticipated squabbles or at least tensions between them living so close for 33 days - it never happened. It was all very beautiful is my opinion. All of it. There were no “contestants” per se…the experience was not of that nature.

It did reveal that probably the nuns who do stay in contemplative life have in all probability been on quite a journey themselves, and some of the Sisters did give a glimpse into their personal journey. Contemplative life it came home to me yet again, is a Grace granted - else you would out of the place quicker than one went in. These women did anticipate 33 days of complete peace and quiet away from life’s problems. Ha!!!..probably some of us have that concept of contemplative life and living.

Undoubtedly it was edited and I guess with our editing facility we can make reels of film say almost anything we want it to say. I took it on face value aware of all that at the same time. I very much doubt the Sisters (and the women themselves) would have given the documentary their approval for public release if there was anything intrinsically false about it - anyway I took that as for granted too - and aware of that.

Thanks again for sharing your own opinion:thumbsup: …Barb:)
 
I understand, but why not just follow a woman with real commitment? A woman that has chosen this life, instead of taking women that thought it would be “fun” and “different” and just something to try out?

Reality means just that…Reality. And this just seems disingenuous to me, as do all reality shows. Just show me the life of a real nun, or a real soldier, or race car driver, or whatever, just don’t show me people that just do it for 30 days and then proclaim to be the real deal.

But hey Barb, I’m just a dinasoar about TV today. Just ask my wife!😃
 
jimcav said:
I understand, but why not just follow a woman with real commitment? A woman that has chosen this life, instead of taking women that thought it would be “fun” and “different” and just something to try out?

Reality means just that…Reality. And this just seems disingenuous to me, as do all reality shows. Just show me the life of a real nun, or a real soldier, or race car driver, or whatever, just don’t show me people that just do it for 30 days and then proclaim to be the real deal.

But hey Barb, I’m just a dinasoar about TV today. Just ask my wife!😃
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Hey Jim…Hiya! 👋 …Many years ago now I did see a most beautiful documentary (again on ABC - free to air television - Aust. Broadcasting Commission) about a young woman going into a strictly enclosed Carmelite contemplative community. It followed her right up to her clothing as a novice on an on and off basis and gave more insight I felt into contemplative life and living than did the subject of this thread, which incidentally is titled “The Abbey”. This young woman from the previous documentary, it sticks in my mind, was very very quiet, shy and most serious -painfully, very painfully so, was my impression…at the end of the documentary the prioress commented that she almost did not accept her for postulancy…and having done so, in due course was astounded “at her powers of contemplation”…I always remember that comment because some 40 years down the line since I saw it, I am still unsure what she meant. So I know what you mean about showing a documentary of a young man or woman actually entering into the life in postulancy or noviceship. And I agree that it would be wonderful to see such a documentary in this age of reality TV that (other than “The Abbey”) is absolute voyerism and morbidly so as the contestants are under tremendous stress and have no privacy whatsoever. I hate them…although I must confess that this year I got hooked into again “Big Brother” which is an appalling show!!!..I got hooked into it and despised myself for doing so…and still do! But it did highlight for me that I am as weak and voyeristic prone to shock factor TV as anyone at all.
Too bad a camera did not follow me into strict monastic life…it would have made great comedy:D

Not too sure what you mean about being a dinasoar where TV is concerned, but I am so sick and tired of the violence and sex on TV and here in Australia and what actually is shown re V and S is increasingly worse!!! I tend to channel surf looking for documentaries or current affair type shows or a good movie. Most nights there is something worth watching and Deo Gratius! I love a good murder mystery (thriller) or good comedy. I must make a mental note to ask my psychiatrist (who is more like a friend than a doctor and treats me like an adult - we just chat most of the time) whenever I next drop into her office what my taste in television tells her about me. I know she probably learns more about me from our relaxed chats than even I give her credit for:D

Thanks again for the opinion and (name removed by moderator)ut…much appreciated:thumbsup: …Blessings…and my regards…signed…"Hey Barb:D "
 
We have seen the final episode of “The Abbey”. All five women are returning to their daily lives and none have a desire to take up Benedictine cloistered contemplative life; however every one of them has had a breakthrough in their life - a major breakthrough into insight and understanding of themselves as they are without any sort of watering down … and with a spirit of acceptance and of hope that in returning to their normal living they will be on a totally different road, although what this means in actuality is unknown to them and this I saw as entirely positive.
Each of the five has a completely new sense of God Present in their lives alreadly, rather than a sense of “finding” God…they have experienced the God already there. Hope that makes sense.

The major plus I think that came out of this documentary was the absolute benefit of, if one is able, taking a month in the guest house of a monastery. It would not be a journey for the ‘faint hearted’ and I think too it would need to be a directed month on retreat.
The other thing that came out of the documentary was a glimpse anyway into strict contemplative life as actually lived…and as a counter cultural way of living - an alternative way of life to daily life as we mainly live it.

Blessings and regards…Barb:)
 
I have just received a circular from Jamberoo Abbey, where the documentary “The Abbey” and the subject of this thread was filmed.

There is a DVD of the documentary available at $AU34.95 … also a CD for the same price which features the sacred music from the soundtrack.

www.jamberooabbey.org.au

or email: candleorders@bigpond.com

Postal Address:
Abbey Candles
695 Jamberoo Mountain Road
Jamberoo 2533
New South Wales
AUSTRALIA

Here is an extract from the media spin: "…The women learn to come to terms with their lives, troubles, beliefs and aspirations always with the nuns providing support and counselling. They struggle to maintain the silence and open their minds and hearts.

The transformation of the women makes a compelling story"

…in fact an amazing tribute to what just 33 days in a monastery can do for and to a person…

Blessings and regards…Barb:)
 
Dale_M said:
Wonderful! Thank you, Barbara Therese! 🙂
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…👍 …

You have great signature, Dale. St. Frances de Sales and his writings were a real rescuer of mine at a time of great confusion in my life…
 
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