Concluding the Retreat

Suscipe me Domine 

This morning at Holy Mass we renew our profession, re-commiting ourselves to our promises of stability, conversion to a monastic manner of life and obedience that we each made on the day of our profession.

That's why retreat is so important.  Sometimes we can get so busy with the needs and cares of daily life, that we can forget that first fervor, that first love that initially brought each of us to the monastery.

We all need to take time to step aside and let God renew us.  We hope that these reflections we have shared with you over the last few days have been a gift in your lives, as these days of retreat have been for all of us.  Together, let us pray the verse that we will sing at Mass, echoing that first time we sang it on our profession day:

Suscipe me Domine secundum eloquium tuum et vivam: 

Et non confundas me ab exspectatione mea.

Gloria Patri, et Filio, et Spiritui Sancto

Sicut erat in principio,

et nunc et semper,

et in saecula saeculorum.  Amen.

(If you uphold me by your promise, I shall live;

let my hopes not be in vain [Psalm 119:116]. 

Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit. 

As it was in the beginning,

is now and will be forever.  Amen.)