Oklahoma abbey monks spend Holy Week moving forward to Resurrection Sunday
Monks at St. Gregory’s Abbey in Shawnee reflect on Easter’s promise.
SHAWNEE — The serenity of the grounds outside St. Gregory’s Abbey is
matched in the building’s interior as the monks who reside there
prepare for today’s Resurrection Sunday Mass.
The monastery’s abbot, the Rt. Rev. Lawrence Stasyszen, O.S.B., said
preparations for the service celebrating Easter started months ago in
both tangible and spiritual ways.One monk carefully nurtured an abundance of pristine white lilies that will adorn the abbey this holiday morning.
Another readied the large paschal candle, also known as Christ’s candle, for its ceremonial use at the Easter Vigil on Holy Saturday.
And each of the monks joined together to relearn a special Gregorian chant first introduced at Maundy Thursday services, with plans to perform it at subsequent Easter Mass.
Stasyszen, 46, said each day at the Benedictine monastery is filled with times of prayer and reflection. He said these experiences are heightened during Holy Week, the days leading up to Easter and the holiday itself.
“There’s a lot of practice and rehearsals, but we have to keep in mind the reflection too,” the abbot said.
The liturgy of Holy Week and the Easter service itself helps to remind the monks and other believers of the spiritual meaning behind the Easter holiday.
“The whole purpose of the liturgy is to help us step out of chronological time into a divine sense of timelessness,” he said. “It is not simply re-enacting the last days of Jesus’ ministry. These powerful liturgical celebrations help us to enter into Christ’s Passion, death and resurrection.”
Sound of the season
Stasyszen said the monks pray five times a day at brief services that are open to the public. He said the monks do various things in addition to prayer and reflection, including teaching at St. Gregory’s University and other activities. Stasyszen said the group came together recently to relearn a Gregorian chant he wanted to add to the Holy Week/Easter festivities.The monks, ranging in age from Brother Simeon Spitz, who is 27, to Brother Matthew Brown, who is 88, gathered in a chapter room where they hold meetings to talk about monastery business from time to time. Once there, Brother Damien Whalen, O.S.B., the abbey’s choir master, helped the monks rehearse one last time before Maundy Thursday.
“I loved chant as a child and was learning it as we stopped using it (before Vatican II),” he said.
Stasyszen said the church has been rediscovering the Gregorian chants that were a mainstay in ancient rites ever since Pope Benedict XVI began encouraging Roman Catholics parishes to do so. He said after Vatican II, also known as the Second Vatican Council, Catholic churches received permission to use English instead of Latin in the Mass and many did so by doing away with the Latin Mass.
Stasyszen said he chose the “Gloria,” a Latin chant, for this year’s Holy Week and Easter services because it is a hymn of praise that fits with the holiday.
“It has not been sung during this penitential season so in a sense we’ve been fasting from the ‘Gloria,’” he said. “It’s pretty dramatic coming into the Easter season or the Christmas season. When that song of praise is sung, it sets the tone.”
Worries for lily bulbs
Stasyszen said Brother Andrew Raple, 80, had been preparing for Easter since January. He said that is when Raple, who has been at the monastery since 1949, received the lily bulbs.Raple worked patiently in the monastery’s greenhouse to cultivate the blooms, which will be placed in the abbey and sent to several churches.
He said he was concerned about the lilies because Easter is late this year — coming in late April, when the optimal time for the flowers to bloom is late March. Raple said he worried, too, because the truck that delivers the blooms was two weeks late because of icy weather in Indiana.
Stasyszen said Raple is a master horticulturist who grows the poinsettias that adorn the abbey at Christmas.
“It’s especially nice as a monastic community to have a member of our community grow the lilies because it shows the anticipation of Easter months in advance,” he said.
Heritage of faith
About 50 people gathered for the abbey’s Palm Sunday service on a blustery morning. Whalen distributed palm leaves to those who waited outside for the traditional Palm Sunday processional.Stasyszen, who led the processional, stopped at the open doors of the abbey to read about Jesus’ triumphant entry into Jerusalem chronicled in Scripture.
Stasyszen and Brother Benet Exton showed visitors the paschal candle which would be used in the days ahead.
The large candle, including the stand, is almost 6 feet tall, decorated with ribbons and five stylized nails that Stasyszen said represent the five wounds of Christ.
It was to be used Saturday to light the darkness in the sanctuary to symbolize the light of Christ entering a dark world.
Stasyszen said all of the age-old symbolism of the season sparks feelings of kinship with the monks who established the monastery in 1875.
With Easter’s arrival, Stasyszen said he recalled a fiery message delivered on Easter Sunday 1889, that the monastery’s leader at the time, the Rt. Rev. Ignatius Jean, O.S.B., delivered to local settlers.
Stasyszen said the monastic community’s heritage of faith, its strong sense of social justice and high priority on education for everyone, was encapsulated in the abbot’s homily.
“He was very forceful in the message that he gave,” Stasyszen said.
He said Jean, who was precursor to the first bishop in Oklahoma, urged the pioneers to treat American Indians with respect.
“It just reminds me still of what we want to accomplish as a monastic community, certainly as educators today,” Stasyszen said. “He said he did not want to see the ground stained with the innocent blood of Indians.”
Stasyszen said Jean’s homily those many years ago serve as a fitting reminder of what Easter is all about. He said the monastery strives all year to spread the message the holiday message of hope, peace and love through liturgy and service.
“Part of what the monastic community tries to do is to point to the kingdom of God, which is a kingdom of justice and peace,” he said.
“In the Catholic understanding of the liturgy, we actually become present to His one sacrifice.”
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