This past weekend, Sister Maxine and I stayed with the Benedictine Women of Madison at Holy Wisdom Monastery in Madison, Wisconsin. It was a delight to be with the sisters and with the wonderful community of oblates, retreatants, coworkers, and members of the Sunday assembly. The monastery grounds held so much beauty too — trees, trails, hills, and critters!

Benedictine Women of Madison is an ecumenical religious community in the monastic tradition of Saint Benedict. The sisters community is for single women of any Christian tradition. There is also an oblate community, that is, “an intentional community of women and men who find a practical spirituality in the Rule of Benedict.”

Sisters Lynn, Joanne, and Mary David

Because this is an ecumenical community, women from any Christian tradition are welcome to become a Benedictine sister. So if you are a Christian woman who is drawn to monastic life within an ecumenical context, I invite you to get to know the Benedictine Women of Madison. You can remain as a Lutheran, Methodist, Presbyterian, Catholic, or part of another Christian tradition and become a sister! To learn more, check out the Benedictine Women of Madison website.

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Join A Nun’s Life community for prayer today at 6 p.m. CST (your time zone).

Happy Nunday! We are well into the summer now here in the midwest. It’s been hot and humid with the occasionally cool breeze wafting through. I thought this would be a perfect summer’s day nun photo — Niagara Falls! Courtesy of Patricia, this photo shows Sisters from the congregation The Servants of the Sacred Cross. The photo of the Sisters’ visit to Niagara Falls is from September 2007.

I am delighted to have this photo because it gave me an opportunity to learn more about these Sisters. And I realized that I had already bumped into one of the Sisters earlier on the A Nun’s Life page “Nun or Sister?” — Mother Wendy James, SSC, the foundress of the community.

The Sisters are “an international, ecumenical religious sisterhood of laywomen, married and single, living and working in their own homes and communities” who serve “within a traditional, conservative, Religious Community, committed to the historic Catholic Faith.”

On their website they describe their life further:

The Servants of the Sacred Cross are called to take up their cross and follow Christ in a life of prayer and service. Sisters are both married and single, living and working in their own homes and communities under Vows of Simplicity, Purity, and Obedience.

Some Sisters carry out a variety of active ministries in their parishes and local communities. Other Sisters are called to a more contemplative expression of service in a life of solitude and prayerful intercession. The prayer of each Sister must be, “Lord Jesus, as it would please you, bring me someone today whom I can serve.”

I don’t know any more about the community other than their website, but I am impressed with and curious about their exploration of and actual living of a new AND historic form of consecrated life. By new I mean that it is recently founded and has multiple forms of consecrated life (married, lay, contemplative, active) under the same roof (so to speak). It is also an ecumenical community — Anglican, Catholicm and Eastern Orthodox. By historic I mean that they profess a commitment to the “historic Catholic Faith”. Now to be honest, I’m not sure exactly what that phrase means, and hopefully someone with a better understanding of this will offer comments below. I think that it has to do more with the common tradition shared by Anglican, Catholic, and Eastern Orthodox Christians but again, I’m not really sure.

Would love to hear your impressions and welcome the Sisters to offer their comments to help us get to know this community.

I had a most delightful experience this weekend visiting the Monastery of Holy Wisdom, home of the Benedictine Women of Madison (Wisconsin). I was invited to their Celebration of Ecumenism in which the community celebrated their first year as an ecumenical community. This is the first Benedictine ecumenical community and so a very historic moment. Abbot Primate Notker Wolf, the highest representative of the women and men in the Benedictinew Order worldwide, was there and gave a wonderful reflection on ecumenism worldwide and the good work and vision that the Benedictine Women of Madison are engaged in.

Though in its first year as a formal Benedictine ecumenical community, the Benedictine Women of Madison have been involved in the Benedictine way of life and in ecumenicsm for many years as a Roman Catholic religious community. Over time, and with much prayer and discernment, the sisters were called to form an ecumenical Benedictine community. Here’s what the sisters say:

In June, 1966, in the spirit of Vatican Council II, we decided to open a retreat and conference center. We would offer hospitality to Christians of any denomination and seekers of world religions. Our community prayers, retreats and programs would include the message: all are welcome here.

The response to our offer of hospitality has been overwhelmingly abundant. Formerly, Christians of various churches praying together seemed innovative; this practice is common today. We continue to know ourselves as Catholic, Lutheran, Episcopalian and Presbyterian. While these labels sometimes separate us, we also know our unity as Christians who live, pray and work together in our world. These experiences continue to transform our lives.

Fourteen years ago, we initiated a dialogue with our federation of sixteen other monasteries of women. We shared our vision of becoming a Benedictine community for women of any Christian denomination. Through these years our vision has become clearer and our desire to be a community of Christian Benedictine women from various churches has become stronger.

We have not made the journey alone. Prayers, encouraging words, counsel from our ecumenical board and discernment with our Benedictine Federation helped us birth this new community.

A new identity calls for a new name. We are now Benedictine Women of Madison. Holy Wisdom Monastery is the new name for our home, replacing Monastery of Saint Benedict Center.

Our community work remains the same: prayer, hospitality, justice and care of the earth.

For more information on how Holy Wisdom Monastery came to be, check out Frequently Asked Questions regarding the monastery name change.

The celebration was truly beautiful and a testament to the beauty, strength, vision, and faithfulness of these women as well as of the Benedictine Order and of the women, men, and children who are part of the wider Holy Wisdom Monastery community. In terms of religious life, single women who are of any Christian tradition can come together and live and worship and serve in a monastic community.

I have had many women ask me about becoming a sister and are looking for a monastic way of life that is not exclusively Roman Catholic. I would highly recommend getting to know this community.