Outside Altus, Arkansas
Sister Macrina: In Her Own Words
"When someone asks where I’m from and who I am, this is how I like to introduce myself: I come from the meadows, vineyards and forests of Altus, Arkansas. The country is a cherished memory of what I call first home. My childhood companions were animals, birds, insects, trees, plants, wild flowers and angels. I come from a family that was not without flaws. By today’s standards we may even qualify as a bit dysfunctional yet in spite of our defects I have always felt a unique and beautiful bond with my family.
My second home is with my Benedictine community of sisters, St. Scholastica Monastery in Fort Smith, Arkansas. We follow the rule of St. Benedict with the gospel as our guide.
In addition to writing, part of my ministry is leading retreats. In my retreats I attempt to draw you to the window of your soul. I invite you to look through that window, see the gifts you have been given, recognize your potential to assist in the healing of our world, and become involved in a process I call deep listening."
My second home is with my Benedictine community of sisters, St. Scholastica Monastery in Fort Smith, Arkansas. We follow the rule of St. Benedict with the gospel as our guide.
In addition to writing, part of my ministry is leading retreats. In my retreats I attempt to draw you to the window of your soul. I invite you to look through that window, see the gifts you have been given, recognize your potential to assist in the healing of our world, and become involved in a process I call deep listening."
A Master of Everyday Spirituality
"Wiederkehr is a master of everyday spirituality. She has taken the Benedictine tradition of Lectio Divina (divine reading) and expanded it into new fields of wonder. To her, sacred texts are all around us. She discerns evidence of God's presence in nature, relationships, and the daily rounds of life. As a skilled and creative devotional writer, Wiederkehr can always be depended upon for images or personal anecdotes that are brimming with beauty and insight. She weaves these together into books that combine observations with prayers and suggested passages to read — making them perfect for personal and group retreats."
-- Frederic and Mary Ann Brussat, Spirituality and Practice
-- Frederic and Mary Ann Brussat, Spirituality and Practice
Ever Flowing
A Song from the album Take Heart by Velma Frye
- Lyrics by Macrina Wiederkehr, OSB
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O, ever-changing God, protect us from congealing,
Ever flowing, ever flowing, ever flowing, ever flowing. ‘Til we flow into a Sacred Stream, ‘Til we flow into that Eternal Drink which is You. Then pour us back into the world and let the flowing begin again, And again, and again, and again. |
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Ten Life Lessons
from Macrina Wiederkehr's Webpage
"By nature I am a bit nomadic. I probably belong to the tribe called hunters (as opposed to the gathererswho settle into one place, tend their crops and wait for the harvest). Belonging to the Hunter Tribe fits me quite well spiritually for I am always seeking, reaching beyond what I can see with my visible eye. My hunt is for the great Source of Life we call God. My hunt is for meaning and purposeful living. Jesus, the Christ, is my guide. I feed on eternal questions and deep listening. In spite of being a hunter I long for solitude and have even taken a vow of stability of life which may seem not to fit with a hunter’s heart. Yet even hunters are called into solitude and quiet as they wait for their prey. They learn to keep vigil. There are hunters who, in the midst of the hunt, discover that the prey they thought they were seeking turn out to be far beyond their original expectation. They return home with nothing to brag about except the scenic view of a pierced heart that only they can see and understand.
Perhaps we are all a bit like that. We don’t fully understand our own vigilance and who it is we are waiting for, until suddenly we feel the breath of the Hound of Heaven on our heels. We slow down, then, and turn around to discern who might be hunting us.
These Things I Have Learned on the Great Hunt:
-- Macrina Wiederkehr
Perhaps we are all a bit like that. We don’t fully understand our own vigilance and who it is we are waiting for, until suddenly we feel the breath of the Hound of Heaven on our heels. We slow down, then, and turn around to discern who might be hunting us.
These Things I Have Learned on the Great Hunt:
- All work (even menial tasks) can become a joy rather than a burden.
- “Practice” is one of the most important words in the spiritual life.
- It is harmful to my soul to judge others.
- All moments of waiting can become moments of keeping vigil.
- The book of the earth is as holy as the book of scripture.
- I am happiest when I am able to surrender my own will.
- If I am not happy with what I have, I probably won’t be happier with more.
- Even if I don’t agree with someone I can learn much by listening to them.
-- Macrina Wiederkehr
A Note from the Sisters at St. Scholastica Monastery
on the occasion of her moving forward
Sister Macrina Wiederkehr, OSB July 28, 1939-April 24, 2020
Sister Macrina Wiederkehr, OSB July 28, 1939-April 24, 2020
“O light of revelation when dawn shows its face, and when the shades of twilight enfold me, may I receive the peace that comes from being in communion with you. You are a window to the eternal, hold me in your view. Don't let me ever out of your sight. Death will hold no terror for me, sheltered under your wings. May I rest in peace in life and in death.”
-- The Flowing Grace of Now, by Sister Macrina Wiederkehr
We, the Sisters of St. Scholastica Monastery, thank you for loving our Sister Macrina in this life. We are grateful for the gift of her and all the ways she touched others with the delight of God's world and words. Know we are with you always. Our prayers go with you, and we are comforted by yours for us, and especially for Sister Macrina. Remember this phrase from the heart of her pen, 'My God, help me believe the truth about myself no matter how beautiful it is.' You have brought beauty to her and us here at St. Scholastica Monastery. Let us walk her into the season of God's heart, where a tree full of Angels embrace her in sacred arrival. Our love and sympathy go to the family of Sister Macrina and all those who knew her.
Affectionately,
Sister Kimberly R Prohaska, OSB
Administrator/Prioress Elect and the Sisters of St. Scholastica Monastery
-- The Flowing Grace of Now, by Sister Macrina Wiederkehr
We, the Sisters of St. Scholastica Monastery, thank you for loving our Sister Macrina in this life. We are grateful for the gift of her and all the ways she touched others with the delight of God's world and words. Know we are with you always. Our prayers go with you, and we are comforted by yours for us, and especially for Sister Macrina. Remember this phrase from the heart of her pen, 'My God, help me believe the truth about myself no matter how beautiful it is.' You have brought beauty to her and us here at St. Scholastica Monastery. Let us walk her into the season of God's heart, where a tree full of Angels embrace her in sacred arrival. Our love and sympathy go to the family of Sister Macrina and all those who knew her.
Affectionately,
Sister Kimberly R Prohaska, OSB
Administrator/Prioress Elect and the Sisters of St. Scholastica Monastery
And Macrina laughed.
When I moved to Arkansas many years ago, a good friend from Texas, Sidney Helen Holmgreen, asked me: “Will you meet Sister Macrina Wiederkehr?” I had known Sidney Helen from childhood; she was like a second mother to me. She had been reading Macrina's works for years and had participated in a few of her retreats. I hadn’t read any of Sister Macrina's books, but I’d seen quotes.
Not only for quotes like these, but also for other reasons I was inwardly predisposed to like her if I ever got to meet her. I had always been drawn toward aspects of monasticism, having been deeply shaped by the writings of Thomas Merton who was a Trappist monk. I liked the severity of the Trappist way, but the Benedictines intrigued me with their humaneness. I was drawn to their emphasis on living in community, social service, hospitality to the stranger, prayer, and holy play. At one point while teaching in Arkansas I was asked to lead a retreat at another Benedictine monastery, in Pennsylvania, and I was so impressed with them that I became a lay associate or oblate at the monastery, even though I am not Catholic. That didn’t seem to matter at all I am a Protestant Christian, and I think another oblate was Jewish.
One day I received a call from the monastery where Macrina was - Mount Saint Scholastica in Forth Smith, Arkansas - asking me if I’d lead a retreat for the sisters on Islam. Typical of their openness, they were interested in the world’s many religions. Part of the Benedictine way is be receptive to the world without letting differences become divisions. They believe in listening to the world with a generous spirit: "listening with the ears of the heart."
That’s when I first met Macrina. She helped organize the retreat. I liked her immediately: her spark, her kindness, her love of life, her openness, her honesty. A little later I was asked to lead a retreat for the sisters on poetry. I did so and got to know Macrina even better. I discovered that she loved music as much as I did and that she very much had what I think of as the spirit of process theology. I do not mean that she had the worldview of a process theologian. But she had the love of nature and social service, of poetry and beauty, that process theologians so appreciate. Also, to my surprise, that she had a sense of divine fluidity: a sense that God is a great becoming. Indeed, I think that the lyrics that she wrote for Ever Flowing are about as process-in-spirit as any that I’ve ever heard.
In time I shifted my oblate membership to Mount Saint Scholastica from the monastery in Pennsylvania and began to take infrequent retreats there. The retreats usually lasted for two days. I would pray and eat with the sisters, spending the rest of the time by myself. I stayed in rooms that were close to Macrina’s office; and sometimes we would meet during the day just to talk. She was always immensely gracious to me, helping me find my way around the monastery and escorting me to the community prayer or to the dining hall. During these retreats I go to know the other sisters, too, whom I very much loved and admired. I think of them often and miss them always.
The last time I saw Macrina was just after the election in 2016. I needed a retreat to get my spiritual bearings, and I drove up to St. Scholastica, staying for a day. I was having coffee in a small kitchen next to the guest rooms and Macrina joined me. We shared impressions of the election, talked about our families, shared thoughts about life's meanings, and laughed.
For some reason, the thing I remember most about that last visit is her smile, her laughter. She was not at all afraid of death, but she did indeed love life. Her laughter on that day was and is for me a window into the playful side of God: a side of God that doesn't mind at all if we have a sense of humor, and who beckons us even and especially in times of trial, to have flexible imaginations, That is the image I carry of her to this day: Macrina laughing.
I feel quite sure that, today, a spark of that playful joy is now being recycled back to earth from heaven, thanks to the good sister from from St, Scholastica Monastery. Macrina was and is our sister, too: a sister whose God could never be imprisoned by the smallness of any parochial mind, a God who is in the earth as well as in sacred scriptures, a God who encourages us never to let ourselves be congealed into "this" or "that" when, in truth, we belong to greater love that includes all moments, on earth as it is in heaven. It is into that love, I believe, that Macrina has now been resurrected.
-- Jay McDaniel, April 25, 2020
- "My God, help me believe the truth about myself no matter how beautiful it is.'
- “Holiness comes wrapped in the ordinary. There are burning bushes all around you. Every tree is full of angels. Hidden beauty is waiting in every crumb.”
- “My God is not imprisoned anywhere, not in the Bible nor the tabernacle. Real Presence is everywhere, and those with the hearts of children revel in it.”
Not only for quotes like these, but also for other reasons I was inwardly predisposed to like her if I ever got to meet her. I had always been drawn toward aspects of monasticism, having been deeply shaped by the writings of Thomas Merton who was a Trappist monk. I liked the severity of the Trappist way, but the Benedictines intrigued me with their humaneness. I was drawn to their emphasis on living in community, social service, hospitality to the stranger, prayer, and holy play. At one point while teaching in Arkansas I was asked to lead a retreat at another Benedictine monastery, in Pennsylvania, and I was so impressed with them that I became a lay associate or oblate at the monastery, even though I am not Catholic. That didn’t seem to matter at all I am a Protestant Christian, and I think another oblate was Jewish.
One day I received a call from the monastery where Macrina was - Mount Saint Scholastica in Forth Smith, Arkansas - asking me if I’d lead a retreat for the sisters on Islam. Typical of their openness, they were interested in the world’s many religions. Part of the Benedictine way is be receptive to the world without letting differences become divisions. They believe in listening to the world with a generous spirit: "listening with the ears of the heart."
That’s when I first met Macrina. She helped organize the retreat. I liked her immediately: her spark, her kindness, her love of life, her openness, her honesty. A little later I was asked to lead a retreat for the sisters on poetry. I did so and got to know Macrina even better. I discovered that she loved music as much as I did and that she very much had what I think of as the spirit of process theology. I do not mean that she had the worldview of a process theologian. But she had the love of nature and social service, of poetry and beauty, that process theologians so appreciate. Also, to my surprise, that she had a sense of divine fluidity: a sense that God is a great becoming. Indeed, I think that the lyrics that she wrote for Ever Flowing are about as process-in-spirit as any that I’ve ever heard.
In time I shifted my oblate membership to Mount Saint Scholastica from the monastery in Pennsylvania and began to take infrequent retreats there. The retreats usually lasted for two days. I would pray and eat with the sisters, spending the rest of the time by myself. I stayed in rooms that were close to Macrina’s office; and sometimes we would meet during the day just to talk. She was always immensely gracious to me, helping me find my way around the monastery and escorting me to the community prayer or to the dining hall. During these retreats I go to know the other sisters, too, whom I very much loved and admired. I think of them often and miss them always.
The last time I saw Macrina was just after the election in 2016. I needed a retreat to get my spiritual bearings, and I drove up to St. Scholastica, staying for a day. I was having coffee in a small kitchen next to the guest rooms and Macrina joined me. We shared impressions of the election, talked about our families, shared thoughts about life's meanings, and laughed.
For some reason, the thing I remember most about that last visit is her smile, her laughter. She was not at all afraid of death, but she did indeed love life. Her laughter on that day was and is for me a window into the playful side of God: a side of God that doesn't mind at all if we have a sense of humor, and who beckons us even and especially in times of trial, to have flexible imaginations, That is the image I carry of her to this day: Macrina laughing.
I feel quite sure that, today, a spark of that playful joy is now being recycled back to earth from heaven, thanks to the good sister from from St, Scholastica Monastery. Macrina was and is our sister, too: a sister whose God could never be imprisoned by the smallness of any parochial mind, a God who is in the earth as well as in sacred scriptures, a God who encourages us never to let ourselves be congealed into "this" or "that" when, in truth, we belong to greater love that includes all moments, on earth as it is in heaven. It is into that love, I believe, that Macrina has now been resurrected.
-- Jay McDaniel, April 25, 2020