Go to home page - diocesan shield

The Anglican Church in Tasmania                                                             Search

a healthy church...transformingLIFE

Tasmanian Anglican

December 2004

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Monks and Nuns? Anglican?!
Yes, indeed!

 

 

Make mention of monks and nuns, to a fellow parishioner in almost any of our Anglican churches and a picture of hauntingly beautiful, silent ruins, emerging from the morning mists of an English winter, will be envisaged.

This was brought home to us one day when a couple doing the 'tourist thing' in this part of Victoria, saw the signs to the Benedictine Abbey, just outside Camperdown, and decided to call in. On answering the door (to these historians as it turned out) the monk was faced with looks of incredulity. The tourists were not expecting to come face to face with a real, live monk! Regaining composure, they explained haltingly that having seen the signs to the Abbey, they had come to see the ruins!

So let's set the record straight.

There are no ruins here - we are Anglican, Benedictine, monks and nuns, living the monastic life in Australia in this the 21st Century. Often, the reality of monks and nuns within the church is unrecognised and vocations are lost. One cannot answer a vocation to a life they do not know exists. To prosper and nurture vocation in our young people should be a priority for all Anglicans.

Some may ask, are not monks and nuns wasting their lives? Is it not a ridiculous travesty of an affluent, educated society for some of its members to choose deliberately a life of obedience, silence, withdrawal, chastity, in order to pray? The answers to these questions depend on our answer to another: is love, or rather, is Love, relevant today? The monastic comes before God in praise and adoration, and to hold the world and its people in love before Him. To those called, the monastic life gives a framework for constant conversion.

Authentic choice

A vocation is a call from God to enter into a particular journey. A monk or nun is consecrated solely to God, a consecration lived out with God in community. There is a vocation for every individual life. As a human society we are dependant upon each one's filling their unique role in the human family. A vocation to monastic life is an authentic choice that leads to union with God and cuts through the superficiality of today's world.

Who would embark on a monastic vocation? God calls whom he will and an individual will often be surprised to find he or she may be being called. Personality, status, training, may not obviously include a monastic vocation. Only one reason matters: it is the longing to give a whole-hearted surrender to the God who calls. God who calls remains faithful.

Spiritual heritage

We believe there is an important future for monastic life in Australia. As we kneel in awe and wonder beneath the great sign of the Southern Cross, we can tap into the spiritual heritage of this country and truly worship; God is truly among us. Is God calling you to the monastic life?

St Mark's Abbey, Camperdown, Victoria is an Anglican Benedictine monastic community of monks and nuns. A vocation is to a particular community. There are other Anglican monastic/contemplative and apostolic communities in Australia. A candidate for monastic life will normally be aged 23-40 years, with sound physical, mental and psychological health, free from debt and dependants.

Weekend conferences are planned for 2005 at Camperdown, (dates to be finalised) to help those wanting to discern a possible vocation.

For further information on anything in this article, please contact us: The Vocations Director, St Mark's Abbey, PO Box 111, Camperdown, Victoria 3260