Doing Time

I have done time twice in life so far, once in the Army and once in a Roman Catholic Monastery... This entry is about my time at St. Joseph Abbey a Benedictine Roman Catholic Monastery. It has been at least three years since my short stint at St. Joseph Abbey, but that time in there was enough to cause permanent damage to my faith. I no longer look at religious life or the priesthood through naive rose colored glasses. When I entered I was convinced I was following a path God wanted me on, and perhaps I was, but I didnt realize that if I was on the correct path it was for a purpose unbeknownst to me and for reasons other than what I thought, An in part looking back I can see how I was running from problems hoping to find a better life through a religious life.

When I was being courted by St. Joseph Abbey, I was aware of a few things, that the vocations director with whom i was speaking with was probably a homosexual, and that everyone there was older than dirt. There may have been 6 men under the age of 50 including myself . I can see how two faced everyone was looking back, coming in , everyone puts on a great front, loving, kind, caring, wanting to know about you, interested in you. etc. But once I entered it all changed, they stopped wanting to get to know me, the kindness stopped and i was expected to know what was going on after only 3 weeks of living there. I caught on pretty quick to how these men were no longer living by a rule of prayer and silence, but were expecting to be cared for by others coming in to the monastery such as myself, and were expecting new people coming in to follow insignifcant rules they were no longer following.

I expected a frugal life, a life helping the poor in the community, a life of prayer and a life of kindness and helping each other when the time was needed. Instead I found a community that expected me to follow rules they no longer followed, a community that was more eager in spending money on projects to modernize the monastery with art buildings and expensive retreat buildings than focusing any money on a barely functioning bread baking kitchen, in a run down building, that would deliver the bread in a broken down van. All while we in the community had catered food for meals, with left overs abound to toss away with no reflection on how the poor are suffering and are hungry. I felt like a hypocrite. It was even worse to see how they gossiped about each other behind their backs, treating three members in particular like fools and bad mouthing them as well. In turn I could only imagine what they would be saying about me in a few years time. They expected the younger men coming to be caretakers, while barely doing anything to help the ones around them.

Yet twice I was told so far, that the problem is I wanted to do things " my way " both times i bit my tongue in response, the response is, who doesn't want to do things their way ? The leaders in the monastery were all doing things their way under the guise of what was supposedly best for the monastery, yet they lacked any connection with the poor, my fault was realizing this way too late. Their main concern was the seminary they were teaching at which is located on the property, and fundraising for the seminary and to keep the monastery activities aloft.

Had i not been so naive, and excited I would have searched for a community that is focused on serving the poor, is kind to one another and the elderly in their midst and is frugal.

In the end the bullet points are as follows, they were backstabbers to each other in the way they gossiped about each other, would dump the infirmed they could no longer care for into a assisted living facility and wouldnt visit but maybe every other week or so while one other man did make personal time to go see him as much as possible, the senior members could have caredless in visiting. And like anything time is something one makes for others, you dont make the excuse of why you cant. There were at least two closet homosexuals living there which did bother me to a degree but what bothered me more was their blatant catty bitchy behavoir when they got annoyed or were aggravated, not to mention one member left because he flat out came out of the closet and had no choice but to leave from what i was told and should not have been told in the first place. Then the lack of guideance i was given, i was struggling so much spiritually and physically while i was there, given mixed signals on what i could and couldnt do and berated when i made a mistake, with no one taking the time to on a regular basis meaning at least once a week to just ask how I am adjusting, do i have any questions, and more over, what am i doing with my time.

Everything was a fight, it seemed, and when it wasn't i was home sick, and my parents needed me home as well. combine the two and it was time for me to leave as i had enough of the garbage that was going on. I was considered a rookie and any concerns i had were non existant oddly enough until I left, then they wanted to know what was wrong and decided to make changes as to which i didnt ask what they were because i just didnt care, it was too little too late. An more over not big enough changes that would actually help the monastery, or the poor. It would have taken at least 10-20 years before i had enough seniority to be heard and taken seriously.

I feel that I wasted so much time there, I did enjoy the private times I had to pray in silence, and the nights were more often than not so quiet and peaceful, i could actually sleep with out fear of what was going on outside.

But the lack of support , the lack of friendship, the lack of trust, the lack of serving the poor and living a frugal life, the pomp of catering to rich donors, it all made me sick. It showed me that what I believed to a good , nobel and holy life style was just nothing more than a commune or a retirement home of elderly with their own ideas on what it meant to be a Benedictine Monk. An just giving face to the Rule of Saint Benedict.

I can though understand why St. Benedict didn't want followers, I can even better understand why he created the rules he did. It makes sense from a perspective of wanting to do something ones own way when one has already said they are really not interested in forming a group .

So now here I am, trying to figure out what to do with my life now, I gambled big on my life career twice, once was to be in the Army, the other a religious life, i bombed twice, I was completely wrong about a religious life, i felt like a fool, and I would have been better off spiritually never trying, and staying naive to how religious and priests really are .... how they are no more holy than I am an how some are actually worse than I am. I keep trying to rekindle what I had, I have not completely given up trying but everything feels worthless, and I just dont care about myself anymore. I dont care that i tried, i dont care that im a good person, because evidently it just doesnt matter. I may have helped a few people on the way and that might mean something to God and those i have helped.

In the end, i still feel lost , empty, and depressed. no purpose. no nothing.

Getting a job is just as pointless, my goal is to work for myself when i can figure out how to make a living at what i want to do. An to reconnect with my faith.

I have learned to not be so naive to not be so wiling to trust religious and clergy, that they are just men an women, regular people with a job like anyone else, trying to do the best they can. They are human, not divine, not holy, they dont get a free pass at anything, they have tempers, agendas, personalities, problems, everything like anyone else. An that means that my trust is something i cant keep giving away.

If any of this irks you, oh well, this is my perspective of what i went through, and really only a little bit of this time in my life, it would take a proper book to really dive into things with more detail. to give a full perspective as to what i mean. an maybe one day i can look back on this and remember and write that book. Right now i needed to get this out because im tired of hearing twice now, that i just wanted to do things my way. that just isnt true. I expected better, I expected people in this monastery to not be the jerks they are. An to not abandon and neglect and turn their backs on those that could no longer care for themself.

I mentioned homosexuals briefly, im not against them, i dont hate them, i have had bad encounters with some over my years but there is no hate, i dont hold the same opinons as the church does toward them. not entirely, I do though have a problem with the super catty behavior the eye and neck roll, the manerisms. An find it a problem when one of them is a teacher and finds it no big deal to oogle a male student as if one were in a mall with buddies checking out some attractive female. I should have embarressed him infront of the class and called him out on that but i didnt. It will i am sure be a matter of time an things will show themself.

Religion is a tough topic for some, some of you reading this may be completely offended just at the idea of religion, you may hate Catholicism way more than i ever could for your own reasons that you feel are valid, im not here to argue with you, and i am not intersted in that kind of conversation. An i wont be conversing about any of this either. I had to vent , I had to get this out. Like it or not, i dont care, reply or not i dont care.

I do thank anyone who read this, and shared this moment with me. be safe as i am sure you are struggling with your own problems.

peace.