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We welcome you to join us for Advent Vigils November 29 (reflections from Sister Janet Goetz), December 6 (reflections from Sister Val Luckey), December 13 (reflections from Oblate Mary Hembrow Snyder), December 20 (reflections from Sister Jean Wolbert) in the monastery chapel, 7:00 p.m.

Monastic Life Is...

The new issue of The Mount, Winter 2025 is available in PDF format. We are happy to share it with you!

Benedictines for Peace will host a Silent Peace Walk at Perry Square on Tuesday, December 16, at 7:00 pm. As wars rage in Gaza, Ukraine, Sudan, and around the globe, the special focus of this walk is peace on earth.

In a special three-part podcast series, Sister Joan Chittister talks with feminist theologian Elizabeth Johnson, CSJ, about Sister Elizabeth's latest book, "Come, Have Breakfast: Meditations on God and the Earth" (Orbis, 2024). Sister Joan is pictured here with her pet bird, Lady Hildegard.

Benedictine scholar Sister Laura Swan has studied and written about the history of women's spirituality and the monastic life for many years. She will engage us in this webinar with voices from the past that call to us with their message — one we desperately need in our lives today. We see this as a nudging of the Holy Spirit, a call to listen because we are in time of reformation and impasse and in need of guidance.

Sister May Nguyen, pictured here with Erie Benedictine Sister Katherine Horan, received her white coat in a ceremony at Gannon University last month. The traditional white coat ceremony marks the transition for junior Bachelor of Science in Nursing students into the clinical phase of their program. Sister May, of the Congregation of Lovers of the Holy Cross of Hanoi, a Vietnamese congregation, is living at the monastery while she pursues her nursing studies. Sister Thi Hoa Nguyen is also living at the monastery and studying early childhood education.

In the monthly booklet, Give Us This Day,  produced by the Benedictine publisher Liturgical Press, each day's prayers include a short reflection by a noted author. This month an excerpt by Erie Benedictine Sister Joan Chittister from her book, The Liturgical Year, the spiraling adventure of the spiritual life, will appear on November 29, the vigil of the First Sunday of Advent, the beginning of the Church's liturgical year. 

Benedictine scholar Sister Laura Swan has studied and written about the history of women's spirituality and the monastic life for many years. There is no fee for this webinar on November 18 at 7:00 p.m. ET where Sister Laura will engage us with voices from the past that call to us with their message — one we desperately need in our lives today. We see this as a nudging of the Holy Spirit, a call to listen because we are in time of reformation and impasse and in need of guidance. With Sister Laura we will explore what the message of the Beguines might be for us today.

Sister Jacqueline Sanchez-Small is interviewed in this YourErie.com news clip reporting on the living rosary, organized in response to Pope Leo's has urging to be “united and forceful” in our protection of migrants’ rights in the US.