He reads the blog, and my blog post about that event perked his interest, wanting to pick my brain about the Third Order Oblates of Clear Creek. So I thought that would make a good Saturday blog post, per his suggestion, to hit two birds with one stone. Just finished some work, and I'm in need of some good weekend R&R. Blogging usually does the trick.
Clear Creek. Third Order. Oblates. Laity attached to Clear Creek. To benefit from their spirituality, if not also to become an associate member of the wider community of Villagers (Abbot Anderson's term he used in his conference talk HERE).
Okay, here goes.
The devil has struck the shepherd; the sheep are scattered. We cannot presently trust the person of the Pope, Bishops, and Priests under them. Generally speaking, ANY of them. We are the sheep looking up from the rocky, lifeless soil of the "conciliar church," which was once a fruitful pasture of "amber waves of grain"
Patriotic, 4th of July song reference intended.
We look up to the hilltop where the attentive, sober, serious, and authentically pastoral shepherd once sat. In his place is a listless, somnolent, disoriented, servile, clericalist who is not consistently leading as Christ commanded in Sacred Scripture, or in a Christ-like way.
Instead, traditional, faithful Catholics, look for alternative sources that run contrary to the norms of Church history. We look away from the parochial hierarchy to traditionalist societies of priests, and traditional orders of monks and nuns for guidance.
The traditionalist/conservative religious and priests are, by default, leading by example, at least in their orthodoxy, devotions, and external attachment to ecclesial traditions. In the case of an Abbot, he pastors not only the members of his monastery, but 3rd Order lay members attached to it.
I personally think it is a good idea for some laity to be 3rd Order lay members of a traditional monastery or other religious institute, including Our Lady of the Annunciation at Clear Creek Abbey in Hulbert, OK, as long as their reasons are balanced. I would also recommend considering being an Oblate under Our Lady of Guadalupe Monastery in Silver City, NM, which, in my opinion, is even more faithful objectively to the Sacred Tradition of the Church.
Or for that matter, perhaps consider being a THIRD ORDER member of the Society of St. Pius X, or a member of the Confraternity of the Fraternity of St. Peter.
But flip the coin to the other side, as I often do on this blog. The Crisis is everywhere, including trad circles. I absolutely do not support laity trying to escape the world as if they were monks in the Egyptian deserts of the Early Church, which some are doing who try and set up homesteads in the deep woods around Clear Creek.
If that is the mindset, then I personally would discourage the person from becoming a lay Benedictine. Better just to have morning and evening prayers, go to Mass on Sundays, while offering your daily humiliations according to the demands of work in the world of men.
But I'm just one individual with a blog.
But I'm just one individual with a blog.
Okay, I'm off to the pool for a swim, and then an evening of beer, Netflix, and lap time with my canine buddy Peanut. Tomorrow a group of us go swimming/picnicking out at Blue Hole Spring oasis.
My next blog post will be patriotic, on the 4th of July.