From: richarra@gmail.com   
      
   The gift of the moments   
      
     Each moment of your day, which you devote to this new way of life   
   is a gift to God. The gift of the moments. Even when your desire to   
   serve God is sincere, it is not an easy thing to give Him many of   
   these moments: the daily things you had planned to do, given up gladly   
   so that you can perform a good service or say a kind word. If you can   
   see God's purpose in many situations, it will be easier to give Him   
   many moments of your day. Every situation has two   
   interpretations--your own and God's. Try to handle each situation in   
   the way you believe God would have it handled.   
      
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   October 6th - St. Bruno the Carthusian   
   (c. 1035-1101)   
      
   St. Bruno, founder of the Carthusians, was born into an unidentified   
   noble family of Cologne, Germany. Called by his talents to an   
   intellectual life, he studied first at Reims, then at Tours, and   
   became a brilliant scholar in philosophy and sacred and profane   
   literature. Returning to Cologne for theological studies, he was   
   ordained a priest in 1055. Then he was named director of his Alma   
   Mater at Reims. During the 20 years of his directorship, this noted   
   school maintained its high reputation. Many of the alumni became   
   distinguished scholars and churchmen including Odo of Chatillon, the   
   future Pope Urban II.   
      
   Bruno was too omnicompetent, however, to be left in the schoolroom.   
   Named chancellor of the diocese of Reims, he soon became embroiled   
   with the archbishop, Manasses I. Manasses, who is said to have become   
   archbishop through simony (buying his appointment) was in opposition   
   to the church reform policy of Pope St. Gregory VII. When Bruno and   
   some other diocesan officials stood for reform against Manasses, they   
   were forced to leave the archdiocese. Bruno went back to Cologne.   
   Eventually Archbishop Manasses was ousted and Bruno returned to Reims.   
   He was even offered the Reims archbishopric himself, but he firmly   
   declined. He had no ecclesiastical ambitions, and as a matter of fact,   
   the whole episode had shown him the folly of church politics.   
   Resigning his own offices and disposing of his possessions, he now   
   retired with a few friends to the Cistercian monastery of Molesmes,   
   France. Here they put themselves under the spiritual direction of St.   
   Robert, founder of the Cistercian monks.   
      
   The Cistercians had been founded to provide a more ascetical approach   
   to the monastic rule of St. Benedict. Bruno and his friends sought an   
   even stricter life. They asked St. Robert’s permission to live apart   
   from the Cistercian monks as hermits, but even that device did not   
   satisfy them. At length Bruno persuaded his former pupil, St. Hugh,   
   Bishop of Grenoble, to provide them with a still more remote site for   
   a hermitage. In 1085 they moved to a hidden valley called Cartusia or   
   LaChartreuse. Here they built a simple chapel and surrounded it by   
   some small cells. This was the origin of the Carthusian Order of   
   hermit-monks; this was its motherhouse, La Grande Chartreuse (The   
   Great Chartreuse). Actually, Bruno had not intended to found a new   
   order. His aim was rather to take the Rule of St. Benedict and give it   
   a simpler and more ascetical interpretation. But the Carthusian slant   
   could only produce an obviously different sort of institute.   
      
   Several years after the foundation of this community of hermits, a   
   Benedictine abbot who paid a visit to the pioneer Carthusians wrote   
   the following wide-eyed report: “Their dress is poorer than that of   
   other monks, so short and thin and rough that the very sight frightens   
   me. They wear hair shirts next their skin and fast almost perpetually;   
   eat only bran bread; never touch meat, either sick or well; never buy   
   fish, but eat it if given to them as alms … Their constant occupation   
   is praying, reading and manual work, which consists chiefly in   
   transcribing books. They celebrate Mass only on Sundays and   
   festivals.”   
      
   How could this rigid life even survive? Bruno’s secret for survival   
   was to inculcate a spirit of love and joy that made the austerity   
   pleasant and achieved in its practitioners a wonderful sense of   
   balance.   
      
   Most religious rules in the history of the Church have had to be   
   altered or adapted. Since the Carthusian rule was compiled, it has   
   never been changed, for it has never needed to be changed. Hence the   
   proverb about this rule: “nummian reformata ouianumauam deformata”   
   (never reformed because never deformed”).   
      
   Naturally, in a period when the whole Church badly needed general   
   reform, St. Bruno, with his joyful austerity, became one of the   
   reformist leaders. In 1090 his former pupil, Pope Urban II ordered him   
   to come to Rome and serve as his adviser. The Saint obeyed, provided   
   that he be allowed to maintain, as best he could, his eremitic life.   
   Pope Urban permitted him to have a little hermitage tucked away in the   
   vast ruins of the Roman Baths of Diocletian. Inevitably, however, the   
   hermit was drawn into the turmoil of public life. He no doubt assisted   
   the Pope loyally in defending him against antipope Gilbert of Ravenna,   
   and in running several reformist synods. But the Abbot’s monastic   
   detachment enabled him to remain ever the monk. Thus he refused to   
   accept the bishopric of Reggio, and he was able to establish two   
   monasteries in Italy following his way of life. In Italy as in France,   
   he acquired the reputation of a wonder worker.   
      
   Bruno the Carthusian died in 1101 without ever returning to his   
   original monastery, but he had already set firmly the Carthusian mode   
   of life. A popular cult of him quickly developed in southern Italy.   
   Pope Leo X canonized Bruno viva voce in 1514. His feast was extended   
   to the whole church in 1623.   
      
   Carthusian monasteries have been ever since a strong, if select,   
   presence in the Church. During the Reformation, 50 Carthusian monks   
   died for the faith. The first and only “Charterhouse” in the U.S.A.   
   was founded in 1950 at Arlington, Vermont. St. Bruno’s arm is long!   
   –Father Bob   
      
      
   Saint Quote:   
   We need to find God, and he cannot be found in noise and restlessness.   
   God is the friend of silence. See how nature--trees, flowers,   
   grass--grows in silence; see the stars, the moon and the sun, how they   
   move in silence... We need silence to be able to touch souls.   
   --Blessed Mother Teresa   
      
   Bible Quote:   
   Blessed are ye when they shall revile you, and persecute you, and   
   speak all that is evil against you, untruly, for my sake: Be glad and   
   rejoice for your reward is very great in heaven. For so they   
      
   [continued in next message]   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)