I knew the Benedictines had gone ’round the bend of late, but this is just bizarre.
The [Presbyterian] Rev. Lynne Smith is believed to be the first woman in the United States to join a monastery founded by Roman Catholic sisters without converting from her original religion.
(Thanks, Open Book)
Update: The original news story link no longer works, so here’s another version.
First U.S. ecumenical community for women
Lynne Smith describes herself as a new monastic for the new millennium. Smith is a Presbyterian Benedictine — not just a baptized Presbyterian, but an ordained minister in the Presbyterian church. She is also a novice in the ecumenical community of Benedictine women of Madison.
“Smith said she was attracted to the sacraments and regular prayer of Catholic monastic life, but didn’t have a way of living that life within the Protestant tradition.”
Why doesn’t she just convert, instead of being pretend-Catholic?
. . . not that this particular convent is terribly Catholic, anyway.
enough said…
“…so the St. Benedict Center was reborn as a retreat center and ecumenical gathering place.”
Sounds sort of like the grounds of the convent here in Pittsburgh where my brother made his Buddhist retreat.
But I’m surprised – could there actually be worse out there than the Joan Chittister-supporting Erie Benedictines??
Ugh, this watered-down, pot-smoking hippie Catholicism is not what we need right now.
And people are still afraid to come out and speak against The ever-revered Spirit of Vatican II.
Well, we’ve come a long way from thinking that all non-Catholics are hell-bound (or in my case thinking that Catholics were, in fact, so bound). I suppose that good ol’ St. Benedict would at least have to comply with the teachings of Vatican II. It sounds like the Presbyterian reverend/sister is in genuine (yet presumably imperfect) fellowship with the mission and spirit of the monastery.
So in short: Yes, the sky is falling. But I don’t take this as one of the evidences.
Cheers