The photograph shows a demonstration in Florence on the 15th March – showing the flag, making a stand, resisting the values of nationalism and bigotry. There was drumming and shouted speeches. Yeah! Right! Business as usual. Then on Thursday of this week, almost accidentally, we found ourselves near to La Certosa outside of Florence. I say accidentally because all we had in mind was to walk out from the centre into the surrounding hills. But here we were looking at La Certosa up on its hill just outside of Galluzzo so why not have a look as we were so close. And even though it was the end of the afternoon we were in time for a guided tour of the monastery. It remains a working Cistercian monastery though I’m not sure how many monks are still there they still produce various liqueurs. There was the vast complex edifice of the monastery with its surprisingly large cells where the ordained monks lived, prayed and worked, the various cloisters, the church, the paintings but the impression that particularly stayed with me was about the nature of the monastic vocation as to the notion of practice. Practice as a way of life. Which is an idea I have been exploring for some years now. Not practice makes perfect; I don’t find perfection a useful focus, but what is a valuable way of life? Conversation – yes. Some sort of work – yes. Some sort of exercise, which merges with prayer, meditation – yes. Community – yes. The details will all need further refining but these things are a starting point. So witnessing the life at La Certosa, the centuries of tradition and history was a gift. It didn’t seem to me that the monks had been wasting their time but rather that their ceaseless labour is a gift for us. I, personally, do not wish to live in an all male community; my relationship to women is too much part of my life. But there is much that I can learn from. The treasure of prayer, contemplation, meditation built up over thousands of years is there for us to receive. After all we need to explore models of how we might learn to live in a post-consumerist society, to learn to live anew. Resistance can take many forms.
Returning the favour
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