Quarr Abbey Issue 27 NEWSLETTER Summer 2020 Human, Safe and Caring Friends of Quarr “Stay Safe!” We hear this phrase quite a lot these days. Spontaneously, it seems, we fight the ‘malediction’ of the pandemic with good wishes. On behalf of the Friends of Quarr we St Benedict quotes the Bible saying: “A good word is above the best hope you continue to be well and safe in gift.” It is a good thing to say good words, to ‘say well’, to give a ‘bene- these challenging times. diction’ –literally, a ‘well-saying’, what we call a ‘blessing’. It is the first Quarr Abbey like so many other step towards doing good. Wherever there is an evil, the right answer, charities has been hit hard by the Covid19 pandemic and the support of according to St Paul, is to do good: “Do not be overcome by evil, but the Friends and all those who visit the overcome evil with good.” (Romans 12:21). There is always so much abbey is ever more important. good we can do. Fundraising, as we know it, is impossible When we bless others, we are asking God to bless them. Our blessing is in the ‘new normal’ with arranged a wish; God’s blessing is efficacious. Pope Francis solemnly blessed the events having to be postponed or world on 27th March. He reminded us that we were not under a curse cancelled. The Friends were unable to hold the Easter Day Retreat and we and that God’s blessing would accompany us all through this trial. God’s cannot arrange a date for the Advent blessing rarely suppresses evil totally; but, through it, opens doors of life. Retreat. The Friends calendar for 2021 To see these doors we need hearts attuned with life. Let us be attentive has not been produced because of the and inventive. Families have found new ways of expressing love and threat of the on-going pandemic. The chairman will donate the funds, which proximity, beyond the suffering of separation and distance. Friends and would have been used to produce the neighbours have developed strategies of solidarity: a smile, a phone calendar, to the Accessible Paths Project. call, flowers or vegetables from the garden put at the door, help with It is hoped the project will be started shopping, keeping an eye on the more vulnerable, those more in need in the second week of September, of attention; nothing exceptional, when you think of it, just the simple, pandemic and weather permitting. elementary, and humbly effective language of love. To love is to procure The Friends send good wishes to you what is good for the other, to wish him or her good, and to do good, as and your families and hope that you much as we can. continue to keep safe. If you would like to join the Friends please email: And, yes, by the way, it is a very good time for loving others, for [email protected] or telephone offering support and humanity. St Benedict, speaking of the guests of 01983 882420 ext. 209 and leave a message. the monastery, says we should first pray with them and then omnis exhibeatur humanitas. We could translate: ‘let them be treated as Like many charities, Quarr Abbey is human beings by human beings’. In good health or in illness, in youth suffering a lot of the present Covid or old age, gifted or handicapped, rich or poor, native or foreigner, a crisis. The Community is very human being remains at the same time carer and in need of care. The grateful for any donation towards stress can be on one side, or the other. Jesus, the most wonderful carer the maintenance of the monastery ever, was much in need of care in the crib and on the cross. He is cared and estate so that Quarr may remain open to many. Donations can be for in those who suffer. He is caring in those who serve them. made online through the website. You Getting closer to Him, we may, through these difficult times, become might also consider putting us in your will. The Procurator can be contacted more simply human, and even see more clearly what it is to be a human for any questions: procurator@quarr. being, what weakness this implies, and what nobility. org and 01983 882420 ext. 204. Abbot Xavier 1 was closed; all its staff were put on and unable even to enter a church to pray furlough. Our Operations Manager was before the tabernacle it was not something Quarr tasked to master the rapidly expanding we could take for granted. We gained a mass of advice and assistance offered by greater awareness of what it means for the Government. a monastic community to exercise a Abbey ministry of intercession on behalf of the Perhaps unsurprisingly the closure of the Church made the greatest difference wider Church and of the world. Chronicle to the community. It was very strange We gathered together before the statue celebrating the first Sunday Mass during of our Lady in the cloister for an act of lockdown. The Mass was celebrated as devotion each day after None. This was Lockdown Abbey normal, but abnormally, no congregation the regular custom during May, but was present. The door to the Church we extended it indefinitely. An Oblate rattled rather pathetically a few times on discovered a medieval Sequence, “Stella Someone said to me recently: “Of course, that first Sunday, but afterwards, only caeli exstirpavit”, composed during the you monks spend your whole lives silence. There was no offertory procession, fourteenth century for use in a time of in lockdown, so it doesn’t make any the cantor had to remember to intone plague. It wasn’t easy to sing, but once we difference to you.” I wonder. There may the “Agnus Dei” rather than exchange had mastered it this became a favourite be some truth in it; we do try to take the Kiss of Peace, and there was no need, chant we could offer to our Lady. solitude and silence seriously, but I have of course, to repeat the Communion noticed a fair few differences of late. It soon became clear that there would be Antiphon. a difficulty in providing the regular daily Lockdown crept up to us at Quarr We had a vague and rather insubstantial Mass for our sisters at Saint Cecilia’s Abbey slowly, and we didn’t really see it coming hope that it would all be over by Easter, in Ryde. For a time they had a visiting until it was upon us. Coronavirus was a but the Solemnity of solemnities came Dominican priest, but after Easter he left, topic of conversation in the Art Gallery. and went in the midst of our isolation. and they were left without a Mass. The The Chronicler exchanged humorous It seemed somehow very wrong that we problem had to be solved. The solution remarks with the artists about the various could not share the joy of Christ’s victory involved a priest of the community living precautions to be taken. But it didn’t with our faithful friends and neighbours. at The Garth, Saint Cecilia’s external guest really strike home until one day I was told Their desire to come was almost tangible: accommodation for a week at a time. Mass the next exhibition had been cancelled. when we placed a recording of our Easter could be said for the sisters daily while The Gallery, the Bookshop and the Sunday Mass on our website, two hundred keeping strict isolation. The Garth has a Visitors Centre all closed together. The of them listened in, and that within forty- small private garden attached, and what little courtyard was emptied of all its eight hours of its posting. with a generous supply of books, most of crowds and business. Worried artists We felt very privileged to be able to the brethren found their week at Saint were concerned about the refunding of celebrate the Mass and the seven Hours of Cecilia’s a welcome silent retreat. their hire fees, volunteers were suddenly Prayer each day in our Abbey Church. It Otherwise the usual day to day ministry unoccupied on their day in the week. was something we had always done, but of the priest-monk to those outside the The Teashop stayed open for takeaways it became something more vital. With so community was much curtailed. Visitors for a few days more, but then that too, many people deprived of the sacraments, were few and far between. Nevertheless Hudson Media 2 Fr. Luke was able to take the sacraments strange a thing to hear- the new normal. As I write the Farmshop is in process of to a friend and neighbour who was dying, Bees were still regular visitors to the re-opening to a limited extent. On my clothing himself in personal protective gardens as the Isle of Wight Bee Keepers round I can see yellow markings on the equipment rather than the customary Association run a teaching apiary at paths leading to it; lines setting out the liturgical vestments. Quarr and that was still maintained. You approved social distancing limit. There is Although the guesthouse was closed from cannot keep bees on lockdown, but hives also a yellow box junction, marking the the beginning of the crisis, it was not, of were moved to areas where they could point where two lines of customers may course, empty. Saint Benedict says that be checked regularly but more discreetly. cross, and cause confusion and possibly guests are never lacking in a monastery, And the queen-rearing apiary reduced in contagion.