Author: Paul Zalonski

Vincent Bataille elected new abbot president of the Swiss American Congregation of Monks


Vincent de Paul Bataille.jpgAbbot Vincent de Paul Bataille, emeritus abbot of
Marmion Abbey, was elected for six-year term by the capitulars of the 44th General Congregation Swiss American Congregationon Monday, August 8, 2011. As the new Abbot President he’ll over see certain parts of the monastic life of little more than a dozen monasteries (see a previous blog post).


Abbot Vincent saw to the
renovation of Marmion Abbey, the building of the abbey church, and attracting
new vocations to the abbey, plus several additions to the academy. He earned the MA (Music) University of Notre Dame,
MEd from DePaul University,
Chicago. He taught Math and Language at Marmion Academy, and held the position
of Dean of Students at the Academy. 


For a period of time he was appointed the Prior
of Priory of San José, Guatemala before being elected the 4th Abbot of Marmion Abbey
and President of Marmion Academy, Aurora, Illinois, in 1991. Until now he’s been the Vocation
Director for Marmion Abbey, and a member of the Abbot President’s Council,
Swiss-American Congregation.


May God grant Abbot Vincent the graces needed for certain and clear leadership.

Saint Benedict and Saint Scholastica, pray for us.
Blessed Columba Marmion, pray for us.

Monks in the Newark hood

Fr Edward of Newark Abbey.jpegThe Newark, New Jersey colony of Benedictine monks have been involved with the teaching of youth and parish work since their founding in 1857. The monks, priests and brothers, live a life of prayer, work within the context of the fraternal life that engages one’s freedom to serve the Lord in unique ways.

A recent film, The Rule, documents the life and work of the Benedictine monks of Newark Abbey.
Neither the lives of the monks nor the lives of the students would be classified as easy; certainly complacency is not a virtue with the monks and their students.

Read Marcia Worth’s article “Monks in the Hood.”

The Liturgical Commentaries of St Symeon of Thessalonika



Liturgical Commentaries of St Symeon Steven Hawkes Teeples.jpg

I am happy to recommend my friend’s recently published book, The Liturgical Commentaries of St Symeon of Thessalonika.

From the book:

This volume contains an edition and facing
English translation of Explanation of the Divine Temple and “On the Sacred
Liturgy,” the two commentaries on the pontifical (hierarchal) Byzantine Divine
Liturgy by St. Symeon of Thessalonika (†1429). This edition is based on MS
Zagora 23, which contains extensive corrections and additions apparently added
to the text by the author himself. The book opens with a historical and
theological foreword on liturgical commentaries and mystagogy by Archimandrite
Robert Taft. The introduction surveys the life and career of St. Symeon,
analyzes the structure and theology of the commentaries, and concludes with an
account of technical and editorial questions. The index includes references to
names, places, and topics in Symeon’s text and in the introduction and traces
key terms in the commentaries in both Greek and English.

A review:

Fr Steven Hawkes Teeples, SJ.jpg

With this book Fr.
Steven Hawkes-Teeples, SJ, Professor of Byzantine Liturgy at the Pontifical
Oriental Institute in Rome, fills a gaping hole in the scholarly literature
associated with the overlapping academic fields of Byzantine Studies, Medieval
Studies, Orthodox Theology, and Oriental Liturgiology. The present volume
represents the first translation into any modern western academic language of
both commentaries of St. Symeon of Thessalonika (d. 1429) on the Byzantine
Divine Liturgy or Eucharist. Such neglect is surprising, for St. Symeon is an
author of the first importance. As the last and most prolific Orthodox
liturgical theologian of the Byzantine era, who lived at the point when the
Byzantine Empire was moving toward its demise before the Ottoman onslaught, he
crowns and closes his era. — Robert F. Taft 

Saint Dominic de Guzman

Sacred Conversation, St Dominic et al, Fra Angelico.jpg

Speaking always with you or about you, O God, beginning all his actions in contemplation, he advanced in wisdom. He brought many to Christ by his life and teaching, he devoted himself without reserve to the building up the Church, the body of Christ.
(Preface for the Mass of Saint Dominic)
If you have time, you’ll want to read The Life of Saint Dominic from the Vitae Fratrum.
Also, there is last year’s post here.
Saint Dominic, model of the New Evangelization, pray for us!

A Still Small Voice: meeting God

Still small voice.jpgThe first reading from today’s Scripture readings at Mass call us to reflect on how Revelation is made known to us; in what ways do we meet God? How are we to understand the teachings of the many saints and others who have claimed to have encountered God? Knowing who are true visionaries is rather difficult, I have to say, and some are even frauds. The credibility of the witness is so crucial here since we only have indirect knowledge of God because only Jesus’ Mother (and family) and apostles had direct experience of Him, how can we talk about an encounter with the Lord. One way to wrap our minds around meeting the Divine Majesty is to listen, in part, to Father Benedict Groeshel:

The best lesson one may learn from these authenticated and canonized visionaries is to do what you are supposed to do and leave the rest to God. The fulfillment of duty is the guiding principle of any decent moral life, in any religion of the world, because it expresses the natural law and is completely consistent with the revealed law of God. The fulfillment of duty placed before us by the providential circumstances of life, as we are guided by the commandments and the teaching of the gospel, is the straight road to God. Along that road any valid religious experience which occurs may be useful.

Father Benedict Groeshel, CFR
A Still Small Voice, p. 138

God launches us into life’s adventure with the grace needed to succeed, Father Julián Carrón reminds


The Mystery, however has not launched us into the
adventure of life without providing us with a compass with which to find our
bearings. This compass is the heart. In our epoch, the heart has been reduced
to a feeling, a question of mood, but we can all recognize in our experience
that the heart does not allow itself to be reduced, it will not be conformed to
anything. “Men and women were created for something great, for infinity.
Nothing else will ever be enough.” The Pope says in his Message, and we know it
very well.


So whoever takes his heart seriously, made as it is for what is great,
begins to have a criterion for judging the truth or the falsity of whatever
proposal dawns on the horizon of his life. “You are constantly being offered
easier choices, but you yourselves know that these are ultimately deceptive and
cannot bring you serenity and joy.”

Father Julián Carrón
President of the Fraternity of Communion and Liberation
Alfa and Omega [sic]
28 July 2011

Benedictine abbots meet

St Benedict medal.jpgToday begins the 44th General Chapter of the Swiss American Benedictine Congregation. The ruling abbots and conventual priors with elected delegates will be at Westminister Abbey in Mission British Columbia, Canada.

Among the business items to be worked on: the election of the new abbot praeses (abbot president) for the congregation because Abbot Peter Eberle finishes his term of service; to listen to the reports of the abbeys; and the election to admit to the congregation (or not) of the Monastero di San Benedetto (Norcia, Italy).
As a note, the abbot president is not a superior general of an order, that is, he is not superior of monks in autonomous (and fully functioning) monasteries, but he does have executive powers as a major superior of the Congregation, and therefore his direct power is limited. His concern is for “the welfare of the whole Congregation” and is concerned for the Confederation, too. But the Praeses has 23 items to which he pays attention.

Continue reading Benedictine abbots meet

World Youth Day participants to consecrate themselves to the Sacred Heart

As Catholic grammar school student I was introduced to the Sacred Heart of Jesus by the Nazareth sisters. Everyday we said a prayer to the Sacred Heart and we did the Litany to the Sacred Heart yearly in church. To me it was normal; the image of the heart outside the body was at first weird but in became indicative. Over time I realized that others had no idea of God’s unconditional love. My devotion to the Sacred Heart grew as time went on; my religious practice was helped by reading a bit of history and my friend Dom Ambrose who wrote his license thesis on St Gertrude’s teaching of the Sacred Heart.  Also, that first Friday devotion of Saint Margaret Mary Alacoque, like many, would relish in observing the First Friday with Mass, and hopefully confession if I could find a priest. The organizers of the World Youth Day captured part of Spanish religious and civil history by making a connection with proposing an Act of Consecration to the Sacred Heart of Jesus to all the participants. What a great idea!!! This is a yet another concrete way to be “planted and built up in Jesus Christ, firm in the faith.” What follows is merely an interesting paragraph from the catechesis prepared for the WYD; you can read the preparatory Catechesis here. Today, and certainly during the WYD, make an offering of yourself to your Lord and Savior.

Sacred Heart of Jesus, King.jpgThis search of man’s heart ends when one discovers God’s Heart. On this topic, St. Augustine says: “You made us for yourself, Oh God, and our heart is restless until it rests in you”. The concern to which St. Augustine refers is the difficulty we all have in attaining true Love as a consequence of our condition of creatures; we are finite; moreover, we are sinners. Over and over again we run into the difficulty of our selfishness, the chaos of our passions, that throws away this true Love. Man’s heart “needs” a heart at his same level, a heart that can enter into his history, and, on the other hand, an “all-powerful” heart that can take him out of his limitations and sins. We can say that In Jesus Christ, God has met mankind and has loved us with a “human heart”. In the encounter of man’s heart with the Sacred Heart of Jesus, the mystery of salvation becomes real. “In fact, from the infinite horizon of his love, God wished to enter into the limits of human history and the human condition. He took on a body and a heart. Thus, we can contemplate and encounter the infinite in the finite, the invisible and ineffable Mystery in the human Heart of Jesus, the Nazarene” (Benedict XVI, Angelus, 1/VI/2008)