We are starting only with the celibate female branch at the present time.  We have six at present, and the deadline for candidacy is this Sunday, September 14, Feast of the Triumph of the Cross.  We start their novitiate year officially on October 10, Feast of Our Lady of the Cloister.

http://cloisters.tripod.com/cloisterites/

We are working with officials of the Diocese of Charlotte, NC, on this.

Those candidates who are already on the yahoo group--which is one way we keep in touch--have been modifying their wardrobes toward modesty; simplifying their lives by dejunking their homes; and have been discerning the names of their hermitages.  So far, we have The Cleft; The Paraclete; and Mount Carmel.

Hurricane Ike raked across Puerto Rico, which is where one of our celibate lady candidates is located.  Please keep her safety in your prayers.  We also have one in Texas, and we're praying for God's will to be done--please, Lord, protect those in jeapordy.

Anyone interested in being a Cloisterite, please remember the Diocese of Charlotte, North Carolina, in your prayers.  Don't forget to pray for your own diocese.

I had mentioned including married folk in the Cloisterites--that will have to take the form of a Lay Association of the Faithful.  I have a number of people interested in that.  The lay hermits would try to follow the same horarium as the celibates, but there would be far more flexibility in order to accommodate family.  The lay hermits would live their married lives in reparation for neglect and abuse of spouses and children (among other things).

Now, before anyone blasts me for that last paragraph, permit me to convey one observation--most objections to such a concept come from those who have never been married.  I say the following with the greatest of charity--you're in for a real surprise if you ever do get married and have such expectations as to not be more flexible with one's thinking.

If both spouses are working at the time of marriage, both will be occupied with the remunerative work.  Spousal time afterward will hopefully be blessed with quality interaction.  Newlywed fights occur as a result of unmet expectations.  My advice is to get said expectations out and decide on conflict resolution measures before the wedding.

When she becomes pregnant, though, the parameters--and expectations--all change.  Once the baby is born, the focus of the parents is entirely on providing for the child.  Support systems have to be in place.  If there are no relatives in the area, then it is up to the husband to find support from either the workplace or the church.  (Neither happened when we lived out-of-state and away from our families.  My life is a cautionary tale in that respect).

The next couple of decades will probably be spent on the raising of children.  Homeschooling may enter the picture.  The family may be blessed with special needs children.   If properly informed, the care of said child will be incorporated so that family life will be seamless.  If not homeschooling, when all of the kids are away at school, and the husband is off to work, what is the woman supposed to do with herself during those eight hours?  I should hope she would turn to God.  How many times have I heard other moms say while awaiting our kids' release from school, "I wish I knew what to do with myself during the day?"

And that brings me back to the subject at hand--lay hermits.  The lay association of the faithful, which I have dubbed "Monastics of Nazareth," would have three classifications--married; widowed or divorced with option of remarriage; or consecrated widow/widower.  I have only this week started pulling those inspirations together, and since the celibate Cloisterite Hermits are the primary focus at this moment in time, I have to concentrate on that.  I have to come up with a year's worth of lesson plans in less than a month.

My summer was overwhelmingly overwhelming.  My Aspergers son was incorrectly diagnosed as bipolar last year, and the meds he was on made his drivers education course twice as hard for everyone involved.  When we were finally finished with driving with an instructor, I thought I would require an EKG--yes, my son's reflexes were that slow.  Only last week did we get to the Mecca of Autism--UNC-Chapel Hill--to have him re-evaluated by their new bipolar center.  They said he wasn't bipolar, and now we're weaning him off the meds, and have added Adderall to the equation.  He's sleeping through the night now (thanks to Clonidine and Remeron), and I've got my sweet kid back.

We also had computer problems out the wazoo.  Fortunately, Staples was able to refurbish our first desktop PC, which we've dubbed "Chunk" due to it being the size of a dehumidifer, and made it wireless capable.   It has Windows ME.  We invested in a 1TB Alienware laptop--we call it the "The Tardis"-- for my gradute school hubby.  With him being in school, and both boys taking honors classes in high school, as my college roommate put it, "You need all the internet access you can get."

I'm a hermit during the day, and work to make the lives of my three students as problem-free as possible in the evening.  What's wrong with that?

And here's an update on our proposed Reparatrices of Charity of the Miraculous Medal (RCMMs): we have just about the number needed to start the foundation, but I've got to work with them on the constitutions.  The Rule of St. Vincent de Paul will be used.  They are to make reparation for crimes against the poor.  The aspirants are following the horarium to the best of their ability in their own homes, from whence they are developing their ministries.  One of the group projects we will be initiating will be a poverty relief site for the state of Mississippi, similar to the one conducted by the Friends of Pine Ridge Reservation: http://friendsofpineridgereservation.org/

Here is the link for the RCMMs: http://cloisters.tripod.com/charity/

On this Patriot Day, let us remember the American Martyrs (IMHO) of September 11, 2001.

Blessings, Gemma

"Cloisterites-in-dispersion," what do you mean by that?

Long story short, the starter convent is no longer available, as that particular aspirant (also the homeowner) has become impeded due to health, and it simply would not be charitable--nor prudent--to bring her soon-to-be-sisters-in-religion to the house.  She was also going to be the main source of remunerative work.

Then our second source of income became impeded.  To keep the group from splintering further, I said a quick prayer for guidance, and I woke up a couple of mornings later with "Cloisterites in the World" on my mind.

I had already been working with a canon lawyer on the Cloisterite project, so I sent her a copy of "Cloisterites in the World," and at a meeting yesterday, she pointed out Canon 603--the canon regarding hermits.

Once my family realizes that my primary vocation is, by law, safe from destruction by this project, they will hopefully support me more in what I'm trying to do. 

So--the Cloisterites will be working towards becoming habit-wearing hermits in their own locales, until we manage to raise the funds for property and monastery.  An eremetical laura will be located somewhere for those who wish to stay on as hermits, but be surrounded by community.

Here is what the "Cloisterites-in-Diaspora" are doing:

The basic four elements of the cloistered life are: liturgy & lectio; silence & solitude.

The basic four emphases of the Cloisterites are: reparation; vocations to the cloisters; our own foundational initiatives (proposed/renewed charisms); and emerging communities.

1. Develop your own horarium.according to your state in life, but as close as possible to the Cloisterite horarium given on the website.

2. Morning offering–to include the four basic Cloisterite emphases.

3. Daily Mass–does not have to be EFLR.

4. Sunday Mass–EFLR if possible.

5. Daily Divine Office–Morning & Evening Prayers, more popularly known as Matins & Vespers. May pray more if led by the Holy Ghost.

6. Daily Rosary & Adoration–if possible, do this "Live"before the Blessed Sacrament. Otherwise, you may do so online @ www.savior.org/

7. Solitude time–May use this time for Lectio Divina (prayerful reading of scripture). Curtail social events, even those at church. You’re living a cloistered lifestyle in the world.

8. Night Offering–offering the pure heartbeats of sleep as adoration of and reparation to God for the cloisters & emerging communities. This is when your prayers are strongest.

We're still working on a diaspora rule.  The above pretty much covers everything, though.  I do plan to include married people/couples; consecrated virgins; widows; and widowers, also.  I, myself, will transition from Lay Passionist to Cloisterite hermit.

And while this is going on, I am reminded of Mother Seton, and the bishop requesting that she start a new order of teaching sisters.  She looked at the rule, and said it didn't include widows with children.  The bishop called her into his office sometime later, and showed her the rule again.  He had rewritten it to allow women with children.

I am also drawing from the example of the Little Portion Hermitage in Arkansas; and the Servants of the Sacred Cross (http://www.thesacredcross.org/).  While their communities are similar, there will definitely be differences.

As I said before, the Cloisterites-in-Diaspora are just the first phase of this project.  We will eventually have a monastery for the celibates.  For now, we will stay put.

Blessings, Gemma

Slow.  Real slow.

However, we are making progress, and if I'm reading the inspirations correctly, the aspirants for the Cloisterite foundation will be gathering at one aspirants' house--our 'starter convent'--in October.

But what comes after that?  Everyone usually assumes that they will start in on conventual life at 5:30am on a particular start date.   Not so.  They might follow the Horarium, and pray at the appointed times, but they're really there to learn to get along.

They will have to go to another monastery to receive their training.  And it's possible that there will be more than one monastery involved, since the Cloisterite charism is three-fold.  However, I think it would be imprudent of me if I were to tell anyone other than the aspirants and the appropriate church heirarchy whose door(s) I think we should go knocking upon.

The Cloisterites are to be a renewal of the Society of Mary Reparatrix.  I have added some new pages discussing the spirit of the SMRs on the Cloisterite website: http://cloisters.tripod.com/cloisterites/

Go to "About Us," then "Charism," then scroll down to the bottom of that page, and one will see "Our Society of Mary Reparatrix Pages."

As far as other founders/foundations are concerned, there's some pretty huge news coming from Catholic Answers: Rosalind Moss, who calls herself a Hebrew Catholic (she converted from Judaism), is founding a new community which will be called the Daughters of Mary, Mother of Israel's Hope.  They will be started in St. Louis, and one of the purposes is to "fill the world with the holy habit."  I think theirs will be blue.  Rosalind has aspirants, and she will be making the novitiate along with them.

In the Archdiocese of Chicago, a new community called the Sisters of the Real Presence of Our Lord Jesus Christ are starting.  They will be using the arts to get across the reality of Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament.  Their habit is the "traditional black."  They will have both the Novus Ordo and Latin Mass.

I believe in Kansas City, Kansas, there is an Augustinian Recollect hermitess who is trying to start an eremetical community.  They will have the Extraordinary Form of the Latin Rite (EFLR), formerly known as the Traditional Latin Mass (TLM).

A poster on Phatmass mentioned that she had felt a call to found an order which would change cappas with the liturgical season.  However, she dismissed it as fantasy.  Then we started seeing posts from a sister who had started the Missionaries of the Liturgy.  The side stripes on their large scapular, and the ribbon on their San Damiano crucifix changes with the liturgical season.  (Presently, they would be wearing purple).  The Missionaries are based in Illinois.

I am very relieved to see the pope asking the religious orders to really and truly get back to their founders' charisms--instead of what they keep passing off onto the faithful and the world as being religious life.  We've had discussions of "what's wrong with (order name)," and there is not just one answer as to what happened.   Read Ann Carey's book, "Sisters in Crisis."

One of the members of our Women in Discernment yahoo group

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/womenindiscernment/

is a former Dianic priestess, and she said many of the modern-day convents were spiritually dangerous places to be.  I know for a fact that a "Catholic" neo-pagan got a job at a convent, and had the sisters offering incense to the four winds.  How did I know about the "Catholic" neo-pagan?  She had written to a magazine on whose mailing list I had somehow landed, and she said it was her mission to rejoin Catholicism with it's neo-pagan roots.

Say what?! 

On our "Nearly Nun Club" yahoo group, which is for those who spent some time behind convent walls, but had to leave and live a devout life in the world, I have a few members who left after the Vatican II changes.  According to them, the Mass is what was changed first.  They said that convents were going to be closed so that sisters would live in little loci out in apartments.

Stupid question.  If you're closing convents, where is the central government and files for the congregation supposed to be kept?  God never intended the sisters to live in loci.  This is why we're having failures all over the world. 

The liberal sisters/nuns are going to have to pull a reality check and quickly.  According to an anonymous poster on one nun's blog, three cloisters closed in January alone.  The "liberated" nuns are not offering a radical life of sacrifice like what the discerners are looking for.  I've been working in vocations for 20 years this year, and they ALL want a radical departure from lay life.

It all boils down to this: live your charism.  If you don't live your Rule, you're useless.  Harsh words?  Yes.  But it has to be.

Life is busy here at Cloister Outreach, but that's the way it's supposed to be.  "Idleness is the enemy of the soul," says St. Clare.

But it's not all church work.  Of course, I have a family to work for--three students.   Hubby is a graduate student, and my two teen-aged sons are in middle and high schools respectively.  I'm also an aspiring author, and have a number of works-in-progress.

What am I reading?

A Very Violent Rebel: The Civil War Diary of Ellen Renshaw House.   Ellen lived in Knoxville, TN, during the Civil War.  I've been working on a book covering the history of Knoxville's Old City Hall--"The Silent Observer"--for the last two decades (18 years), and now that the kids aren't quite so dependent on me, I have more free time.  I discovered a wikipedia article on Old City Hall, and once I get my thoughts together, I will update the article.

OCH, as we called it at TVA when I worked there, started life as a Deaf & Dumb Asylum in the 1840s.  At the start of the Civil War, a local doctor started a hospital in the building.  After two years, the Yankees paid a visit to Knoxville, and took over the Institute.  To the Union army, the building was known as "Asylum U.S.A. Hospital."  After the war, the asylum staff declared the building unfit for use, and another year passed before the school reopened.  The school then prospered, until more room was needed, and they moved to South Knoxville.  City offices then occupied the complex, as well as a technical school.  The City of Knoxville would occupy the buildings for about sixty years, and moved to the City-County Building.  A non-profit organization worked out an agreement with TVA, and Old City Hall's renovation took place during the 1892 World's Fair.

TVA would eventually vacate the premises when the reduction-in-force took place.  The next tenant would be the Knoxville Area Chamber Partnership.  The buildings are now vacant.

Such is the life of an Aspie whose brain just sometimes won't sit still.

Blessings, Gemma 

As to the blog's title change, that is.

I had been toying with the idea of some other kind of communication, but seeing as I've got the disorder known as Asperger's Autism, and that coupled with inattentive ADD, having more than one venue is going to, well, not work.  I had considered vlogging, but ever since I contracted mono at age 18, I've have even worse problems with speech.  And I was a speech champ in 8th grade.

So, I've adjusted everything to reflect more efficiently the life of the author.  I am reclusive, not only because of the autism and ADD, but also because of -- ta da -- gasoline prices.  (Am I kidding?  Only a little).

I am in the South (North Carolina, to be exact), and the "Traddie" is short for "Traditionalist"--I prefer what is now called the "Extraordinary Form of the Mass," which used to be called the Traditional Latin Mass (TLM).

And there you have it--the explanation for my blog's title change, that is.

Permit me to leave you with the challenge of the day: if you're going to pray for rain, carry an umbrella.

Blessings, Gemma

Yes, I realize it's been a very long time since my last blog entry, but there's been a lot going on here, both with Cloister Outreach and in my personal life.

Unfortunately, the entry title is the result of a combination of both.

Without going into details, expectations are not being met on one aspect of the homefront.  Whenever someone believes that discipline and not drugs is what a child needs, there tends to be tears.

A lamenting aunt, and the question of someone's presence, the reader says.  Who is missing? they ponder.

I'll tell you who's missing--the religious sisters who used to run homes for "problem" children AND the aspirants to our proposed initiatives which would help deal with the same problem.

I had to wait about a week to write this entry--I was too upset.

I'm grieving (still) over the many, many institutions that closed because of the "updates" to religious orders after Vatican II.  "But they didn't have a religious vocation," some say.  Perhaps I need to make a slide show of all these closed institutions, and the people who are now hurting because they're gone.  Then say, "They didn't have a vocation," again.

I run an internet discussion group for ex-nuns, and nearly all of them said the reason they left was due to the changes in the Mass, then the change in the habit, then the loss of community life.  Notice the convents were being emptied in DROVES.  Many who left have stayed single, praying that religious life would return to some semblance of something they recognized.

At least five active religious orders have sold their magnificent motherhouses within the last few years due to lack of vocations.  The cloisters and "habited" conservative orders, OTOH, are building and bursting at the seams.  Communities using the Extraordinary Form of the Roman Rite (the Traditional Latin Mass) are growing, also.

What is this telling us?

I realize that there's prejudice against new communities, esp. those founded by laity.  I keep trying to tell ppl that there have been many orders founded by lay folk.  Why do so many insist on staying on the fence?  As far as I'm concerned, I would look at the suffering of my fellow humans, then ask God how I can help.  If He shows me an emerging community, then I would ask for the grace and the flexibility to be a good founding member.  Keeping God's Will and the suffering of others at the forefront of one's priorities will lead one to live community life with the greatest of gentle charity.

Our foundations will be started by the Reparatrix Society of Our Lady of the Cloister (the Cloisterites) and the Congregation of Charity of the Miraculous Medal, Servants of the Poor.  I must "stick to my guns" where this is concerned.  I cannot be founding more than two orders at one time.  Both charisms that we are starting with are not exactly generic, but are generalized to the point of being flexible enough to encompass what we're trying to do.  From there the apostolates and charisms will be founded.

Clear as mud?  The reader can always write in with questions.

Here are the URLs:

http://cloisters.tripod.com/cloisterites/

http://cloisters.tripod.com/charity/

And the communities which will be founded by both of the above:

http://cloisters.tripod.com/jointfoundations/

I shall reiterate: Where are you?

Blessings, Gemma 

"I just don't see how a married woman like you can found all those charisms," someone said.

Skepticism.

Can't live with it.  Can't live without it.

However, new religious foundations can definitely live without it.

Our Lord asked if He would find any faith when He returned at the end of the world.  I wonder if we're approaching that stage, as I'm finding a lot of folks out there who just can't see how Jesus can use a married woman with children to found "all those charisms."

"All those charisms."  Hummm.

 Lead, follow, or stand aside, please.  Thank you.

My philosophy is this: if someone's having doubts that anyone in my position can found a religious order, they should go look for their vocation in an established order.  Seems to me like that would be common sense.

I'm not standing here saying that someone has a married vocation when I feel--as they do--that they have a religious vocation.  I'm being something called RESPECTFUL.

"All those charisms."  Hummm.

Is it too much to ask for such in return?  Even if someone else doesn't see how it can be done by someone like me, for Heaven's sakes, give me a prayer!  I've always extended everyone the benefit of the doubt.  Jesus said not to judge.  Extending the benefit of the doubt is a form of not judging.  So follow the Lord's guidance, please.

"All those charisms."  Wellll. . .

I'm in the process of pulling together the necessary paperwork to inform my local bishop of our plans to establish the Monks and Nuns of Our Lady of the Cloister.  We have aspirants, but no money and no building.  And yes, I've been working with these aspirants for a few years now, so I know them (I hope).  They have their own private yahoo group called "aspirants forum," and we keep up with each other that way.

I've always said that "all those charisms" (almost sounds like a bitter ex-nun saying "you're with THOSE people") would come from the foundations already established.  I will be putting all my eggs in one Cloisterite basket.  Take a chill pill, dudes and dudettes, we have a plan.

I've also started a private, by-invitation-only Yahoo group called "Founders Forum."  So, it's not like I'm going about this entirely on my own.  We share information, cry on each others' shoulders, etc.  We're quickly finding out that no two religious communities takes the same route to being founded.  We all have to follow Canon Law, of course, but the people, places, and events leading to the foundation are all going to be very unique to the charism.

"All those charisms."

 Fr. Benedict Groeschel, CFR, told founders to look at their communities.  Do they look absurd?  If so, GOOD.  The Holy Spirit loves absurd.

 So I have every faith that "all those charisms" are from the Holy Ghost.  Ever hear of anything called APOSTOLIC ZEAL???  Those religious of these new SOLC foundations will go where I--one person--cannot go.  Everywhere you turn, something needs to be done about society, to let them know that God does indeed exist. 

Let go and let God, folks.  He's in charge.  Don't worry. . .be happy.   And pray for "all those charisms."

Blessings, Gemma

My army?  Prolly more appropriately Our Lord's army.

My very soul pines to be able to send workers into the drowning vineyard of the Gulf States.  I say this next line not as ego, but as zeal--I really wish I could've seen the spokespersons for our new communities standing with the public officials, and pledging to stay with the job of humanitarian assistance as long as it's needed.

How much of a relief would the victims have if they saw assistance coming from a habited sister or brother?  Would it not seem as if the angels themselves had landed?

I am a certified American Red Cross disaster worker.  I am trained to do damage assessment (which has to be done within 24 hours).  Eighty percent of any city being under water is unprecedented.  As the song says, "I wish we'd all been ready."  Viewing the news footage taped from helicopters, I am reminded that had I been there, such is how I would've been doing the damage assessment.  If a home has been moved off it's foundation, it's considered destroyed.  Most of the homes and businesses seen in the news clips would have more than likely been declared destroyed by virtue of the water levels.

When the American Red Cross worker was discussing how they had set up the shelter at the Astrodome, I found myself wishing that our communities could send personnel to assist there, also.  As a homeschooler, I wonder about the impact on childrens' education--and college students.  The ARC worker mentioned nurseries where parents can take the children who can't settle down to sleep.  Could our sisters (and/or brothers) not be of help?  Our orders dedicated to education could be down there helping keep the youngsters occupied.  Our healthcare orders would definitely be there.

I know all things come together in God's time.  At times like this, I try to respect that.  I can only beg and plead for mercy; wisdom;  and patience for the victims; wisdom for the rescuers and other workers; and common sense for everyone involved.

Pax, bonum, et caritas,

Gemma

I was wheeling our garbage toter to the curb one afternoon, and as I came from around the back of the house, I saw a most interesting cloud which looked like a preborn infant in the womb.

I could very easily make out the distinct shape of the curled fetus, complete with accurately-sized head with closed eyes, nose, and mouth.  The arms and legs were curled in toward the chest--in fact the legs were crossed at the shins.  There was even an umbilical cord.

After depositing the toter at the curb, the wind began to pick up, and as I turned to observe the cloud again, I was mortified to see it being pulled apart.  I was sickened as I watched the head and neck become stretched and pulled away from the body.  The wind turned the rest of the cloud into what looked like mush.

And all this on the day I received the first very serious inquiry about the Sisters of the Holy Innocents and St. Gianna Molla.

Such events are really not that unusual when I'm working on the Holy Innocents sisterhood paperwork.  When I first started designing the vocation brochure (still in progress--sorry), I was startled one morning when opening the back door to find a black cat hunched up on my patio.  My Beagle went ballistic.  A few mornings later, I found the same cat hunched up at the top of the small hill behind the house.  Several days later, I saw the cat hunkered down between two parked cars across the street from our house.  I related these incidents to my then-next-door-neighbor, who promised to shoot it if he saw it--he believed it to be a witch's familiar.  I haven't seen the cat since.

I am also in possession of a Holy Innocents rosary, from the Church of the Holy Innocents in New York City.   A day before the rosary arrived in my mailbox, we felt a diabolical presence at the corner of the property line on the hill behind the house (scene of the second black cat incident).  Both of our dogs started whimpering and covering their faces with their paws.  I invoked the St. Benedict medal attached to my Five-Fold Scapular, and called on Our Lady, St. Michael, and the angels.  The presence finally faded, and the dogs were back to normal.

FWIW.

Blessings, Gemma

Thank God, it's Ratzinger!

An incredibly short conclave, but the Cardinals asked God to speak--and they listened.  That's heartening.

However, I think we're in a lull where St. Malachy is concerned.  Pope Benedict XVI could be considered the Glory of the Olive, if you consider the Olive to mean peace, and JPII was a great peacemaker, and Benedict is a product of JPII--hence the glory of the peacemaker.

Plus Ratzinger took the name, "Benedict."

BUT--"Glory of the Olive" wasn't St.Malachy's prophesy to begin with--it came from the Bens themselves, stemming (pun intended) from a vision to their noble founder that a member of their order would wear the papal tiara before the end of the world.  My other sources say such could hold true, also.

Sooo, this is where papal prophesy gets really interesting, and freelancers like myself should really shut up.

Like I said, I think we've made a departure from St. Malachy.  The pope himself has said he thinks this will be a brief pontificate.  Will we have the "black pope" then?  Conchita from Garabandal said there was to be another antipope before the end of the world.  (But, then again, Garabandal wasn't approved by the Church, either).  I think there will be an antipope sometime after our present pope.  Perhaps that's what "black pope" actually means.

I'll leave it there.

Pax tecum, Gemma

1979.  As I recall, our pope of fond memory, who we're about to bury, was on American soil in October of that year.

I have memories that I'd almost rather forget, but they're important for that "J" word--my spiritual journey.  After a contentious summer, a social worker from my parents' church arranged for us to see a family counselor at a children's home (Baptist, that is), to try to talk me out of this obsession with Catholicism.  To make a very long story short--at least forbearing to the space allotted here--the counselor (a Baptist) told my parents that if they believed that I was saved, to let me convert.

My first Mass was televised from somewhere, and JPII was the celebrant.  We were at my sister's house, and she suddenly got the idea to take me somewhere downtown to find a shop her friend had recently opened in new "mall" in an old convent.  The day was overcast, and continuously threatened rain.

The building complex had been known as the Ursuline Academy of the Immaculate Conception, and was comprised of a chapel building, convent, and "gym."  A lovely courtyard was hidden behind the buildings.  A statue of Mary--this particular representation I had never seen before--stood watching over the courtyard.  Her head was inclined, and her hands were folded in prayer.  I addressed her as "Our Lady of the Cloister," since "The Cloister" was the name of the "mall."  A restaurant called "Raposo" had been put in the chapel.

On the ground floor, a photographic display had been set up, showing the Ursuline community which had conducted the academy.  I barely remember the parlors, but the door leading to the chapel was incredibly thin.  I have no recollection of the second floor.

Up on the third floor of the convent building, my jaw dropped to see the scarred outside walls where the cell dividing walls once stood.  I couldn't help but be disgusted.  The cells were very thin, also.

I forgot about Our Lady of the Cloister for a few years--until I and the other discerners started the SOLC.

So, what's all this got to do with St. Malachy's papal prophesy, "the Glory of the Olive?"  It could have a lot to do with it.  The next pope will more than likely be the one to give approval to the Monks and Nuns of Our Lady of the Cloister.

I've done a lot of thinking about "the Glory of the Olive."  Some have thought perhaps it would be a Benedictine.  However, there are no OSB Cardinals.  Educated by the OSBs?  Doesn't look like it.    From a region of the world known for olives?  Maybe.  Perhaps an Italian.   Within Lombardy is Lucca from whence the olive oil in my cabinet hails.

Olives on his coat of arms?  I haven't seen any coats of arms, so I can't answer that  one.  Glory of the olive--olive branch meaning peace.  JPII was a peacemaker, so the next pope could be one of his cardinals.  That leaves out only about six.

I was stumped until one of our aspirants clued me into another possibility--olive skin.   From the "darker" regions of the world.  A non-"caucasian."  She told me of another prophesy I wasn't aware of --that of the black pope.

My prayer is that the Holy Ghost chooses a cardinal who is supportive of the Tridentine Mass, and has at least some of the charisma that JPII had.

Ironically, there will be a major moon, sun, and earth eclipse the day of the pope's funeral.  There will also be a lunar eclipse the seventh day after the start of the conclave.   From what I heard, JPII was born during an eclipse.

Pax, bonum, et caritas, Gemma