Shaw Island, part of the San Juan Island chain in Puget Sound, is truly an island from regular suburban or city life; even more so than the other islands in the chain. Shaw makes Orcas Island look like a hopping metropolis.
We traveled over on the ferry from Orcas to Shaw this morning because we were looking for a reverent Mass, and hoping that the Mass at the Benedictine Monastery on Shaw would be just that. Part of the charm of these islands is that they are like small countries unto themselves, complete with mountains and farmlands tucked in between the boundaries of the blue, cold water. The monastery is in one of these farming areas; a quiet, gravel-crunching turn under a wooden archway, with a large rust-coloured Benedictine cross melding into the red and brown trees. Along the road cows, llamas, peacocks, chickens and wheat are growing and living silently under the resplendent sunlight of a Sunday morning.
The first good sign is that a nun barrels by us in an ancient red Subaru, in full work-habit with a blue and white bandana tied like a pirate’s over her headpiece. Coming in from haying, she is hurrying to change for Mass. The chapel is the second good sign, for it is lovingly built- how can one see that? The straight lines of the roof, the carefully allowed moss on the Japanese-style gate, the trimmed bamboo reeds, the small touches here and there of both beauty and sturdiness. It is a strange combination, this San Juan-style-sturdy(pine logs and cedar siding) and the beautiful Oriental décor and garden: but somehow, it fits together: the whispering of the wind in the pines and the green, sleepy sound of the water flowing down a rock into a carefully placed pool; the island rocks placed in the cracks of the slate path, but island rocks polished to a beautiful sheen, little tiny works of art; the off-center apex of the building held aloft by a rugged pine log, left in it’s natural but shaven state- off-center in a stance of demure, subtle reverence to the altar which becomes the focus of the space rather than the building itself.
The Benedictine sisters come quietly into the cloister area of the chapel, behind a transparent grille of bamboo, and begin to sing: we look at eachother in gratitude, because it is a beautiful, simple, “Asperges me…” and the Mass begins. The quiet reverence of a Novus Ordo Missae said the way it was promulgated, complete with the priest facing the East- ad orientum-the worshipful rythym of a people looking towards the Lord with one another.
I was thinking about this, this quiet enclave, the beautiful farm with its centerpiece this little piece of heaven, and wondering how we all present got to this beauty, this intersection of ourselves and Our Lord, on this small island in the more or less pedestrian State of Washington. How can I describe these moments, whether you are in a little town in New York, or Mexico, or a makeshift altar on pilgrimage? They are moments where you look around gratefully to the serious, reverent neighbor, the wise, sacrificial and quiet-spoken priest, the plaintive air of the Gregorian chant, and the air becomes heavy with the supernatural, as if the Lord sees the feeble human attempts to worship Him and gently turns His gaze our way, filling us all in ways unspeakable.
For myself, I was thinking about this miracle, and then the Old Testament was read: “ I Myself will gather a remnant, I will shelter them in a good land, I will be their Shepherd.” I thought of how the Lord Himself grants the enclaves, the tiny pockets of real worship, real life, in the midst of the Ellulian flight from Him that is the world.
I was thinking about the small number of nuns and their age, I was thinking in a worldly way about the survival of this place with the lack of vocations; for most people cannot even see this place, they hear its name, perhaps, and look no further- for they are not looking further than convenience or of ‘uplifting service’. I myself fall into this convenience thinking very often.
I was wondering about the mystery of these small enclaves of heaven, compared with the busy, alternating current of suffering and entertainment of the world. But I was, again, thinking in a worldly sense.
But these enclaves are the Lord’s, it is His will that allows them, grows them and leaves them in the hands of His creatures: they remain His. When we ignore them, or do not look for them, we are poorer and we are culpable.
As we left, the little valley spreading below the road, I saw a peacock sitting majestically on the balcony of the nun’s house, across from the barn. As he spread his wings and moved in his silvery, slow way, I was forcefully reminded of the loss of Eden- and the Deep Beauty that must have been there. It was the combination of the light, the reverent Mass, and the Presence of God that made me see an ordinary day as a slice of Paradise. It was a grace.
If you seek, you will find.
