Alison Kerr - My Oblate Journey with NZCCM
BY ALISON KERR
When my husband John died in 2015, I set off five months later to walk the pilgrim route from Le Puy-en-Vélay in France to Santiago de Compostela in Spain. I already carried a long-held love for the pilgrim way and the labyrinth as metaphors for the spiritual journey - and that experience only deepened my understanding.
Not long after my return from that long walk in 2016, I saw that a NZCCM Meditation Retreat was to be held at Waikato University in early 2017.
I knew immediately it was the next step on my journey.
Meditating in Community
After the retreat, I joined a local NZCCM meditation group and for several years now I have led a faithful group of meditators who meet every Wednesday in the little church near my home.
In 2018 I attended a WCCM silent retreat at Monte Oliveto before making a solitary pilgrimage to the Holy Island of Lindisfarne on St Cuthbert’s Way, and in late 2019 I went to Bonnevaux for a Yoga Retreat with Giovanni Felicioni.
My intention was to explore a contemplative practice that would help me integrate body and spirit in a loving acknowledgment and acceptance of my own ageing body. I did not know how incredibly helpful that would prove to be in the 2020 context of the pandemic and, for me, a breast cancer diagnosis and a mastectomy followed by chemotherapy and radiotherapy.
Bonnevaux Abbey & Chapel | Photo by Enos Mantoani
My WCCM Benedictine Oblate Journey Begins
In terms of my NZCCM oblate journey, I attended the WCCM Essential Teaching Weekend at the Home of Compassion in Wellington in 2017 and I was introduced to the idea of becoming a Benedictine oblate by Kath Houston at a 7-day silent retreat, the Fourth National School Retreat at the Tyburn Monastery in 2018.
Since that time I have continued along the path towards full oblation, meandering rather than racing towards the goal - becoming an oblate novice in 2020 at the WCCM Featherston Benedictine Oblates’ Gathering and seeking final oblation in Featherston in 2024.
I meet regularly on zoom with various NZCCM meditation and oblate communities. I also join Dr Noel Keating’s group in Ireland on a Monday and Friday morning New Zealand time.
NZ Oblate group on retreat
Inspiration & Motivation
I find that poetry has the power to ignite the divine spark within me and cause it to quicken and flame up in recognition of the divinity and the humanity that we all share, that love that we are all part of and that is part of us.
I chose to seek full oblation because I want to continue to lead a life and be part of a community that follows the Rule of Benedict. This source of wisdom and spiritual framework is now, as it has always been, counter-cultural in its focus and emphasis.
It asks me to listen, to be obedient, to be faithful to a way of life that “will bring you back to God”, which is where I want to be, in God with God in me.
The vow of stability asks me to be still, at home in my own body and spirit, at home in God, the divine spirit.
The vow of obedience asks me to listen with the ear of my heart, to the God who speaks in a still small voice, through the natural world, through the people I encounter and the words I read and hear; to be attentive to what I hear and to act on it.
The vow of conversatio morum asks me to be faithful to the Benedictine way of life, to turn towards the light of Christ and to turn away from, letting go of, whatever will hinder my journey towards spiritual maturity.
So I continue to meditate twice daily, read the Psalms and the Rule of Benedict with a commentary and try to listen to and learn from my fellow pilgrims as well as from John Main and a range of contemporary writers.
I find that Hildegard and Julian, Sufi poets Rumi and Hafiz and the Celtic saints, as well as more modern mystics all encourage me in a way of being in the world that acknowledges and celebrates the God who is everywhere and in all things, the God who is Love.
