A Simple Twist of Fate...

...My late Abbot had many blessings that were apparent in his demeanour, temperament and spirituality. Being though half-German, a sense of humour was not one of them.

It was our custom at the beginning of the season of Lent for each monk to present to the Abbot a letter outlining his intended abstinences above and beyond those striped-down for the whole community.

As these latter were fairly rigorous in any case, younger monks were required to restrain from attempting anything too glorious - or indeed vainglorious - on top of the house norm. ('Singularity' is, perhaps, the worst of all that a monk living in community can be known for.)

My own offering, therefore, was modest - a commitment not to read 'The Times' for the duration, which in those days was penance enough. Father Abbot opined that such a course was indeed the beginning of the royal road to sanctity: monks should first quit the newspaper, then when sufficiently robust of spirit 'The Spectator' and finally when approaching the very gates of Heaven the 'Times Literary Supplement'.

On being asked where the Catholic in-house paper, 'The Universe', fitted into this ladder of holiness, he merely replied that he would not ever have it about the place lest it gave the brethren temptation against the Faith! (He had a strong point in those days when it was 'more Catholic than the Pope.' Sanctimonious twaddle by and large.)

The letter duly have been written I was on my way to see the old fellow, when our paths happened to cross in the cloister. "Ah, dear Dom. X. I see you have some post for me. Might I enquire what are your intended extra penances then?"

Foolish young monk as one was, with more than a dose of English whimsy, I jested - bad move - that my chosen offerings for this Lenten fast were to be quitting 'smoking and celibacy.'

Now to the right audience that would have been a cracking jape, one that would go down in the annals of local monastic legend. "Ah, dear Dom X. You remember him don't you?" they would have said in centuries to come. "How about that time he gave up smoking and celibacy for Lent? Managed it too, bless his sacred memory." And so forth.

Sadly 'twas not to be, for said half-German Abbot was not in the least minded to take the line that this was any self-aware, nay self-deprecating, sentiment on my part, with simply no intended disrespect for the great preparation of body, spirit and soul towards Eastertide.

He stared, he growled - neither a good portent. Somewhere between stalking and storming off he then went. Ooooops.

For condign punishment, later the order came: gated for a month. That is, no Thursday afternoon walks - the only time one was allowed out of the monastery grounds. Boy was that tough. Never mind forty days of no sugar with the cocoa, try thirty days of 'cabin fever.'

With then the shriving season once more upon us - H does a fine pancake I must say on the Tuesday - I shall as ever since that day refrain from sharing with anyone but the Good Lord (whose sense of humour is eternally wondrous) those particular penances to be undertaken.

And as dear, lamented Robin used to say: "It's never what you choose to happen in Lent that tests you. It is something the Lord has up his sleeve. Pray and watch therefore for a simple twist of fate." (Great Dylan fan was Robin. Jesters all.)