|
|
 egina
Laudis is a monastery of contemplative Benedictine women living
in union with the Roman Catholic Church and following the Rule of St. Benedict according to the Primitive Observance.
Founded in 1947 in Bethlehem, Connecticut by Mother Benedict Duss.
|
| egina Laudis was elevated to the
status of an abbey
in 1976. The community of Regina Laudis is presently made up of 40
women, representing a wide diversity of personal andprofessional
backgrounds. Regina Laudis means Queen of Praise. Our prime
mission as contemplative Benedictines is to pray the Divine
Office or Liturgy of the Hours, keeping the prayer of
the psalms resonating through the day and night, every day of the
year. |
 |
 n
order to give ourselves as fully as possible to the mission
to pray without ceasing, we live and work within the enclosure
of the monastery. The enclosure, marked by physical walls and
grille work in certain locations, functions like the permeable
membrane of a cell wall that allows life to flow in and out.
|
| The stable
but essentially dynamic character of our monastic life is determined
by the constantly interpenetrating rhythms of prayer,
work, and study. |
 |
 e
seek to extend participation in this dynamism to guests whenever
possible through various forms of hospitality,
in accordance with St. Benedict's admonition to receive each guest
as Christ. The Benedictine motto is ora et labora: prayer
and work. Our work is twofold, |
including both lectio divina, which means sacred reading or
study, and manual work. In the monastic tradition the texts of
Scripture, the writings of the Church Fathers, and other inspired
texts are regarded as fertile fields to be cultivated with the
whole of one's being. The word of God, when taken in and pondered in the memory of the heart, helps
us to read all our daily experiences, great and small, in the
perspective of faith.
|
|
 s
we develop a contemporary understanding of the dignity of all
human labor and the Gospel mandate to be wise stewards of creation,
we strive to support new and diverse expressions of that stewardship.
We believe contemplative life must build on natural aptitudes
and prior professional experience. As she moves through the
stages of formation within the enclosure, each woman is challenged
and helped to find new forms of the particular service God has
called her to, whether that be through land
and animal management, scholarship, art,
law, social services, the performing
arts, medicine or any other area of human endeavor.
|
 |
 ormation
at Regina Laudis follows the classical stages of Postulancy, Novitiate, First Vows, Perpetual
Vows and the reception of the Consecratio Virginis, the
ancient Rite of Consecration to a Life of Virginity. Each nun
takes the uniquely Benedictine vows of Stability, Conversion of
Life and Obedience: Stability, binding her perpetually to this particular
|
monastic community; Conversion of Life, obliging her
to choose every day to re-center herself in God through the community;
and Obedience, by which she pledges fidelity to the authority of the Abbess and all those delegated to take responsibility within the "school of the Lord's service." |
| |
 other
Abbess David Serna O.S.B. is the second abbess of Regina
Laudis. Mother Abbess David is assisted in her position
by the Prioress, Mother Dolores Hart, O.S.B., well-known
actress of stage and film, who has been the Abbey’s Dean
of Education since 1972,and
the Subprioress Mother Maria Immaculata Matarese, O.S.B.
Mother Maria Immaculata practiced Law in Hartford, was
elected to the State House of Representatives and spent
seven years working in the Hartford Legislature. |
|
|
