Day and a Life

Penelope Wilcock

Description

The monastic rhythm of life at St Alcuins means that all is peaceful on the surface, but beneath there are strong currents as each monk contends with his own hopes, fears, challenges, and temptations.Not every monk is settled and secure. Sadness permeates the monastery when it is discovered early one morning that one of the novices, Brother Cedd, has disappeared. It quickly becomes clear that disturbance in the life of one can impact many. As the day goes on, the question looms: will Brother Cedd return? And what will be the consequences if he doesn't?In this moving conclusion to The Hawk and the Dove series, Pen Wilcock describes a single day in the life of the community weaving a deeply touching, frank, and witty tapestry of monastic life.

Sujets

• Historical fiction

Informations

• Publié par: Lion Hudson
• Date de parution: 17 juin 2016
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781782642015
• Langue: English

Extrait

A Day and a Life describes a single day at St Alciun s and with it, fifteenth century monastic life As we observe the monks at their prayers and their work, we glimpse their hearts and their struggles, so similar to our own. Readers of this conclusion to The Hawk and the Dove series will enjoy one last visit with their old friends.
LeAnne Hardy, author of the Glastonbury Grail series
Followers of, and newcomers to, the series are welcomed to St Alcuin s as old friends. Wilcock s prose exquisitely captures those qualities of monastic life which she extols; her narrative is reflective and lyrical, humbly but tenderly evoking the simplicity and faith of a community of devotion. It is a community to which the reader is invited, just as they are, to grapple with what it is to live and love in a fellowship of faith.
Anna Thayer, author of The Knight of Eldaran series
Titles in the Hawk and the Dove series:
The Hawk and the Dove
The Wounds of God
The Long Fall
The Hardest Thing to Do
The Hour Before Dawn
Remember Me
The Breath of Peace
The Beautiful Thread
A Day and a Life
A Day and a Life
PENELOPE WILCOCK
Text copyright 2016 Penelope Wilcock This edition copyright 2016 Lion Hudson
The right of Penelope Wilcock to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by her in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopy, recording, or any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.
All the characters in this book are fictitious and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.
Published by Lion Fiction an imprint of Lion Hudson plc Wilkinson House, Jordan Hill Road Oxford OX2 8DR, England www.lionhudson.com/fiction
ISBN 978 1 78264 200 8 e-ISBN 978 1 78264 201 5
First edition 2016
Acknowledgments
Scripture quotations marked KJV are from The Authorized (King James) Version. Rights in the Authorized Version are vested in the Crown. Reproduced by permission of the Crown s patentee, Cambridge University Press. Scripture quotations marked NRSVA are from The New Revised Standard Version Bible, Anglicized Edition, copyright 1989, 1995 by the Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the USA, and are used by permission. All rights reserved.
Cover image Brian Gallagher
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
For Deborah Sokell with my thanks for so much encouragement
Unless you give up everything you have, you cannot be my disciple.
Paraphrase of words of Jesus, Luke 14:33

He said, Go out and stand on the mountain before the Lord, for the Lord is about to pass by. Now there was a great wind, so strong that it was splitting mountains and breaking rocks in pieces before the Lord, but the Lord was not in the wind; and after the wind an earthquake, but the Lord was not in the earthquake; and after the earthquake a fire, but the Lord was not in the fire; and after the fire a sound of sheer silence. When Elijah heard it, he wrapped his face in his mantle and went out and stood at the entrance of the cave. Then there came a voice to him that said, What are you doing here, Elijah?
1 Kings 19:11-13, NRSVA

Jesus walked, and he stopped. What is the speed of love?
Revd Canon Martin Baddeley, in reference to Jesus and the Canaanite woman, Matthew 15:21-28

In your disabilities and in what you decline to do lies your way home.
Diana Lorence of Innermost House

Gracious and holy Father, please give me intellect to understand you; reason to discern you; diligence to seek you; wisdom to find you; a spirit to know you; a heart to meditate upon you; ears to hear you; eyes to see you; a tongue to proclaim you; a way of life pleasing to you; patience to wait for you; and perseverance to look for you.
St Benedict of Nursia

Also I heard the voice of the Lord, saying, Whom shall I send, and who will go for us? Then said I, Here am I; send me.
Isaiah 6:8, KJV

We re all just walking each other home.
Ram Dass
Contents

The Community of St Alcuin s Abbey

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Twenty

Chapter Twenty-One

Chapter Twenty-Two

Chapter Twenty-Three

Chapter Twenty-Four

Chapter Twenty-Five

Chapter Twenty-Six

Chapter Twenty-Seven

Chapter Twenty-Eight

Glossary of Terms

Monastic Day

Liturgical Calendar
The Community of St Alcuin s Abbey

(Not all members are mentioned in A Day and a Life )
Fully professed monks
Abbot John Hazell
once the abbey s infirmarian
Father Francis
prior
Brother Cormac
cellarer
Father Theodore
novice master
Father Gilbert
precentor
Father Clement
overseer of the scriptorium
Father Dominic
guest master
Brother Thomas
abbot s esquire, also involved with the farm and building repairs
Father Bernard
sacristan
Brother Martin
porter
Brother Thaddeus
potter
Brother Michael
infirmarian
Brother Benedict
main assistant in the infirmary
Brother Damian
teaches in the school
Brother Conradus
kitchener
Brother Richard
fraterer
Brother Stephen
oversees the abbey farm
Brother Peter
ostler
Brother Josephus
teaches in the abbey school
Father James
makes and mends robes, occasionally works in the scriptorium
Brother Germanus
has worked on the farm, occupied in the wood yard and gardens
Brother Walafrid
herbalist, oversees the brew house
Brother Giles
assists Brother Walafrid and works in laundry
Brother Mark
too old for taxing occupation, but keeps the bees
Brother Paulinus
works in the kitchen garden and orchards
Brother Prudentius
now old, helps on the farm and in the kitchen garden and orchards
Brother Fidelis
now old, oversees the flower gardens
Brother Basil
old, assists the sacristan - ringing the bell for the office hours, etc.
Fully professed monks now confined to the infirmary through frailty of old age
Father Gerald
once sacristan
Brother Denis
once a scribe
Father Paul
once precentor
Brother Edward
onetime infirmarian, now living in the infirmary but active enough to help there and occasionally attend Chapter and the daytime hours of worship
Novices
Brother Boniface
helps in the scriptorium
Brother Cassian
works in the school
Brother Cedd
helps in the scriptorium and when required in the robing room
Brother Felix
helps Father Gilbert
Brother Placidus
helps on the farm
Brother Robert
assists in the pottery
Members of the community mentioned in earlier stories and now deceased
Abbot Gregory of the Resurrection
Abbot Columba du Fayel (also known as Father Peregrine)
Father Matthew
novice master
Brother Andrew
kitchener
Brother Cyprian
porter
Father Aelred
schoolmaster
Father Lucanus
novice master before Father Matthew
Father Anselm
once robe-maker
Chapter One

It starts in the deepest darkness of the night. The call of a hunting owl. Across the valley, the loud, melodramatic yapping of a vixen. No other sound. The hens are asleep on their roosts, close together, their heads tucked down. The sheep, packed tight in the byre, breathe air warmed by each other s bodies. The calf sleeps close against the warm belly of her slumbering mother.
The abbey lies under a gibbous moon, rapt in the Grand Silence. Clouds drift. How profound is the night, and sometimes how terrible. Dreams. Death. Darkness. Demons of insecurity, terror, loneliness, regret are let loose. But at this hour, who is stirring?
In the infirmary, small lights burn. The two men who have kept watch over the sick make their second round of the dark hours, quietly and without fuss: turning those who can no longer move, changing wet sheets, checking all is well. Brother Michael holds the lantern up, so he and Brother Benedict can see their way along the passage. The place where they are is eaten by shadows, but the warm, dancing halo of candlelight illumines Michael s face. Even in the crumpled weariness of the depth of night, you can see the kindness. You would trust this man, with your life - and many do. Benedict is new to working through the night. He took his solemn vows - his life vows - in the summer. In his novitiate year, they let him go to bed. But here, someone always has to keep watch. Now Brother Damian has been moved to work in the school, and John is abbot, Michael is grateful to have Benedict with him. And they know each other well. The night strips away defences, and bonds form between man and man, in the care of the sick.
The infirmary is set apart from the main buildings of the abbey: the great church, looming up monolithic, a majestic assurance of faith immoveable under the night wind, the shifting clouds, the waning moon. Beside the church, the cloister garth, and set around its verdant square the west, south, east ranges of the abbey buildings, all folded in stillness.
Father Bernard, the sacristan, is lost in dreams; just the faintest whistling snore. He has no idea what he dreams, because he never remembers them. He is not tortured by the recollection of deadly sweet concupiscence, the sensual ardour of unconscious erotica: not that it doesn t happen - he just forgets. The moon doesn t peep through his window; at this hour she is looking in on someone else.
The sacristan s cell has been built just a little larger, to accommodate an utterly essential device: the clepsydra. This water clock drips time away until the point is reached when the striking mechanism, operated by weights and a rope,