This week Abbot Damian Carr, of St. Joseph’s Abbey, Spencer, Massachusetts, will come to Berryville to conduct the Regular Visitation of our community at Holy Cross Abbey. This periodic visit, stipulated by our Order’s constitutions, gives each monk the opportunity to speak to Abbot Damian and reflect upon the state of our life together. Dom Damian will draw up a Visitation Report from our meetings as part of the report on us, as for each community of the Order, presented to the General Chapter when it next meets. A Regular Visitation helps discern the shape of a communities vocation and response to God. It also strengthens the bond of charity between a community and the monastery it was founded from.
Abbot Damian will open the Visitation on Monday evening, 8 June, and begin the actual interviews after the Mass of the Holy Spirit celebrated Tuesday morning, 9 June.