The Easter Octave is a time for community building - extra time together doing those things that rejuvenate us as individuals and as a "family" unit. This did not prevent us from sharing the joy of the season with those outside of the community. Two members of the community traveled to Mundelein Seminary to participate in the Institute on Religious Life's annual conference. The theme of this year's conference was "Religious Life, Ever Ancient, Ever Beautiful..." In recognition of his staunch fidelity to the faith and his acheivements in publishing and education, Fr. Joseph Fessio received this year's Pro Fidelitate et Virtute Award.

The psalms, according to Fr. Garrigou-LaGrange, are a school of contemplation, of self-oblation, and of holiness. These fruits grow and flourish when the psalmody prayed has both body - harmoniously arranged structure bringing the tranquility of order - and soul, the interior devotion rising toward God like a flame. The very parallelism of the psalms when chanted or prayed in the tradition of the Church, two or three phrases punctuated with a pause in the middle, gives a natural body to the prayer. This harmonious body is disrupted by undue haste, depriving the spirit its ability to rest in God. Our community takes great care to preserve this body in our prayer so that soul may flourish. 

"At the base of consecrated chastity, there is an experience of being involved in an adventure of love that demands everything, because it can give everything. There is a kind of falling in love that makes the light of every other creature fade away. There is a sensation that, by responding to divine seduction, God becomes the only One. It is in this way that one chooses God and commit oneself to Him, who is loved as one's only love. There is a realization that one can have many friends and brothers and sisters, but only one Spouse."
 - Pier Giordano Cabra

"The Liturgy of the Hours... was seen as a kind of necessary complement to the fullness of divine worship that is contained in the Eucharistic sacrifice, by means of which that worship might overflow to reach all the hours of daily life."
​- Apostolic Constitution promulgating the Liturgy of the Hours

Each day, the community gathers to pray the Liturgy of the Hours, the prayer of the Church. In keeping with the Church's emphasis on Lauds and Vespers as the principle Hours and in accord with our manner of life as contemplative-active religious, we pray with loving care the Hours of Lauds, Vespers, and Compline. 

After Jesus called His disciples, He spent a good deal of time patiently working to form them to follow in His footsteps and to bear His likeness to the world. In the same manner, souls consecrated to Christ embark on a life time journey of formation, the purpose of which is gradual identification with Christ.