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BENEDICTINE WOMEN
OF MADISON
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Myth
#320:
Volunteers at
a Monastery
Pray All Day
Depends on how you define prayer. Our Benedictine community invites
single women between the ages of 20 and 50 to broaden their
spirituality by caring for the earth through the Volunteer in
Community program at Holy Wisdom Monastery. Continue your
spiritual journey here with people of different faiths and backgrounds.
To learn more contact Sister Lynne at lwsmith@benedictinewomen.org or
(608) 836-1631, ext. 198.
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PRAYER & WORSHIP
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All are
welcome to join us for daily prayer, Sunday worship or special
liturgies. For more information contact Lynn at llemberger@benedictinewomen.org
or (608) 836-1631, ext. 138.
Click on the following links for prayer and worship schedules:
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RETREATS
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The grounds of
Holy Wisdom Monastery are bursting forth with new life. Tiny green
shoots are springing up in the prairie, the bluebirds are back and Lost
Lake shimmers in the sunshine. Rebirth of Earth's living things remind
us of God's promise for renewal of spirit any time we put aside our
busy agendas and pause to listen with the ear of our heart. Give
yourself the gift of renewal by spending a day or two at Holy Wisdom
before the busyness of summer sets in. Come by yourself for a personal retreat,
bring some friends for a group experience or recharge with other
seekers at our Ministry Renewal Day.
The spaces are wide open and the possibilities are endless . . .
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BENEDICTINE LIFE FOUNDATION
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Save
the Date! Thursday, September 16, 2010--an evening of hors
d' oeuvres and wine reception followed by a fundraising concert at the
monastery with Trevor Stephenson and members of the Madison Bach
Musicians. More details to follow soon.
Michael Belongie's limited edition poetry book, Now Is All We Haveis
available for $30, with all proceeds benefiting the building campaign. Click here to
order your copy or contact Mike at mikesb@benedictinewomen.org,
(608) 836-1631 ext. 124.
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OBLATES
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James Finley
is returning to Holy Wisdom Monastery to lead a silent retreat called,
Little
Things That Fill the Whole World: Gospel Metaphors of Spiritual
Awakening, September 17-19, 2010. Click here for
more information.
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CARE FOR THE EARTH
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Greg
Armstrong, Benedictine Life Foundation board member and former
executive director of the University of Wisconsin Arboretum, provides
us with the latest copy of Nature Notes.
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BUILDING NEWS
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Holy
Wisdom Monastery earns highest LEED certification!
For more information on the LEED
certification, please visit our website.
"For us, sustainability is not a trend," says Joanne
Kollasch, OSB, "but a commitment to the earth--a 21st century
expression of 1500 years of Benedictine tradition."
The United States Green Building
Council (USGBC) affirmed the green nature of the new monastery building
by awarding it a Platinum rating--the highest level of Leadership in
Energy and Environmental Design (LEEDŽ) certification available. The
monastery earned 63 out of a possible 69 points under LEED-New
Construction (NC) version 2.2, making it the highest-rated LEED-NC v2.2
building in the United States to date!
LEED promotes a whole-building approach to sustainability by
recognizing performance in five key areas of human and environmental
health: sustainable site development, water savings, energy efficiency,
materials selection, and indoor environmental quality.
To learn more about the USGBC and LEED certification go to
their website www.usgbc.org.
Tours
Tour the 'green' Holy Wisdom Monastery! Take a self-guided or guided
tour. Click here for
more information or contact Mike at mikesb@benedictinewomen.org,
(608) 836-1631 ext. 124.
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ELECTRONIC TECHNOLOGY
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Notes
on forwarding copies of Benedictine Bridge: Some of you are getting unsubscribed from Benedictine
Bridge when you forward the e-newsletter to others. We do
appreciate you sharing the e-newsletter with your friends, and
encourage you to forward it by using the Forward Email link at the
bottom of this email. This will help us generate a brand new email for
the person you wish to forward to. If you forward this email using the
Forward button in your email program, then you are giving others a
chance to unsubscribe you from our list with the unique email we
generated for you.
Help Us Get
Our Address Right on Google! It
has come to our attention that our address is incorrect when you search
for "Holy Wisdom Monastery" on Google. Help us get this
fixed! Click here to
see the incorrect address and name, click on the "Is this
accurate?" link, and then "Confirm" that this is not
accurate. Hopefully this will encourage Google to look into this so
that our guests know where to find Holy Wisdom Monastery.
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HOLY WISDOM MONASTERY
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The
new Holy Wisdom Monastery is
spiritual
ˇ home to Benedictine Women of Madison, North
America's first monastic community for single women of any Christian
denomination and a spiritual resource for all
environmental ˇ
built to be one of the "greenest" buildings in the country
featuring geothermal heating and cooling, bamboo floors, green roofs,
natural lighting, water conservation and more
open to
all ˇ public Sunday worship at 9 am, group
and individual retreats, meetings, nature walks, weddings, tours...
local ˇ
4200 County Rd M,
Middleton, WI just 20 minutes from downtown Madison
Contact Debby at ddelciello@benedictinewomen.org or (608)
836-1631, ext. 141 for more information
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The
spirit of God
is a
life that bestows life,
root
of world-tree
and
wind in its boughs.
Hildegard of Bingen
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Care for the Earth:
A Longstanding Monastery Tradition
By: Neal Smith, executive director
Care of the earth is nothing new at Holy Wisdom Monastery. As the
story goes, three sisters went into the countryside outside of
Madison in the early 1950s looking for a site suitable for a new
Benedictine monastery. They had come from Sioux City, Iowa at
the invitation of the first Bishop of the Madison diocese. What
they found was a hilltop in the country with an unparalleled vista of
the Madison skyline. After saying a few prayers and burying
medals of St. Benedict, they set out to acquire the land.
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Rooftop gardens at Holy Wisdom Monastery
-- one of the components of LEED certification at the Platinum
level. Copyright 2009 Fotografix photos from Hoffman LLC.
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Once they tracked
down the current owner, they negotiated for the 42.5 acres that
included Lost Lake and the hilltop (often referred to as "God's
Hill"). What attracted them to this place? I'm sure it
was the natural beauty and unique reflection of God's creation. Thus
began the tradition of care for the earth at Holy Wisdom Monastery.
Several years later they acquired the balance of the 138 acres to
make up the current grounds.
Until the sisters owned the property, the land was farmed, and only a
few trees existed on the initial parcel. The process of
returning the land to a more pre-settlement existence soon
began. It started with the gradual elimination of farming,
developing a plan to attract native wildlife and planting trees and
bushes. In the early 1970s, conservation practices began,
including the contouring and planting of grass waterways in the areas
still farmed. With the 1980s came the conversion of highly
erodible hillsides to woodland and savanna areas, using the
government Conservation Reserve Program (CRP). The 1980s
also saw the first volunteer work day,
a tradition that continues today.
In June of 1995 the first Master Plan for the monastery grounds was
completed and unveiled. This plan included a comprehensive and
aggressive choice to eliminate the balance of the farming lands and
restore all possible acres to native prairie and wetlands. It
also included the restoration of Lost Lake to its original size.
(Lost Lake is a remaining example of a 10,000 year old glacial
kettle.)
The implementation of this new plan started in 1996, with the
building of the detention basin (the basin can hold and slowly drain
down 10.5 acre feet of water) on the eastern side of the grounds
and seeding the first 4 acres of prairie in and around it. Each
succeeding year, volunteers collected seeds and seeded between 5 and
15 acres of prairie until a total of almost 100 acres was
finished in 2009. Restoration of Lost Lake occurred between
1997 and 1999. The dredging was done in the winters, when
the ground was frozen, to reduce environmental harm to the
surrounding areas. A total of 85,000 cubic yards of silt were
dredged from the lake and relocated on the grounds.
Gardening and orchard tending have also been a major part of the
monastery's relationship with the earth. For years the sisters
and guests have enjoyed the fresh apples, pears, lettuce, spinach,
onions, squash, tomatoes and other monastery-grown produce. And
don't forget the cider! Ten percent of all production is
earmarked for donation to local food pantries.
With this long tradition of "care of the earth," it is no
wonder that the deconstruction of Benedict House
and construction of the new monastery building would be
"green." Planning began in 2006 and, early on,
included the commitment to make the project as earth-friendly and
sustainable as possible. The requirement that the project attain
LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) Platinum
certification was written into the first draft of the design/build
contract with Hoffman, LLC. The new monastery building was
designed with three key criteria: supporting the mission and vision
of the monastic community, attaining Platinum LEED certification
and achieving cost effectiveness (good stewardship of
resources).
The new monastery building now speaks for itself. All three of the
key criteria were attained without compromise. The building
stands as a living example of the long tradition of care of the earth
at Holy Wisdom Monastery.
And the tradition continues. Volunteer work days, internships, group
volunteer activities and co-worker activities will carry on the
needed work in the prairie, gardens, lake, woodlands, savanna and
orchards. The work could not be done without the thousands
of volunteer hours each year. All are invited to offer their
time, talent or resources to further the environmental works of the
monastery. Please join us for the next work day on Saturday, May
22, 2010. For more information, click here
or contact Mike Sweitzer-Beckman at mikesb@benedictinewomen.org or
(608) 836-1631 ext. 124.
[printer-friendly
version]
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Calendar of Events
April 25, 2010
Earth Day Sunday
Holy Wisdom Monastery joins the National Council of Churches
Eco-Justice Program in promoting Earth Day Sunday to help
congregations celebrate and care for God's Creation. Our Sunday
Assembly Eucharist will incorporate special songs and prayers
honoring God's creation.
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