During Your Discernment . . .

[LilyofSaintMaria]

During your discernment or on retreat have you gone through some pretty embarrassing moments that you had to step back and just laugh at yourself afterwards? Just for some laughs would you mind sharing any? I like to read these kind of things in magazines and such - is that bad? I find it funny because they are so similar to me!

Bernadette

[VeniteAdoremus]

I don't think it's bad

Well... Don't know whether anyone finds this funny, but once I was on a retreat in another country with a friend, and we spoke in the language of my country as if no one was around (thinking the natives wouldn't understand us anyway) - until someone started talking to us in our "secret" language We almost jumped a foot into the air

Oh, and there's of course the endless sitting/kneeling/standing that you always seem to do wrong in a different place...

[alicemary]

When I was doing an aspirancy, and trying to be on my 'best' behavior...I remember getting up early for morning office. I usually just grabbed some water on my way to chapel. During the office my stomach always started to growl....LOUD. I used to die of embaresement. Felt like everyone could hear it! And I was too embarressed to ask anyone if they heard me!
Another time we had a great day, went out with a group of the sisters to visit Lancaster PA, where the Amish used to have alot of farms. We took some tours, did some shopping and eating out. I was absolutely exhausted when we got home to the convent. Wanted to make a visit with the Lord and almost felt asleep in the chapel. The sisters were so sweet, and one of them suggested I get to bed!

[Totus Tuus]

Oh my gosh, I had so many embarrassing moments at OLAM. Once I was walking around the chapel working with my veil flipped over (I don't know if the wind blew it over or what). I even had a conversation with a priest when it was flipped, and he didn't say anything!

The same day, I accidentally put the water in the wine cruet, and the wine in the water cruet when preparing for Mass.

The SAME day, I tripped walking up the stairs (due to shoes that were too big), and there was a group of pilgrims to witness.

I was trying to fix a chalice veil when preparing for Mass the day before, when the paten and hosts fell off so loud that a sister came around from the cloister to make sure everything was ok. Precious metal makes a very reverberating sound when it clashes with marble floors, and I learned that the hard way.

There are a couple of others that are just toooo embarrassing to mention... if you can believe my embarrassing stories actually get worse! But thank God for being able to laugh at myself. I really did, and it was really funny. I probably still blush every time I recall these occurrences, though

[cathoholic_anonymous]

My diary can speak for me on this topic. This entry describes my second visit to Quidenham, which took place in March 2007. (The first visit was in January '06.)

[b]Sunday 18th March 2007[/b]

I might have known I had not seen the last of that coagulated milk pie when I secretly disposed of it last January. It had 'Resurgam' inscribed in the thick, glutinous, nauseatingly pus-yellow crust. Although I don't have a milk allergy that I know of, the smell and the texture and the taste of hot coagulated milk make me feel queasy. The last time I was in Quidenham I thought that I would have to eat whatever was put in front of me, out of respect for the vow of poverty. So I really did try. I speared some of that wobbling mess with my fork and grimly raised it to eye level, where we surveyed each other - me looking dour and the coagulated milk looking decidedly pleased with itself. As I lowered the fork towards my mouth, the stench entered my nostrils and I dropped the fork to the plate with a faint clatter. I couldn't. I just couldn't. Sneakily glancing to the left and to the right to check that my neighbours were engrossed in their own food, I quickly quartered the pie and dropped the chunks one by one into the pocket of my sturdy black coat. I left the crust on my plate for authenticity's sake. A nice artistic touch, I thought.

My one fear was that a sister would smell the cheesey odour emanating from my pockets as I helped with the washing up. It was a great relief to be able to dispose of the thing at last. I had shared this story with Isabel and Anna, reducing them to apopleptic laughter on the train, so when the pie emerged from the kitchen today I was conscious of them both peeking at me over the water jugs and doing their best to suppress their mirth. I shot a mute but horrified glance at Isabel before picking up my cutlery. Right, I informed the pie through gritted teeth, this time you won't win.

I did manage to eat a forkful, but after that I gave up. Perhaps after sixty years in Carmel I will have acquired a taste for it. This time I knew better than to hide the pie in my pocket - I just left it on my plate. The sisters didn't seem to mind. I hope I did not hurt the feelings of the cook.

I was more successful when the nuns put us to work in the kitchen gardens. One of the things that has always deterred me from making a serious consideration of the monastic life is my clumsiness, which is why a passage from a biography of Bernadette Soubirous once made me quite tearful. Bernadette told the bishop that she could not possibly become a nun because she had no dowry and wasn't much good at anything. "I noticed that you were good for something," the bishop countered. "Scraping carrots."

"Bah! Anybody can do that!" exclaimed Bernadette.

Except for me, I thought ruefully. But it now appears that I have a surprising talent for stringing beans. I didn't get on very fast, it is true, but at least a quarter of my strings were so taut that you could have played them like a harp. I am so proud of those beans that I will probably have to confess them to Father Raphael the next time I drop by his spiritual sin-bin.

Another task that I was assigned was apple-peeling. I had this job the last time I was there. My lack of co-ordination was enough to impel Sr Rachel to break the silence and call out firmly, "Vicky, put that knife down!" Then she handed me a broom and said, "Sweep the floor instead." I began to sweep with great enthusiasm, causing an unsuspecting Sr Penny to leap like a startled hare as she came out of the scullery. This time I was determined to do things properly. So I took a peeler rather than a knife and began to hack away at an apple the size of a small basketball. By the time our half-hour was up, the other three kitchen hands had emptied the large plastic buckets of their fruit. Nearly a hundred apples were gleaming whitely in a big metal pan that brimmed with water. I looked down at the apple in my hands. It was the same apple that I had started with, and even now some shreds of skin remained.

I could feel a red flush of embarrassment creeping up my neck. I looked up and met the eyes of the nun who was working on the other side of the table. "That is your personal apple," she said quietly, "and I'm sure it will taste just as good as all the others."

[VeniteAdoremus]

[quote]I could feel a red flush of embarrassment creeping up my neck. I looked up and met the eyes of the nun who was working on the other side of the table. "That is your personal apple," she said quietly, "and I'm sure it will taste just as good as all the others."[/quote]

That's so sweet

Actually, most of that is hilarious I'm so glad that in all the convents I've been in we could serve ourselves from the dishes on the table. I did always try to eat a bit from everything at the table, but it saved me from some embarrassing leftovers on my plate!

[LilyofSaintMaria]

Thanks for the cute little stories! I was right - similar to me!
Bernadette

[be_thou_my_vision]

I accidentally dumped the Precious Blood of Christ all over the front of my shirt during Communion. This was on the FIRST visit with the community I'm entering... I was appalled!

[cathoholic_anonymous]

That is more than embarrassing.

How did you clean your shirt afterwards?

[alicemary]

I just remembered another story. I recall being at the convent for a very special dinner, with visiting priests and the Bishop I think. Mass was so lovely and then we all went into supper. It was a beautiful table and everyone was in such a festive mood. I sat next to one of the superior, a real sweet lady. We were eating roast beef with gravy and I was having some trouble cutting my meat. I tugged on it real hard and it hit the gravy and it landed right on the superiors lap! I could have died. The sisters habits were grey and of course this nice brown gravy showed up like a traffic light! I tried to explain to her what I did, but she said don't worry about it. I could have died.

[be_thou_my_vision]

[quote name='Cathoholic Anonymous' post='1353765' date='Aug 9 2007, 09:13 AM']That is more than embarrassing.

How did you clean your shirt afterwards?[/quote]
It was much more than embarrassing! I nearly cried! And I was only 15 at the time, so it was even MORE appalling!
Sister Lois took the shirt and purified it, then gave it back to me. She said that it was not the first time this has happened, so that made me feel a lot better!

[LilyofSaintMaria]

I just remembered something . . . I visited the nuns in Ada, here in MI. I worked in the garden there - not the cloistered garden, the one on the other side of the wall. The extern sister was giving me orders and I was left alone to do the work. She gave me a spade and clippers and a little cart and then I asked for some gloves. She said she was going to ask me that, but forgot since she usually doesn't wear any. She said she had some, but I told her I brought some and would go get them. Sounds simple enough but as soon as I stepped back into the convent I was like, I don't remember this. I was completely lost - I didn't know how to get back to my room and get my gloves so I just worked without them!

Bernadette

[Starets]

One of the abbeys I was visiting needed to have its website uploaded to a new hosting provider, so I did that and checked the pages for Link Rot while I was at it. Once, just after I had uploaded some pages to the new provider, the power was cut off to the room I was in. I saw one of the monks in an adjoining room, so I asked him about it. he said he'd turn the circuit breaker back on. I then pointed at him playfully and said "I'm telling the Abbot on you!". He threw up his hands and said "o no! don't do that!".

It was the Abbot I was talking to

[ovenbird03]

Wow these are some great stories! I don't have anything quite that good.

From my aspirancy in Summit- The first couple of days in choir I would end up knocking down a whole stack of my books every time I went to kneel. Thankfully Sr. Judith Re-organized them in a way that kept them on the shelf even if I accidentally hit it with my knee. It was pretty embarassing though, with the loud noise it made and all.

[AlterDominicus]

When I was on retreat in Alton last year with the FSGM's on the day of First Profession, Reception into the Novitiate and celebrating 50 years - feast of the Assumption we were given keys by the sisters to get in and out of the convent, our rooms and so forth and my key got stuck in the door when I was going to see if anyone needed helping setting up things, and there was a group of sisters following me so I acted like I was opening the door for them, then I closed the door and tried to get my key out and a sister on the inside was just coming out- so I opened the door and she was like, "You got the key stuck in the door didnt you?" It took 20 minutes, six sisters, a janitor and oil to get the key out.

Also on that same day I was helping chairs in the chapel, it was all quiet and nice and I went to grab one and two came off instead and I dropped it and you can kinda imagine that it was VERY VERY VERY LOUD because everyone looked at me, like stared blankly at me and Sister Philomena came to my rescue and asked me if [b]I[/b] was okay.