Part 3: The interplay of all things: reading the cloisters aright

What can the cloister teach us about everyday life? Esther de Waal shows how the heart of a monastery is not simply a place of quiet, but a place where prayer, work, learning and hospitality are held together in a balanced rhythm. As we continue our St Benedict Week journey, this reflection encourages us to discover that same sense of balance and God's presence in our own daily lives.

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The cloisters, and not the church, lie at the heart of the monastic complex. This is for

most of us a startling statement. Yet we can see this clearly in one of the earliest maps,

that of St Gall c820. Therefore, it is urgent that we read the cloisters aright and let them

show us not only something of the Benedictine way of life but also give us insights into

our own daily life. They stand in line with the ancient tradition of the enclosed garden,

the hortus conclusus, the garden centring on a fountain and enclosed by four vaulted

walkways. We can feel that same sense of harmony as we enter the cloisters here.

Walking slowly and deliberately, we can picture the members of the monastic

community as they too would have made their way along these passageways. These

were the link line of their daily life serving the needs of body, mind and spirit, that

balanced life which St Benedict looked for in his community.

The day began in leaving the dormitory, from which the monks would rise and go into

the church for the first office of the day,. Then they move to the refectory - a chance to

remember the reverence that the Rule always shows for food., taking the body

seriously, treating it with care and consideration. Then come those buildings which serve

the needs of the mind, the intellect. The library, the scriptorium, encourage -time for

reading, and for the making of books, glorious, illuminated manuscripts. The chapter

house, the place of daily meeting, where, after reading a chapter of the Rule, decisions

would be taken on practical matters of maintenance and upkeep shows the mind at

work dealing with business affairs. But then there is the third element, the most

essential, the one upon which everything else depends: the monastic church itself,

which runs along the length of the south side of the cloisters. It is like the baseline which

anchors the rest of life. Seven times a day the monks come here for the Opus Dei, for

prayer, the work of God. Everything flows in and out of prayer; it is like the keystone

which holds everything else together. This is a life of cohesion and unity , of a

continuous rhythm None of the buildings around the cloister is set apart as intrinsically

different or superior for all are equally valid. Everything centres upon God.

instead, there is the interplay between equally valid and all flow into the church for it is

prayer which holds life together EVER.

This however this does not mean that this is a life of exclusion from the world. The

magnificent carved bosses, for which Norwich is justly famed, lie overhead. Here is a

book of life, of overflowing life, in all its splendour and exuberance. Perhaps they are like

the medieval mystery plays from which nothing is excluded. And this wild exuberance is

held in tension with emptiness and withdrawal, with the open space which lies at the

heart of the cloisters. It is a perfect square, deliberately built on a ratio of forty since

that would bring a sense of harmony. It is calming, for ii is uncluttered space, kept green

by the fountain at its centre. It speaks of the stillness which we try to carry in our hearts.

In the Middle Ages this would have been a garden, planted with blue and white flowers,

thought to enhance a sense of peace and quiet. An architect calls it the lung of the

monastery, bringing light and air into the daily lives of the monks who walked these

cloisters. And at the heart of the garden there would have been a fountain, a spring of

living water, the offer of life, of love, of hope. This is where brokenness finds healing,

here the promise of continuing transformation is strengthened. And the hope, threaded

through the way that St Benedict has set before me, is refreshed. I think of the woman

of Samaria at the well and how she drank of that water. “We must recognise ourselves

in her person” St Augustine tells us, “And in her person we must thank God for

ourselves.”