On the 7 December we joined the brothers of Our Lady of Cana Priory in Colebrook (Tasmania) for First Vespers of the Immaculate Conception to celebrate the re-dedication and blessing of their new chapel.
Our fraternal bonds with the Cana Community have been strong ever since their arrival (more or less literally) on our doorstep in 2017, when they initially moved in a few kilometers away from us in the little village of Rhyndaston. Since then they have moved to their new location in the Coal River valley town of Colebrook, where they are in the process of building a monastery in the venerable nineteenth century tradition of Benedictine revivalism and the Tridentine tradition of liturgical prayer (in what is now called the "Extraordinary Rite").
Our two communities continue to be united in prayer, not just for each other, but for the world and for the church, especially here in Tasmania. While in some ways we are quite different—we draw on the much older traditions of the undivided church, East and West, and they on the more recent post-Reformation Roman Catholic traditions—we share the same Christian faith, the same monastic roots, and the same commitment to Christ and the Gospel as the centre of our life. The mutual respect between us is a sign of the church's catholicity and of monasticism's enduring contribution to the church's unity in diversity.
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