Brother Mikah made his Simple Profession on the Fifth Sunday of Lent, April 7th 2019 in the Chapterhouse at St. Joseph’s Abbey, Spencer, MA.

The following text is from the Abbot’s address to Brother Mikah given that day:

Saint Benedict reminds us that, “The life of a monk ought to be a continuous Lent.” And at the beginning of Lent, we read that Jesus went into the desert wilderness. The wilderness is not so much a geographical place or landscape. It is life – your life, my life, our lives. Life is wild. In other words, there is something untamed, uncontrollable and full of the unexpected about it.

Promise and risk are really two sides of the same coin. Every promise we make, and every promise that is made to us, contains the risk that it might not be fulfilled in the way we want or expect – except the promise of God. Because the promise of God is also its fulfillment and that promise, that fulfillment has a name, Jesus Christ.