Poor Clares
Throughout time, men and women have sought solitude and silence in the search for God. This is not solely a Christian vocation for other faiths have followed the same path. Over a number of years, John Robert Young managed to persuade certain communities of monks, friars and nuns to allow him to document their way of life - a life of silence, prayer and work - even the ‘enclosed’ order’ of the Poor Clares at Hawarden, Wales now sadly closed with the nuns joining a sister monastery in Nottingham.
Poor Clare Colettine nuns withdraw from the world in order to pray for the rest of humanity and go barefoot as a sign of poverty and lowliness of heart and in witness to the transcendence of God.
‘The monk is one who, alone and poor, yet rich in a love that is wide enough to embrace the world, feels within him the silence of God expanding into a tremendous smile: it is the presence of the infinite Word claiming possession of another humanity, a possession due to Him not only as Head of the human race but by the right conquest. He has won the right to exult our hearts by the triumph of His Cross.’
Silence in Heaven: Thomas Merton.
