St Bruno of Cologne had an intense love of a penitential life. He had a dream of living in solitude and prayer, and persuaded a few friends to join him in a hermitage. After a while he felt the place too crowded. A friend, gave him some land in the mountains which was to become famous for his foundation “the Chartreuse”—from which comes the word ‘Carthusians’ – where the climate, desert, mountainous terrain, and inaccessibility guaranteed silence, poverty, and small numbers.

It is said that the order has never had to be reformed because it was never deformed. No doubt both the founder and the members would reject such high praise.

One day, the personal prayer of St Bruno was being interrupted by the croaking of a roaring bullfrog. When he could stand it no longer he shouted out the window,
‘Would you, please, be quiet! I am trying to pray here!
All went quiet and Bruno settled down to pray. However, a voice inside him kept insisting,
‘Perhaps the frog was praying in his own noisy way, and God may be as pleased with it’s prayer as with yours.’

From that time on Bruno ordered nature’s sounds be heard in the monastery as God has had empowered them.

Sometimes we have to learn not to fight the nature of creation but to live and pray in harmony with it.

C/f Peter Hannah SJ,