Winter pics

Winter in Moscow after lots of snow has melted and drifted. I love the patterns of the snow curving over the hills.

This is the driveway at home. I couldn't get up with studded tires, and even my boots and Manda's feet slid every step or so. We talked abotu runner sleds but I think that would have been suicidal.

A 3-foot pile of snow on... bike seats?

St. Benedict and monastic routine

Perhaps I should feel like a monk right now, but I really don't. Maybe it takes some time.

In history, we're studying the medieval growth of Christianity, and as part of that we have a little book called St. Benedict's Rule for Monastaries. We read portions of this every morning, along with reciting (reading, if we don't know it) a psalm and a Christian creed, and copying down scripture passages. At the end of the term, our small historigraphical paper will be due on reenactment or routine, discussing the difference in reenacting the past rather than just reading about it.

For a taste of Benedict, here's one snippet about starting his monastary.

And so we are going to establish a school for the service of the Lord. In founding it we hope to introduce nothing harsh or burdensome. But if a certain strictness results from the dictates of equity for the amendment of vices or the preservation of charity, do not be at once dismayed and fly from the way of salvation, whose entrance cannot be but narrow. For as we advance in the religious life and in faith, our hearts expand and we run in the way of God's commandments with unspeakable sweetness of love. Thus, never departing from His school, but preserving in the monastary according to His teaching until death, we may by patience share in the sufferings of Christ and deserve to have a share also in His kingdom.