Signora Sheila

When my mom and a friend visited us some years ago, I played tour guide around Italy. Rome, Venice, and the usual tourist areas. And they loved it all. But we have friends all over, so we also traipsed through the smaller towns and villages. And staying in people’s homes, they saw the real Italy! 

But our trip to Ferrara took us to the Este Castle, where in a nearby church, we got a very creepy and eerie feeling.

Perhaps caused by walking over people long dead and buried beneath the floor, members of the aristocratic Este family. I’m not sure I’d like to worship over dead people.

But the guidebook also showed that the church had a working nunnery open to visitors. And that piqued my interest.

I was tired of all the ancient churches and buildings filled with old paintings. It baffles me why people travel halfway around the world just to spend most of their time looking at a seemingly endless line of paintings. But to each his own! :)

Visit to a nunnery

Mom and Patsy were also ready for a change. So we marched next door, thinking we could just walk right in, like at a tourist site. At least that’s how it was described it in the tourist guidebook.

But there was a sign on the door: Ring for admission. So I rang. And the door creaked open slowly, as if on magic hinges, revealing a tiny foyer, desolate and lifeless. And an inhospitable-looking door in the back wall, blocking the way.

“Let’s hope the inside is more welcoming than this!” I thought. Maybe we’ll even find some life there!

Void of life

We peered around through the sparse light filtering down from the high, deep-set windows. “So much for finding any life here,” I thought. The place was about as inviting as the castle dungeon! “Let’s get out of here,” Patsy whispered, though there seemed to be no one around to overhear.

And then we heard a monotone voice asking, “What do you want?”

“Ah, we were hoping, or that is, uh, we wanted to visit the nunnery,” I stammered nervously as the only Italian speaker of our trio. No one else was there, so we looked around trying to see where that muffled, monotonous voice was coming from.

The strange window

Only then that we see the strange opening that turned, but never opened.

Only later did I learn that all cloistered monasteries have these turnstiles or small revolving compartments that are used to deliver food and necessities. Similar to the revolving turnstile security doors at airports, but window-sized and made of solid wood panels.

They block the view from inside and out, allowing only brief, muffled communication with the outside world. (Take a look at one in this interesting article about the Santa Catalina Monastery; scroll down to the middle of the page.

These turns allow the nuns or monks to receive daily necessities, without allowing direct human contact. And thus, shield them from unnecessary interruptions.

Upon learning it was a cloistered convent with no visitors allowed, we fled the tomb-like, eerie atmosphere, glad to return to fresh air and sunshine, surrounded by people.

And although part of me admires the spirit of devotion and dedication that must lead to such vows, I can’t help but compare such a life to Christ’s commands to love others and to go make disciples. How does one fulfill these commands, in isolation from others?

Yet they had one thing that often seems sadly lacking in our daily lives. Silence and stillness. That eerie silence did not make me feel rested, bit it did make me feel the need for it. 

Be still, and know that I am God. I will be exalted among the nations, I will be exalted in the earth!

Psalm 46:10

Keeping out interruptions

To me, cloistered life seems to be man’s way of trying to do what only the Holy Spirit can do. It seems like man trying to enter God’s presence on his own, trying to create God’s holy peace and rest.

Barred windows and turnstiles cannot create His peace and rest, nor do we need need to enter a monastery. But we do need boundaries in our lives if we really want to enter God’s presence, rest, and peace.

Boundaries, schedules, and clear restrictions that can help us keep out unnecessary interruptions. Limits that say “this far and no further. Limits on TV, Internet, entertainment, hobbies, and time-wasting activities. Because a life filled with too many distractions prevents us from being still in God’s presence.

The gate we need is self-discipline, which is never easy. But as we work to keep interruptions at bay, we create space and time for the holy hush of God’s presence in our lives.

And it’s in that atmosphere that we can hear what He has to say. What do you listen to? What are you hearing?

📷 Image credits: fence; stop; woman; other is mine