“Monastic spirituality teaches us that we are on a journey. The journey is inward to seek God in prayer and silence. Taken alone, we can romanticize this aspect of our life. We can desire to pitch our tent on Mount Tabor and sit with God. We can use the monastery, the Mount, as a nest. But to be monastic there is a parallel journey—the journey outward. We live in community to grow in sensitivity to the needs of others. The only competition allowed is to outstrip each other in showing love and respect. The monastery is then a center to come out of and to invite others into. The key is always to maintain both journeys—inward and outward.”
Christine Vladimiroff OSB in The Monastic Way, ed. by Hannah Ward and Jennifer Wild (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2007) 183.