Fr Luke Macnamara OSB recently returned to Glenstal after teaching a two-week course on the Gospel of Saint John at the Notre Dame de Sion Centre for Biblical Formation in Jerusalem’s Old City.
More than two dozen participants from around the world joined Fr Luke for a series of lectures, individual and group study, field trips and excursions focussing on John’s Gospel.
A Glenstal monk for more than twenty years, Fr Luke completed his doctorate in Sacred Scripture at the Pontifical Biblical Institute in Rome and has lectured at Saint Patrick’s Pontifical University in Maynooth for almost a decade.
In addition to lectures on John’s Gospel, the course included some inputs on Judaism and Islam, taking into consideration Jerusalem’s unique position at the heart of the three Abrahamic faiths.
Glenstal’s Br Justin Robinson OSB – who is currently away on studies in the Holy Land – was invited to give two talks on Islam to the participants. He spoke on the subject of ‘Text, Land, People: an exploration of the Qur’an, its People and Holy Land.’
The presence of two Glenstal monks in Jerusalem provided an opportunity for a number of meetings with friends of the monastery and, most importantly, the chance to pray in the holy places for the Abbey’s monks and their relatives, for Glenstal’s friends and benefactors, colleagues, students and their families.
It was a privilege for Fr Luke and Br Justin to pray for these intentions at the Church of the Holy Sepulchre during an early-morning Mass celebrated on Calvary. In a particular way, they remembered the intentions of the students, families and staff of Glenstal Abbey School who recently began a new academic year together.
Most providentially, the pair later had a chance-encounter with Abbess Klara, the superior of our congregation’s foundations in Ukraine, who has visited Glenstal a number of times over the years and was making a pilgrimage to Jerusalem.
This brief meeting was an opportunity to exchange greetings between monastic communities and to hear news of the Benedictine Congregation of the Annunciation’s brothers and sisters in Ukraine.
To learn more about the Benedictine monastic foundation in Lviv, Ukraine, visit the website of our Congregation here.
To find out more about similar talks, retreats and events from monks of Glenstal Abbey, visit our Events page here.