In the common vocation

 Equally fruitful and welcome were the numerous visits of monks and nuns in these months as at other times. We welcomed m. Maria Pia, recently elected abbess of the monastery of Civitella San Paolo; m. Maria Ignazia, abbess of the Benedictine monastery of Viboldone, who preached the annual retreat to the community in January; then fr Pius Ramon of the monastery of Monserrat, fr Maurice of Boscodan abbey; fr Matteo of Camaldoli; sr Michela and sr Lourdes of the Camaldolese monastery of St Antony in Rome; sr Myriam and sr M. Benedetta of the Capuchin Poor Clares monastery of Oristano; fr Ivo of the monastery of Westmalle, at present chaplain of the Trappist monastery of Vitorchiano; br Emmanuel, French Premonstratensian canon of the abbey of St Michel de Frigolet; fr Filaret of the Kiev Caves Lavra; fr Joseph of a nascent Romanian monastery of the Greek-Catholic Church in Lugoj. Especially significant, if brief, was the passage of eight Chinese novices, accompanied by br Markus of the Benedictine abbey of St Ottilien (Germany), where they are at present spending their period of formation, with the intention, however, of returning soon to their own country to start a new monastic foundation. Our community has been following this project with interest and hope for quite some time, thanks especially to the contacts of br Matteo and his research on the Church in China.

Finaly, we would like to express our fraternal sentiments to the Trappist community of Bellefontaine, in mourning for the recent death pf dom Emmanuel, its former abbot, to whose memory we are especially bound, because he welcomed with kindness br Enzo in 1967, at the beginnings of our community life, and gave him as gift a white hooded monastic habit, which our community later adopted as its liturgical habit.