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Saint Meinrad (MINE-rad) Archabbey provides many social media — like Twitter, Facebook, and iTunes to help people stay connected with Saint Meinrad, its monastic life, and Benedictine spirituality.
Saint Meinrad is one of two archabbeys in the USA, eleven in the world. Saint Meinrad is an hour west of Louisville off of I-64. Map.
Saint Meinrad has an extensive web site. One page is called "Connect Saint Meinrad" giving ways to stay connected to Saint Meinrad electronically with your favorite social media services and devices.
Here are some of the ways:
Blogs Yes, the monks have several.
E-Newsletter A periodic newsletter by e-mail with links back to their web site.
Facebook Become a fan of Saint Meinrad and meet others.
iTunes U "Download lectures, retreats, chant, homilies, special presentations. Files can be played on iPods, burned to CD, or played on your PC or Mac."
Oblate Newsletter This newsletter is listed in another section of the web site, but is also a good resource for anyone interested in the life of Benedictine oblates.
On the Hill A downloadable PDF of the quarterly On the Hill newsletter.
Ringtones Free ringtones for your cell phone.
RSS Feeds A service to receive news about the abbey.
Screensavers Free screensavers for your computer.
Slideshows Slideshows of the Saint Meinrad grounds -- a virtual tour.
Twitter Follow Saint Meinrad.
YouTube Saint Meinrad has its own channel with Saint Meinrad videos.
While some people think monasteries are shut away from the world, that's a narrow view of how monastic life affects and enhances the wider world.
And when it comes to using modern means of communication virtually no one surpasses the Benedictine monks — I am speaking of those like Abbot Fredegise at Saint Martin’s Abbey (early ninth century AD) who helped develop the Carolingian minuscule — a form of writing with lowercase letters, spaces between the words, and punctuation. Before the monks put there hooded heads to task, Europe had many forms of scripts — ALLCAPITALLETTERSMOREOVERTHEREWASNOPUNCTUATION.
After the work of Abbot Fredegise Europe and its future had a script leading to more rapid reading and writing — and widespread learning — which helped build a new civilization.
It is not surprising that Saint Meinrad is using virtually all of the social media methods — it’s an ancient Benedictine tradition of communication innovation. The next time you see someone tweet in all caps, instead of telling them it's like yelling, say, "That's so sixth century."
For my other Examiner.com articles giving an overview of Benedictine Monastic Spiritualty topics, you may like:
Religion 101: How many Benedictines are there in the world? gives the number of Benedictine monks, nuns, sisters, Benedictine monasteries/convents, and the number of lay Benedictine oblates in the world. There are about 10,000 Benedictine oblates in the USA.
Religion 101: Overview of Benedictine spirituality gives a summary of why Benedictine spirituality continues to exist even though its origins are from the ancient desert fathers.
Religion 101: Example of a Benedictine divine office gives an example of the divine office (liturgy of the hours) prayed by monks -- the general form. The sessions last between 15 and 35 minutes.
Religion 101: Seven steps to becoming a Benedictine oblate gives a typical process for men or women (often married) to become Benedictine oblates -- who can come from any Christian faith. No, they do not wear funny clothes. The fastest growing part of the Benedictines are its lay oblates around the world, but it is not for everyone. There are many charisms (distinctive spirituality gifts) in the Church.
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The picture is cohdra_100_8973b.jpg by photographer cohdra and is used subject to license.
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