Introducing the Monk's Garden by Tonja Reichley
When John and I first moved to Ireland in January 2013, we landed first in the village of Kinvara, about a half hour from Galway City on the other side of the bay. We ended up having to move again within a month's time because we couldn't get internet to the cottage we were renting, but I am deeply grateful for that window of time passing through because it means I got to meet, and become friends with Tonja Reichley. Tonja lives part-time in Kinvara and the rest of the time back in Denver, Colorado where she runs an herbal boutique and handcrafts her amazing potions. Tonja is a monk at heart and wanted to learn more about the monastic tradition, and I was longing to learn more about herbs, and so a wonderful friendship was born. She is a beautiful soul.
Tonja has started a brand new series at her blog called The Monk's Garden, bridging the monastic and herbal traditions. The ancient monks were the keepers of medicine in their time and monasteries would have been places of both physical and spiritual healing. I am delighted Tonja has agreed to let me cross-post her reflections here to share with the Abbey community.
Introducing the Monk’s Garden by Tonja Reichley:
As an herbalist, a ritualist and a monk, I am blessed to walk through my days with a sensual link to my ancestral spiritual tradition. The monks in Ireland worked daily with herbs to nourish and heal and with oils to anoint and bless. The textures and scents and tastes that I experience every day through the herbs are ones that have changed little in the hundreds and even thousands of years of herbal medicine. The healing remedies and anointing oils that I create are ones that Hildegard of Bingen and Brighid of Kildare may have given to their patients and parishes and communities.
In my work with the herbs and through my senses, I embody ancient practices and rhythms that are grounded in the glory of Nature. The senses are sacred thresholds and it is through my senses that I connect with the wisdom of the monks, that I hear the song of the Divine, that I see with the eyes of my heart the beauty of God’s greening Earth.
For years I have been intrigued with the ancient practice of The Hours and am delighted to invite you into my Monk’s Garden. Here, together, we will delve into a practice of The Hours deepened and eased with the use of herbs and by actively engaging our senses, which are, like The Hours, thresholds to the Divine. In addition, we will learn about the healing of herbs, ways to use them and seasonal celebrations to honor the Earth and Nature and our own selves.
Week 1, every month, in the Monk’s Garden will explore one of The Hours and recommend herbs, essential oils, words and simple rituals to incorporate into celebrating that time.
Week 2 in the Garden will be a study of an herb (Monograph) that the monk’s would have grown and offer ways that you can work with that herb for physical as well as spiritual well-being and transformation.
Week 3 in the Monk’s Garden is Herbcraft and we will create an herbal medicine, elixir or potion that the monk’s may have created to serve their infirmary or their spiritual community. And that you may create to serve your own self and community.
Week 4 in the Monk’s Garden is Celebration. We will celebrate the wheel of year: a seasonal rite, feast day, cross quarter day, solstice or equinox incorporating herbs and sacred art. Rituals, meditations and herbs will be woven into each of these celebrations.
Welcome to my garden, my Monk’s Garden. May we sow lush vibrant seeds of Spirit together.
Herbal Book of Hours: Lauds
It is the threshold of a new day and you feel the stirring of its awakening with you, even as you are lightly veiled in sleep. Monks have this knowing with us, this primeval memory aching to practice a tradition pre-dating even Christianity, to rise and greet the coming of the light, to awaken and give reverence to the rising of the sun. My Druid ancestors would have done this on hilltops in Ireland, the goddess Brighid’s priestesses would have risen to greet the dawn in ritual under a mighty oak and Hildegard’s nuns in Germany would have gathered in their cloister to sing the Lauds, the coming of the light.
Lauds is one of the sacred Hours of the day, honored and practiced at dawn.
On the wheel of the directions, Lauds would fall in the north-east, which is not far from where the sun rises, especially in the winter months in the northern hemisphere. This direction honors the Element of Air. Lauds is about breathing in the breath of the new day and sharing your own breath of reverence and gratitude to honor its mystery and unfolding. Lauds is for INSPIRATION.
To celebrate Lauds, join in the voices of the ages, of monks and Druids, of wise women and men, of solitary hermits and crones by the fire, by chanting “Awen, Amen, Awen”, bridging pre-Christian and Christian sacred words. Awen is a Gaelic word with no direct English translation although loosely means whole, soul truth and bliss. Amen is a sacred word used to end or affirm prayers in the Christian tradition. Bringing these two words together is a bridging. Bringing these two words together can instill a sense of wholeness of being, honoring all of our ancestral traditions.
To celebrate Lauds, create an incense of vervain, lavender and frankincence. Vervain is a plant representing the Element of Air with its phallic-like tops and wispy leaves. It is a herb sacred to the Celtic people and I found it growing wild in a garden labyrinth at Chartes Cathedral in France, a place that brings together Druidic and Christian traditions. Vervain is an herb of the warrior and inspires action.
Lavender also honors the Element of Air in her physical presence and also through the invitation she calls us in to breathe deeper to calm and soothe our spirits.
Frankincense has been a holy herb since pre-Christian times. Its creamy white resin, when burned, engages the sacred and invites us to be there.
Blend these three herbs, perhaps briefly stirring them in your mortar and pestle as the monks may have done and then burn them on a charcoal as you recite a blessing from your heart or a psalm or the following from my Herbal Book of Hours:
An ethereal, luminescent veil spreads over the Earth,
Sweeping through the threshold: night!
Lover who held my soul in shadow
Acquiesces to the primeval turn: light!
Seep into this place
Awaken me
Quicken me
Behold me as I behold you.
Blessed be. Amen.
May your day be as blessed as the beginning moments of celebration.
See you next week, in the Monk’s Garden, where we will meet an herb that was cultivated in monastic gardens for centuries because of its importance in health and medicine and now is considered a bane in many gardens (although not in mine!).
Herbalist (BS, MBA) Tonja Reichley spends her time in the urban alleyways of Denver and on the windswept coast of western Ireland foraging for wild herbs to nourish, heal and revitalize the whole self. She loves the power and connection of ritual and ancient Celtic monastic traditions. She created MoonDance Botanicals, a herbal boutique where all products are handcrafted by a collaborative herbal community and is the author of The Way of Brighid Oracle Cards, a 33-card deck dedicated to Irish goddess and saint, Brighid offering reflections, meditations and affirmations.
If you are interested in learning more about Tonja's Herbal Book of Hours, consider taking an online course she will be offering in August 2014: Herbal Book of Hours: Honoring Ancient Monastic Traditions Using Herbs, Words and Sacred Art.
