Blogroll addition - addendum!

Sister posted this comment on my recent post:

Dear Mike.. for the reference we thank you most sincerely. May we also point out, as we are sure is clear from entries, that I am a Life Professed Nun in an Order, living as many of us do, as a Solitary. My Vows are with the Order.... Just now I am active if the Order needs me to be here; so I am out supporting our work of great mercy maybe two days a week, the rest in total seclusion, a happy balance indeed... all the old anchoresses worked for the poor in their own way of course.And met so many at their windows.. Blessings this day

Her other site Anchorhold gives more details, including the fact that she lives as a

Consecrated Anchoress, Living Stream Sisters of Faith...

Here, a consecrated anchoress, a solitary nun, measures out her days in silence and solitude and persevering prayer, by the wide fireside, where the Sacred Heart lamp burns day and night....... Or at the open door, threading prayers with rosary beads, weaving St Brigit Crosses, knitting, stitching, hands and heart busy. She is alone on the mountain; birds, the wild flowers and creatures are her companions, birdsong, the stream's liquid melody, and tree-winds her music. Prayer is woven into every deed and act. Her life is simplicity. Her out-goings seldom, for essential reasons only.. and few find their way here.

In the ancient rhythm of monastic life, where the day is punctuated by the sevenfold Divine Office, prayer and work merge. There is no division. All becomes prayer in solitude.

Growing flowers and fruit and herbs and vegetables, an old, old part also of monastic life, close to God in the tending of the earth.

By the inner gate, a wooden rosary with the Risen Jesus at its heart sways in the breeze, and by the big gate, a bare wooden cross, where pale primroses lift their faces to Him, bids you come to Him.

There is peace here, timeless, ageless. The world set aside. A space apart, a place consecrated, dedicated to the Living God, to Jesus, Our Dear Lord.

It is important - and this I should have pointed out in my original post - to understand the crucial distinction between someone who chooses the solitary life as an individual, whether out of a sense of calling or natural temperament, and a religious who, while remaining fully in community, lives in solitude with the permission of their Superior. Two well-known, good examples of the latter would be Thomas Merton (to his community, Fr. Louis OCSO) and Br. Ramon SSF. I would strongly recommend anyone interested to click through to this page by Br. Ramon (obituary here) for an account of what this calling means in a Franciscan context.