retreating: day four (final)

Before I departed on Sunday to drive up to San Jose and catch my flight, I went to mass, cleaned the hermitage as requested, and took some final snapshots.  

I appreciate a place that asks you to take out your own garbage.  I think the fact that you are not waited on, served or coddled at the monastery is a positive thing, in two ways:  

1) the monks, while extending hospitality, are not at the monastery to run a hotel.  I would rather them focus on what they are meant to do, which in turn means places like this exist for people like me.  If I wanted a hotel, I could go to a hotel.  But if I want a monastery I need a place where there are monks and that means it won't be a hotel because that's not their calling.  I think what I'm trying to say is I appreciate that the monastery is a monastery.  (Profound, I know.)

2) Everyone knows that resorts and hotels are not real life.  Neither perhaps is a silent retreat at a monastery.  But the less this favored a resort, the more it mentally got categorized as "real life".  I take out garbage at home, I take out garbage at a monastery.  See, not that different.  One might be a little more secluded and beautiful and conducive to peaceful rest with God, but both are places where I have to do the dishes and clean the shower, and this implies that these tasks are not at odds with finding peaceful rest with God.  Nor should they be.  But sometimes I think I'm inclined to compartmentalize God and faith from real life... not so badly as to say they are only at church on Sunday mornings... but still, I should be aware of any extent to which I keep God in the gaps and not integrated fully into every day life.

the bookstore, office, and chapel behind it

space in front of the chapel entrance.  through the opening is a view out over the ocean

As you enter the chapel, you pick up the book that corresponds to the service you are attending.  The monks sit in the innermost rows of chairs, facing each other.  Other folks fill in the pews behind them.  Everyone moves into the rotunda, lining the walls, for communion.

The chapel was open 24/7-- and like everything there, so peaceful and quiet.  I was glad to have a few minutes before I drove out where I could take some pictures without bothering anyone.

See?  Just like home!  :)  
Why can't I capture this tranquility while taking out the garbage at home??