Christmas, the Prince of Peace and My Monastery

I am a monk and priest of Prince of Peace Abbey, a Benedictine (“Order of St. Benedict”) monastery in Oceanside, California. The featured image shows our church and a detail of its icon of Christ the Prince of Peace. As the Nativity of Christ the Prince of Peace, Christmas is also the titular solemnity of our monastery. On that day I will also start blogging here. Christ is born, and a blog will be born.

I grew up a brown, Filipino, immigrant, naturalized U.S. citizen and Navy brat on various islands in the Pacific Ocean and on the California coast. Now I’ll also be here chewing on the Gospels of the Eucharistic Covenant Rite, the Mass. And as I go along, I’m hoping they’ll help me figure out that vow St. Benedict gave us, conversatio morum, which means “ongoing conversion.” Turn. Love. Repeat.

Dear Readers of “Turn. Love. Repeat.”
California where I reside had a new law go into effect on January 1, 2020. California Assembly Bill 5 forbids freelance writers, editors and photographers from providing more than 35 content submissions to a media organization per year unless the organization hires the freelancer as a salaried employee. Patheos is a media organization, and I am a freelancer. So now I must limit my posts to 35 per year, or 1 post about every 10 days. So as not to exceed my limit here at Patheos, I will post my “extra” pieces at my own blog, Monk Notes.