My first seven months in the Jubilee Year 2000 were spent in Europe, and I kept something of a journal. It is very uneven: some events I covered in detail, and at other times I would go weeks without writing anything.

The first three months were spent at a monastery in northwestern Germany, preceded by a few days with my relatives, who live in the same area.


January 18, 2000

As I flew in the other day from Brussels to Duesseldorf, I noticed a phenomenon I had never seen before. When we left it was overcast; as the plane ascended, we finally broke through the clouds, and were flying just over the tops of them. The sun was ahead of us and to our right. As I looked out the window on the left side of the plane, I could see an image refracted from the plane and following us along the clouds. It was a small circle composed of a rainbow. Inside the circle was a tiny shadow of the plane, flying along with us! As the rainbow is a symbol of peace, I hoped that it meant it would be a good and peaceful stay in Europe....

My cousin Heinrich met me at the Airport in Duesseldorf. As we drove home, we were back in the clouds - it was overcast, and we even drove through a bit of rain. This is typical Westphalia weather at this time of year. There was no snow on the ground, however, and it was not so cold - it was 1 degree in Brussels (34 F) and 5 degrees in Duesseldorf (41 F). Yesterday it was overcast all day again, and once more this morning, when it was also quite windy....

The diet is the typical German fare I am familiar with. For breakfast there are cold cuts of meat and cheese with the good German bread - small buns or pumpernickel. This is accompanied by coffee and sometimes fruit juice. The main meal is at lunch. We have had chicken fricassee over boiled potatoes, and a zucchini and tomato casserole with cheese in it. Often this meal is without anything to drink, which is strange to me. In late afternoon there is tea time, almost as in England, except here it is Kaffeetrinken - coffee with some kind of cake or pie. The last couple of days we have had an open-faced torte with fresh fruit - cherries and bananas - in a glaze. Supper is almost a re-run of breakfast, with the same breads and cold cuts. The last couple of nights it was washed down with beer....

I am presently staying with my Tieskoetter relatives in Ahaus. Maria's aunt is 90 years old and very feeble, needing a lot of care, though she still has a good appetite. Maria herself was sick yesterday, with some kind of sinus infection. Yesterday I also spoke with Christa, my Tekippe relative in Dingden. She said her mother-in-law was on the point of death, and might die any time. I feel oppressed by sickness and death....

I walked this morning the 20 minutes to town to go to Mass. At 7:30 everything is still dark, especially under this overcast sky. Low-flying clouds scud along. It is quite windy; I carry my umbrella, but luckily it is not raining. Though the darkness suggests nighttime, the streets are alive with pedestrians, bicycles and cars. Children are playing in the school yard. One thinks of the centuries during which people in this clime in northern Europe have begun their days in the dark. As I return from the Mass about 8:30, the sky has begun to lighten, but the wind is even stronger. Later I look out the window and see the sun peeping out; I think to go for a walk, but suddenly it is raining again....


January 19, 2000

As usual, I didn't sleep much on the plane - the night is all too short in any case. When I got to Heinrich's I took a nap for a couple of hours, though you are not supposed to do that. During that day I was very tired; in retrospect, I wonder how I was able to carry on a sensible conversation at all. We went to Sunday evening Mass, but I found it very difficult to concentrate on the homily. That night I slept 12 hours - from 10 at night until 10 in the morning. I must have really been tired. But I was more or less awake from 2 until 4. In the nights since I have also been awake at that time, and sleepy during the day - classic symptoms of jet lag. My body is still thinking New Orleans. But last night I slept better - I will gradually adjust to the new time zone....

Yesterday morning I was at a children's Mass. The organist played a song about a star over Bethlehem. The children held up stars made of construction paper to present intentions during the Prayer of the Faithful; then they stuck them to the front of the altar. The whole was well prepared, and the one theme carried through everything. In the evening Maria showed me the photo album of their 25th wedding anniversary. There were games and dances; in the photo album itself each person pictured had written something - a poem, a sentiment, and observation - in silver ink. I wondered if art played more a part in German life than in our own at home....

The sky remains overcast; we have hardly seen the sun since I arrived on Sunday, four days ago. I can see why people here love to go down to Italy at Easter time, and why they go crazy when the sun finally comes out....

I left at home the CD unit for my notebook computer, thinking that I wouldn't need it. As soon as we started asking about how I could get an internet connection here, I realized I would after all. So yesterday I called the Seminary and asked them to ship it. Yesterday I also bought a ticket for Paris for next week. When I got home and examined it closely I realized it was written for Tuesday, when I had wanted it for Monday. Today I went back to the travel bureau and changed it, and then forgot my umbrella there, and had to go back to fetch it. I sometimes wonder if I don't spend a good portion of my life going back to re-do things I didn't do right the first time...


January 21, 2000

The weather continues mostly overcast. The night before last it cleared, and the moon was fully visible, but by the morning it was once more clouded over. This morning I was walking back from early Mass and it seemed to be clearing, and then suddenly there was a rain shower; the weather is very changeable. Almost always the wind blows fairly strongly; no wonder Holland (I am here practically on the Dutch border) is famous for its windmills. On the way to the church I see the modern equivalent of the windmill, some 100 feet off the ground, with a huge three-bladed propeller, which generates electricity. The Germans don't call it a "windmill," since technically there is no mill connected to it; but I don't think we make such a distinction yet in English....

The other morning walking back from church I saw a man with two dogs in a field. Suddenly a rabbit started up, and the one dog was immediately after it. The man ran after the dog yelling, but the dog was paying no attention. The rabbit ran across a road, with the dog following blindly; luckily, there was no traffic. The rabbit ran into another field, and finally into a thicket, at which the dog gave up, and responded to the call of the master. I last saw him scolding the dog with a long sermon. In another field I saw some birds slightly smaller than chickens, with brown feathers. I think they are pheasants, which are seen in this area....

I have been reminded how densely settled Europe is. The houses are extremely close together, in a way that would not be tolerated in an American suburb, though of course one would find even worse in New York city. But the Germans make the most of the limited space with fences which crete small private areas, and small gardens. Few of the buildings are over three stories; the church steeple still dominates the town. But there are many townhouses, and the self-standing houses often have three or four small apartments in them. As I walk to the next village, I see fields being covered by a whole new sewer system for a new development. One wonders where all the people are coming from, when the statistics say that the German population is no longer growing.


January 22, 2000

Yesterday morning it cleared and the sun came out for a while. I was lucky to be out walking, and could enjoy. It gave a lift to the spirit - the sun does still exist! But soon it became overcast again. This morning it was raining fairly hard, though the sun a moment ago peeped through again. Maria said this was the weather to expect at this time of year - they rarely see the sun. The weather report promises more rain or snow showers, strong winds, and low temperatures of about 3 (37F) or 6 (43F)....

In the church I am surprised to see the Christmas decorations still up - a very large tree, surmounted by a big star, the wise men and a camel, and, in the rear, the crib. The decorations are all long down at home. Perhaps this is the earlier tradition of celebrating Christmas until the feast of Purification on February 2....


January 23, 2000

We woke up this morning to snow. It was too warm for it to last on the ground, but it gathered on the cars and trees and dead leaves. Coming from New Orleans, I still find the softly falling snow a delight! In the church for Sunday Mass, I notice that every one keeps their coats on. There is a little heat, but not much. I imagine at home we would not tolerate such a cold church, but here it seems to be taken for granted. In the new ecological religion, in which God does not save man, but man saves the earth, I suppose that Americans must be the Original Sinners: with such a small portion of the earth's population, we consume such a large proportion of the energy. The Europeans are much more conscious of such things, in part, no doubt, because the energy costs here are so much higher....

This afternoon the wind, which had been blowing all week from north and west, that is, from the North Sea and over Holland, shifted to the south and east. The sky soon cleared of all clouds, and for the first time in the week I have been here, the sun really shone in a bright and sustained way. This afternoon I took a walk. Germany is a great place for walking; there are paths everywhere, between the houses, through the woods, along small streams. I walked to the next village. Everyone else was out for a walk too, with such good weather on a Sunday afternoon. These are a hardy people; in even the coldest weather most of them don't wear hats. I passed a large yard where there were deer, a number of does, and a big buck with an impressive set of antlers. Or were these reindeer left over from Christmas? In a wooded area were stations of a Way of the Cross, a reminder of how Catholic this part of Germany has been, in spite of more recent moves toward secularization. In Wessum, the next village, the church was open in the middle of the afternoon, which is not always to be counted on in our modern and crime-ridden societies. On the way back, it is still quite cold, hovering around zero. Tonight there will surely be a lot of ice....


January 31, 2000

Memories of Paris: There were two beautiful days, cold but sunny, during which I renewed my acquaintance with the Paris streets. I attended Mass at Notre Dame at noon, arriving the first day only at the Offertory. Then I located the restaurant for the evening, and looked into St. Gervase and Protase. Then I started to look for the exhibition on the Fauves. A policewoman answered my inquiry: Des animaux? Even when I explained they were painters, she had not the slightest idea, nor did another policeman. But a block later I saw a poster on it. I asked for directions, and was told it was near the Museum of the Quai d'Orsay. So I found my way there, and asked directions at the information desk; they were very helpful, even to providing me with a map. It was still a long walk; the Museum of Modern Art was almost at the Trocadero or the Eiffel Tower, a building of fittingly modern design.

The exhibition began in 1905 with Matisse and Derain. I had the same questiion I had at the Picasso Museum: Why did I like the Impressionists so much, and care not at all for these painters? They really were the Wild Ones, painting a sky pink or a face green. Matisse said it in those early years in so many words: We are no longer concerned about the object; painting has become a pure study in color. Kant's "Copernican Revolution" has been carried into painting.

Perhaps the difference is found in the words Impressionism and Expressionism, a word soon attached to the Fauves. The Impressionists were concerned with the impression nature made on them. True, a certain subjectivity had entered in, and one can even see the development of one to the other: Are the prominent blue shadows in Manet's cathedral paintings really true to life? And yet, the Impressionists were still concerned with reality beyond themselves; whereas the Expressionists were really concerned with expressing themselves, not registering reality, no matter how subjectively. This quickly led to abstractionism, arbitrariness, and the other dead ends of modern art. Along the way the ideal of beauty was also lost. The Impressionists were still paying a compliment to reality by plumbing its truth; the Expressionists were only trying to communicate their inner mood, which could easily be one of rage or incomprehension or befuddlement. So I got off the train of modern art sometime about 1905. The exhibit, however, was very complete and well- organized, and clearly conveyed the movement with its eventual international following.

I walked back by the lights of the Champs Elysees to our Vietnamese restaurant on the Left Bank, to join Bev and her three children for an enjoyable supper.

The next day I began again at Notre Dame, this time arriving on time. I enjoy the Mass there very much; the present- day community seems to echo a long and eventful past in this historic sanctuary. After enjoying the church again, I went to Sainte Chapelle, where I once more admired the windows for an hour or so.

After I went to a small exhibit on Van Gogh. His "Japanese album" was featured. It contained six sketches, done while he was in Arles, apparently under Japanese influence. Paintings of Hokusai and others were displayed for purposes of comparison. There was a boat and harbor scene, a park, a bridge, a castle, two women, and a village. The notebook had been sent to the painter Bernard to give to another painter; Bernard apparently misplaced it, and it was lost for years. It was re- discovered only a few years ago in the area of Arles.

What was unusual about the sketches was that, hidden within them, were all sorts of historical and contemporary faces, as well as a number of self-portraits. They were very hard to discern, even when they were pointed out. As I was leaving, a professor was preparing to give a lecture on them. He said, excitedly, that the painting of the park was once thought to contain 24 faces; but not 62 had been discovered! I found that all somewhat interesting, but wondered what, in the end, it had to do with art.

The next step was the new Bibliotheque Nationale, with which Mitterand apparently had a lot to do. There are four steel and glass towers, connected by an elevated deck; but you enter by going again down an escalator. I was interested in the exhibit on Marcel Proust's A la recherche du temps perdu. It featured biography, books he would have read, paintings of the period, as well as music, manuscripts, first editions, quotations from the book, and so on. This included the starting point of the novel, which eventually amount to 7 volumes; all the memories were triggered by a taste of Madeleine cake dissolving in tea. It made me want to attempt to read it sometime in the original French.


February 5, 2000

Well, I am now settled at the monastery at Gerleve, after having arrived yesterday. Though I am in a foreign country, I feel very much at home here, having spent the three months last year. I'm in the room right next to the one I was in last year. Everyone has been very welcoming.

I have already gotten a phone in the room. It doesn't go through the switchboard, but comes directly into my room, so someone calling from the United States doesn't have to worry about getting an answer in German.

I tried out the computer this morning, and it seems to be working fine. I still have to figure out what it will take to send and receive e-mail. I thought with a computer and a phone line I'd be ready to go, but it looks to be somewhat more complicated than that. But one of the priests here is on-line, so I am hoping he can help me.

We hare having a beautiful day today, over 50 degrees, and sunny, which is unseasonable for this early in February. I took a long walk to make the most of it. Cold and rainy is much more the usual weather.

News from New Orleans is of a bad ice storm, which broke many windows.

After staying some days with Heinrich, related on my father's mother's side, and the visit to Paris, I spent a few days with relatives on the Tekippe side in Dingden, where my great- grandfather and his wife were born. But I didn't get around to writing about it until I got to the monastery.


February 9, 2000

Christa, whose mother was born a Tekippe, and I would go to the 8 AM Mass, which I would concelebrate with the pastor, Fr. Hildebrand. I would read either the Gospel or the first reading, which gave me practice in public reading in German.

After we would come back for breakfast: Georg would usually be at work, and Iris at school. We would have br”tchen, literally, "little breads," like an individually baked French bread. They were very fresh, sometimes still warm from the oven. With that there would be cold cuts, ham, perhaps, and salami, sometimes with liver cheese, as well as regular cheeses. Usually we also had a soft-boiled egg, and always coffee. They know here of corn flakes, but find strange the idea we would eat them every day.

Then I would go back to the rectory and work on the baptismal books. Sometimes I think I am just plowing over old ground, but there is always something new to discover. For example, there is an Index to the baptismal books, covering the years 1800-1943. During the war someone must have undertaken the laborious task of assembling all this data! I discovered that I must look for the family, not just under "Tekippe," but under "Hemming" and also "Kipp." Or did I know that already, and then forget it? I can't tell, because I didn't bring with me the records of previous researches.

On a previous visit I had not found any Tekippe's born in 1821 which would fit the Bernhard Heinrich I found in Burlington, Wisconsin, progenitor of the Tekip's in Chicago and Wisconsin. So I conjectured that he might be the "lost" older brother of Johann Joseph (my great-grandfather), born in 1818. But under "Kipp" I found a Bernard Heinrich born in 1821, the date that Barney Tekip always claimed. I have the name of his parents, but can't work out how they fit into the puzzle, so am again unsure of the relationship, if any, between the Tekippe's and the Tekip's.

The parish office closed at noon, which also put an end to my work there. When I got home, Georg was usually ready to take the dog for a walk. Dusty could not contain his excitement at the prospect of going outside. We would put him in the back of the car, and then drive to the meadows outside of town. Dusty was on a leash, but would run hither and thither, sniffing everywhere. Georg said he was reading the newspaper, to see what the happenings of the day were. I observed that he was also leaving e-mails here and there. We would talk about the dog's antics, or about the weather, or about other topics; sometimes we would pace in companionable silence. Georg seemed to enjoy these quiet times, reveling in those days when the weather was threatening, and he had the whole countryside to himself. One day we had beautiful sunshine, which is never to be taken for granted in this climate; another day it started to rain toward the end of our walk.

One day we talked about neighborhood; Georg had been struck by a statement of a neighbor that sometimes neighborhood was even more important than family. We think of a neighborhood as a place, but this is "neighborhood" by analogy to "brotherhood." Georg said that if he had a problem, or he needed to borrow something, he would more likely go to a neighbor than a family member. I asked how the neighborhood was defined, or the neighbors identified. It was not simply a geographical concept. One could "inherit" a neighborhood from one's parents' circle of friends. A person might move far away, and still retain membership in the neighborhood, though this was difficult. A person who was hard to get along with, or who chose not to participate, would simply be left out of the neighborhood.

Like family, the neighborhood was not only a support, but could make demands. When the 50th anniversary came, it was not the family, but the neighborhood who came to erect the customary trellis with flowers around the front door. Even were one not inclined to celebrate, the neighbors would practically force one to, which meant a German drinking fest lasting over many evenings. The neighborhood, I suspected, was an aspect of small-town life; I will have to ask Heinrich,, but I don't have the impression those customs perdure even in the slightly bigger cities.

When Georg was busy and had to go back to work, Christa and I would have a light lunch, largely a reprise of breakfast. When Georg was freer, we would have the main meal at midday. One day we had potato pancakes, thin potato patties cooked, if I am not mistaken, in deep fat, to a golden brown. They were eaten with butter, or with a sweet syrup derived from sugar-beets. I remember having potato pancakes as a kid, but can't remember having them since. (Christa insisted that they must eat them at the monastery, and, sure enough, they turned up on the menu not too much later.)

In the afternoon I would often take a short rest, look at the local newspaper, and do some reading, or look over the notes I had made in the morning. One afternoon Christa and I took a letter Wilhelm Ritte, who had been my first contact in Germany, but has since died, had among his papers. It was written in 1873 from Iowa back to Germany by J. B. Thunte, my great-great- grandfather. We went to her aunt Hildegard to see if she could decipher the old German script. He talked about his daughter Elizabeth, my great-grandmother, and her son Fred, my grandfather. I expected that he would talk about the farm, and he did that: about the drought the previous summer, and the comparison between the economic system in the U.S. and Germany. But he also had comments on the persecution of Catholics in Germany, which he had read about in the paper, almost amounting to a theology of historical events. Unlike Johann Joseph, my great-grandfather, who couldn't sign his name, these must have been relatively cultured people. Some time I will have to make a translation of it.

Another afternoon we went to see the castle at Anholt, on the Dutch border. Another branch of the Tekippe's had left Dingden early on, when the father found work with the prince there. I met one of the daughters last year in Muenster, and another in Athens last summer. On the way back we stopped at Schermbeck. One of Christa's progenitors had lived for a while there, then came back to Dingden. Sometime I should try to look at the Church records there.

We would have supper together, and talk about the events of the day, or current politics, or the dialect traditionally spoken in this part of Germany. For instance, I was introduced to the word dr”gen, which would be halfway between the German trocken and the English "dry."

After supper we would read or talk, while Christa did her embroidery. There was a TV, but they rarely seemed to watch it. Sometimes we would end the evening with a couple of beers, Georg and I preferring the drier "Pils," and Christa the somewhat sweeter "Alt," or old-style. One evening Renata and her husband Friedhelm - Christ's brother - came over for a visit. Georg pulled a bottle of Chivas Regal out of a closet. Christa hated it, and Georg drank it only occasionally, but I enjoyed it. But I had to sip it neat, as Christa had no ice. I could not imagine a household without it, but Christa insisted she had no need of it!


February 11, 2000

I have been at Gerleve almost a week. Though in one way it seems I arrived yesterday, in another I feel I have been here forever, as I slip back into the routine of a year ago. I have made some changes: instead of getting up at 5:00 and splashing before Matins, and taking a shower afterward, I get up at 4:45 and start the day off right, showing up at morning prayer showered and shaved. It's just a matter of going to bed at 8:45, or just about immediately after Compline. But it is strange to wake up about 10:30 PM, and realize you've been in bed almost a couple of hours already! On the other hand, midnight becomes really midnight. I also decided just to go to the noon meal every day; the German system simply doesn't lend itself to a breakfast and supper routine. Since both those meals consist largely of cold cuts and cheese, there would be a dearth of hot food and green vegetables.

Matins and Lauds lasts about 45 minutes on a normal weekday. I enjoy the singing. Thought the Psalms are chanted in German rather than in Latin, there is still so much that hearkens back to my boyhood when I would hear the monks sing at St. Ben's.

After morning prayer I go out for a walk. The first day it was so dark I could see only a step before me at first; but I know the paths well. Gradually it lightens up, and that will increasingly be so as time goes on; one fine morning I will finally see the sun rise. When the clouds have flown away, the stars twinkle brightly. The handle of the Big Dipper is almost directly above me, and the North Star appears to stand at more than 45degrees, which reminds me of how far north we are here. Rome, after all, is on the same level as New York, and we are a couple days journey north from Rome. In the distance I hear the lonely call of an owl, Whoo Whoo-whoo-whoo...


February 15, 2000

Mail is expensive here. This weekend I finally got around to writing thank you notes to all the people who had given me gifts when I became a Monsignor. The stamp bill came to $22.50!

February 16, 2000

The new schedule still gives me, after a 45-minute walk, a half hour to do some Scripture study in the library. I am working on the Greek text of the Books of Machabees at present.

Breakfast is not with the monks, but in a special guest room. For a few days some sound engineers were taping some of the monks singing Gregorian Chant for a new CD, and they took over the guest room as their headquarters. We were shifted to the monks' refectory, and I wondered if we would have to keep silence. But we were alone; I have the impression the monks largely take a stand-up breakfast in a little kitchen off the main refectory.

With the guests there is almost always conversation, sometimes quite interesting. It often enough turns on theological or Church topics, but may expand to politics, language and travel as well. I am always amazed at the constant stream of guests coming through the monastery, especially on the weekends, but also during the week, staying usually for a few days, but sometimes a shorter or longer time.

At 9:00 AM is the Community Mass, the high point of the day, as one of the guests put it. He was a Church musician, and enjoyed the Gregorian Chant. That love I share with him; the Mass is also the only time I actually go into the choir with the monks; usually I sit in the first pew of the church. As I was leaving last year, I was hearing rumors that the concelebrated Mass was about to be done away with. A new abbot was elected during the summer, and I was concerned, in the account of his installation, that he asked that the priests not concelebrate. But, in fact, the concelebration remains the same, and I can still join the monks in choir. In fact, what changes have taken place have gone in an unexpected direction: the meal prayers are now in Latin rather than German, and one day a week, on Wednesday, the Mass is in Latin instead of German. I wonder if there were some who hoped for radical, progressive changes from a new abbot? If so, they must have been disappointed...


February 17, 2000

Yesterday morning when I went out for a walk it was cold, about 2 degrees Centigrade (36 F), with a high wind. Though the sky was threatening, there were only a couple drops of rain. After Mass the sun was out, then, to show how changeable it is, an hour later it was snowing! It was the first real snow I had seen this year.

After lunch the sun was shining again, so I decided to chance a walk into Coesfeld; though the weather prediction was not promising, it looked even worse for the next couple of days. As I walked, on one side the clouds were very black; fortunately, the wind was coming from the other direction. One sees here sometimes the foreboding skies painted by Salomon and Jakob Ruysdael; on the darker side it looked more like El Greco's View of Toledo. Before I got halfway to town there was a small hail shower, and so it continued through the afternoon, alternating sunshine and hail

Last night I got up about midnight and looked out the window to see that it had snowed; the landscape had been turned into a winter wonderland. It was delightful to walk in it, and see the expansive fields of white in the first light. Even as I write it is snowing, lovely, large flakes...


February 21, 2000

Heinrich picked me up yesterday (Sunday) and we went out to the area where he grew up for his brother's 65th birthday party. It was a nice sit down dinner at a rustic restaurant that was built recently but made to look like an old hunting club. There were wood beam ceilings and antlers here and there. The Germans have quite a ritual for all of this. He had invited just close family. Albert, whose birthday we were celebrating, and his wife sat at the head of the table. His oldest brother said on the side at his right, and then the other brothers and sisters with their wives. On the other side were the wife's relatives. We started with an hour or so of drinks, with champagne or orange juice, or a mixture of the two.

We had a first course of smoked fish. The main meal was sauerbraten, roast cooked in a vinegar sauce, red cabbage, potato dumplings, boiled potatoes, apple sauce, and so on, with two different wines. After there was dessert, something very rich made out of cream, as well as ice cream.

Then the whole group went out on a walk in the nearby woods. That's a peculiarly German custom - I can't imagine that being part of an American party! Then we came back for coffee and cake or pie. All in all, it was quite a feast, and very nice of Heinrich to invite me to be part of it. I had a good time meeting all of the relatives, some of them for the first time; some I had met before.


February 24, 2000

Last summer when I was in Turkey, and visited Mary's house at Ephesus, I first heard of a German seeress, Catherine Emmerich, who actually lived very close to the monastery. She was born in 1774, and lived her whole life in the adjacent area. One evening at supper I asked a guest if he knew where the birth place was. Mr. Eichhorn turned out to be just the person to ask: he was intensely interested in and knowledgeable of the subject. He has since arranged for me to see the birthplace and a museum dedicated to her. I met his wife, and we had supper together.


February 26, 2000

The Tribulations of Technology

[Note: If you are bored with technology, skip this entry!]

Last year I came to Gerleve without a computer. I did some work on the library computer, getting someone to print out texts when I needed them. But largely I just did without. I was writing a book, but I normally do so in longhand anyway.

This year I had the opportunity to buy a notebook computer. Though it is small, and weighs less than 6 pounds, it is more powerful than the one sitting on my desk. I thought I would have it for word processing, for looking up past writings, and many other useful projects. But I also thought I would use it for e-mail. At home, if you have a computer, a modem, and a phone line, you're in business; it isn't difficult to connect for e- mail and the Internet.

Before I left my cousin Heinrich told me that he could make me a secondary user on his T-Online account; that is the biggest service provider in Germany, connected with the national telephone service. He told me the cost would be only 5 Pfennigs (a Pfennig is half a cent) a day. I could have signed up for a few months with a regular service, but I told him that sounded very reasonable, and that he should look into the arrangements.

When I got to Germany and spent some days with Heinrich, we got busy on it as soon as we could. Almost immediately I realized a dilemma: all the T-Online software was on CD's; nothing could be done with floppy disks. But, in order to save space, I had left the CD reader at home. But I was determined to get thing going, so I called the Seminary and had them find it in my room and ship it. Having had things mishandled in the mail last year, I dreaded what the piece of electronic equipment would look like on arrival. But in fact the shipping company delivered it to the door in three days, and it proved to be all in working order.

This was now Friday; I had arrived on a Sunday. In the meantime we had gone to the T-Online Center in Ahaus and gotten the last installation CD. As soon as the CD reader arrived, we attempted, with great expectations, to install the software. All went well, except that when I tried to enter the password, a "T" followed by a four digits, I must have hit the Enter prematurely, and only the "T" registered. But once it was entered, there seemed to be no way to change it, so I would have to live with it.

The first challenge was the phone connector. We had already been to an electronic shop to buy an adaptor, because the German socket is different from the American. The young man, who seemed to be up on what we were trying to do, charged us $10 for his advice, as well as selling us the cord! The German phone connector has three sockets, unlike the one at home, where everything is geared to the one connector. The phone connection at Heinrich's house was connected to the middle socket. We took that out, and tried to insert our plug, but it didn't fit. To the eye it looked the same, but no amount of pushing and pulling would make it go in. So we put it in the left socket. Was that the same as the center one? As the right one? Was it even connected? To these questions we had no answers.

When we tried to dial, we got a message saying, "No dial tone." Heinrich's phone requires pressing a zero to get a dial tone. We tried various combinations of putting a zero in front of the number, by itself, followed by a comma, and so on, but nothing worked.

It was now Saturday morning, and I knew that most businesses were open a half-day. So we packed up the computer and brought it to the T-Online Center. A technician changed the modem definition to "standard modem," and plugged it into the phone socket. It worked! He got the dial tone. But then came a message, "Either all lines are busy, or the identification numbers are wrong." The man said that the lines were all busy, but it seemed to be working fine.

We took it home, and naturally tried it again. We did succeed in getting a dial tone, but then always came the message, "Either all lines are busy, or the identification numbers are wrong." I analyzed that as not very helpful; it should have told you which it was, and, if it was the second, exactly which numbers were at fault.

We tried it all day Saturday, with the same result. By now the Center was closed. Early Sunday morning I tried again, and concluded that either the service was impossible to get, or that, realistically, it had to be the second problem, the numbers. Heinrich and I looked at the numbers we were using, and tried various combinations, but nothing clicked.

On Monday morning I was off to Paris, so nothing more would be done; the following week I was staying with Christa and Georg in Dingden, and didn't have any further chance to work on it.

My hope was that, when I got to the monastery, Fr. Gottfried, who the previous year had been my e-mail connection, and who seemed savvy with computers, could help me. Heinrich kept on asking me what kind of telephone line the monastery had, was it an ISDN line, but of course I couldn't answer him. He felt there was no point in seeking further information until that question was answered. An ISDN line is a souped-up copper wire that carries more information than the normal phone line. Heinrich had one installed at his house for the computer. At home they are still relatively expensive and rare, and I found it hard to imagine that a whole institution would have one.

When I got to the monastery I saw Fr. Gottfried, but he said that he was taping for a CD, and would be extremely busy all week. He is the choir director. In the meantime I had a phone installed in my room; last year it was a month or two before I realized that was possible. The guest rooms are all wired, so the installation is as simple as bringing in a phone and plugging it in.

In the next couple of days I tried to contact T-Online on my own. The socket was the same - three openings, with the phone connected to the middle one. My plug wouldn't fit in that, so I put it in the side one, fired up the computer software, and tried to dial. The result was always the same: "No dial tone." The phone here also needs a zero for a dial tone, so I tried various combinations, but nothing worked. I decided I would have to wait for Fr. Gottfried's help.

He knew quite a bit about it. But he also told me that the whole monastery was indeed on an ISDN line, and that was incompatible with a modem. To connect with an ISDN line, you needed to insert a special card in the computer, and it was about $100. That seemed rather steep for something I would have no use for later, especially when I was so unsure any of this would work anyway.

One evening I was telling my problems to a fellow guest; he was a young man who had a portable computer of his own. He also had a modem but had learned there was one normal phone line in the Post Office, and he was using that to send and receive e-mail. We spent the evening comparing computers, and promised to meet the next morning at the Post Office. He said he could use the line for just a few minutes after 8:00, without disturbing anything else.

The next morning I watched him plug his computer into the phone socket. All went well; he hooked up to his university, and he actually sent and received his messages in a total on-line time of 11 seconds! I had brought my computer as well, so I plugged it in the same way. I tried calling T-Online. I got a dial- tone, and then the familiar message, "Either all lines are busy, or the identification numbers are incorrect."

Heinrich had put on my machine some "tips" from T- Online, so I started studying this for the numbers. At home there are just two things usually necessary to get on a provider: a screen name, which can be some form of your actual name, or an alias; and a password. Here it was more complicated: there were four quantities involved. First was the member number, a long set of digits identifying the subscriber. Then there is a second, secret number, mailed to the subscriber, and used as a kind of password, because it doesn't show on the screen. Third is the user number; Heinrich was "0001," and I would be "0002." Then there was a password. I was still stuck with my "T." Was that making a problem? Did it have to be a minimum number of digits? I presumed that, as a secondary user I would have the same subscriber number as Heinrich. The user number would clearly be "002," and I would naturally have my own password. But I was unsure whether I would use the same secret number or not. Heinrich thought it was a simple matter of using the same numbers and just changing the user number from "0001" to "0002." I wondered if there wouldn't be more formalities to getting on as a secondary user. Besides all the above, there is still a fifth quantity, a name used for e-mail, corresponding to our screen name. I eventually learned that had only to do with sending and receiving e-mail, not with logging on, for which only the first four numbers I mentioned are important; but at first we didn't know that, so it was an additional complication in the mess.

On my first visit to Coesfeld I had noted a T-Online Center there as well. The next time I stopped in and asked about the numbers for a secondary user. All of this, of course, is triply difficult in a foreign language, especially with the technical terms. I was surprised to hear the man say," Oh, a secondary user - you have to apply for that in writing!" Here I had been in Germany for more than a month already, and had visited the T-Online Center a number of times, and no one had bothered to tell me that! I asked him the address, and he said, vaguely, Duesseldorf. But he gave me another copy of the installation software, which I had left with Heinrich.

It seemed strange to me that a phone and on-line company would insist on an application in writing, but I looked at the software carefully. There was nothing about a secondary user. But they gave an 800 number and an Internet address. The latter, of course, was no help. This is the Catch-22: You need to be online to get the "necessary software or make the right connections, but you can't get online untill you have the right software or make the right connections!

I tried the 800 number, planning how I would tell them to speak slowly and distinctly. I needn't have worried. All day long the recording said, "All lines are busy. Please call back later." But the message did give the address in Duesseldorf, as well as a fax number. By listening to it a few times I gradually pieced them together.

I thought a fax might be quicker than a letter, so I tried to include all the information I thought necessary in my best German. I told them the equipment I had, my desire to be a secondary user, the relevant information on Heinrich, my address and fax number, etc. I was unsure only of the number of the phone line we were using; the Postmaster himself didn't know. I sent that out on February 11th, in great hopes that I would hear in a day or so.

In the meantime I was looking at my computer, and I noticed the AOL software from home. I checked it, and found out it had a country list, which included Germany. All I had to do was define a new location, and it gave me a country-wide number to call in Germany. I put an "0," before the number. The next morning we tried it, but got "No dial tone." The fellow guest and I tried various combinations, but with no luck. That was disappointing, because it seemed a promising avenue. I was already paying a monthly fee to AOL in the U.S., and perhaps that would count for here as well.

I waited until the middle of the second week to approach Fr. Gottfried again. He said the phrase twice, but I didn't catch the German; but the drift seemed to be "I will get to it as soon as I can."

In the meantime I asked the other guest if he could send some e-mails for me. It took just a little while to work out the procedure, but it was fairly simple. I would type out the message on my computer, and then put it on a floppy disk in simple text format. He would copy it into a message form, and send it with his mail. If someone sent a message back, he would reverse the procedure, and copy it onto my diskette. So I had a connection, but it was limited: he would only be around for a couple of weeks, so I had to warn everyone it was a very temporary address. Also, I tried to send a message to my good friend and computer guru, but it was returned. I checked the address and tried again the next morning, and it was returned again. But I had more luck with other addresses; one day he also sent an attachment with a message. I was most grateful to him for all the information and help, but he insisted, "Nichts zu danken!" He enjoyed receiving mail, even if it was for me!

In the meantime I had another idea. One day in Coesfeld I stopped at the Tourist Information desk in the city government building. I asked if Coesfeld had a cyber-cafe. The girl had no idea what I was talking about, but her colleague explained to her it was a place for e-mail and Internet, and directed me to the Central Cafe just a couple of block is away.

I had tried this last summer in Athens, and it had worked very well: the cafe had a direct connection to AOL, so it was simple to get my mail. Here it was somewhat more complicated. There were four machines in a corner of the cafe. Each had a coin box: 45 minutes for 5 Marks ($2.50), 15 minutes for 2 Marks ($1.00), 7 minutes for 1 Mark (.50), and 3 minutes for 50 Pfennig (.25). I tried sending a couple of e-mails; to my knowledge they never arrived, but I didn't know that at the time. I also tried putting in the URL for the AOL message service. I got a message, "This computer is not enabled for cookies. This must be enable to get this address." The guest who had helped me with the e-mail had a friend who had suggested a couple of free e-mail services, Hotmail and Freenet, so I checked those out. I went home to think all that over.

The next time I was in Coesfeld I went back to the cafe, and asked immediately for the technician. I told him about the problems with getting AOL. He said he didn't understand that, because the cookies were enabled on the machine. So I offered to show him. He went into the machine and the cookies were indeed enabled; but he changed some parameters, and I was able to get AOL. I had 70 messages backed up! I printed out the personal ones. The price seemed reasonable - perhaps 10 Pf. (.05 ) a page. I went home thinking that I had my e-mail problem essentially solved: I had a way to send and receive e-mail, even if I had to go to town; and there wouldn't be any AOL messages hanging out there in cyber-space that I couldn't get to.

When I went back the next time, however, I had the same problem getting access, and this time the young man was not so friendly. He couldn't come every time I wanted to read my mail; besides that, the changes he had to make to the computer put me beyond his normal "desktop," which was a security risk. He encouraged me to get a Hotmail account, and just tell all my friends I had changed my address. But I told him I had 70 messages on AOL I wanted to read. He asked me how long it would take, and I said 45 minutes. He said that he would give me the time just this once; he would come back at the end of the period and re-start the computer. I agreed to this. This time, I noticed, AOL downloaded some software onto the computer. I started going through the messages one by one. About 20 minutes later he came back and said he had to leave; he would have to re-boot the computer, and I could come back another day to finish up. I promised to think over a Hotmail account. After he left I tried AOL again and this time, perhaps because of the downloaded software, I was able to get into it without his help. I finished up reading the rest of the messages.

By my next visit to the cyber-cafe, I had decided I might as well try to get a Hotmail account. It didn't cost anything, so I was taking no risks, and it might give me another outlet. After successfully accessing AOL and finding there were no new messages, I tried signing up for Hotmail. I managed to do so, but made the mistake of using "Terry" as part of my password. On the German keyboards the "y" and the "z" are reversed, so when it came time to use the password again, I couldn't remember which I had typed, and I failed the password test. Fortunately Hotmail has a back-up option which asks you for a secret question and answer. I used the dates of the Council of Trent: 1545-1563. That allowed me to change the password, so I could eliminate the troublesome "y." So I thought I would send a first e-mail, but I kept getting an error message. Just then the technician stopped by and said he was having problems with Hotmail on this computer, but the other computer had some later software, and it should work there. I didn't see how that was a lot of help to me, as someone was already at the machine; but it was time to go anyway, so I gave it up for the day.

Freenet was another possibility, and might even allow me to operate from the monastery; but I had no way to download the software to try it. The cyber-cafe had no facilities for that; the computer itself was locked up tight, and you could only get to the screen and keyboard. I was afraid to ask Heinrich to do it, because I had already caused him problems. When I was first there, I tried to access AOL, and some software was downloaded to the machine. After that he had problems getting his Microsoft Explorer to work; and since practically everything on the computer was geared to that, it made the machine half useless. He had to get a technician to come in and re-format the whole hard disk, which I'm sure was quite expensive. He told me later he had read in the newspaper that the AOL software had been causing this problem. "Don't talk to me about AOL!" he said.

In the meantime I made a couple more visits to the T- Online Centers in Coesfeld and Muenster. One gave me a price of 6 Pfennigs per minute of use; the other one quoted 1.50 DM a month, which would be Heinrich's 5 Pfennigs a day. At the last place I showed them the fax I had sent; everything seemed to be in order, but they said it would take 8 - 10 days. But here it is over two weeks already, and I haven't heard a thing. Their service stinks. Here it is seven weeks in Germany, and I don't seem to be much ahead of where I was when I arrived. But I have largely given up. It's not worth the time I'm expending on it. I managed largely without e-mail last year, and can do so again. If something turns up, fine. If it doesn't, I'm saving my energy for more fruitful pursuits.


March 1, 2000

The past weekend the weather was beautiful. In the morning it was still cold: the ground was frozen, and there was frost everywhere. But the afternoon warmed up with bright sunlight.

I had a strange experience on Sunday. I walked into nearby Billerbeck, just a little over an hour away. As I was coming into the town I passed a man; I had to dodge him because he was weaving in the path. I thought to myself, "That's strange, I should look around." When I did so, I saw him lying on the ground. I addressed him and asked him if anything was wrong, but he didn't say a word. I looked around for someone to help, and saw a young couple on bicycles. They came to help, and got no response from him either. Then a woman pulled up in what we would call a suburban, and had a "Handy," as they call the cell phones. She called the equivalent of 911; I think it's 110 here. She also got a blanket out of the car to put under his head. I asked him if he was cold; but he had a sturdy jacket on, though without head covering, as is typical here. But again no answer.

We waited about 5 minutes for an ambulance. When I first came up to him, he seemed to be clenching his hands in pain. But now he looked like he was sleeping peacefully. A police car pulled up, and the two policemen came over. One of them slapped him slightly on the face, and he roused. The officer asked him if he had any identification. He started fishing in his pockets. By now he was sitting up. He searched in the other coat pocket, but didn't seem to find what he was looking for. The policemen then got him to stand up and took him to the car; they explained that they had to take him to the hospital to see what was wrong. I said a cheery good-bye to all the good Samaritans, and went on. If it had happened in mid-city New Orleans, I would probably have thought it was just another drunk, and possibly not even have stopped. But in small German towns anything so unusual and out of order immediately snares your attention.

On my morning walk I also had an unusual experience. As I walked down in the darkness toward the old farm house and barn on the property, I heard a motor and saw lights. I presumed it was the garbage truck I had seen before, making its early morning rounds. But then came into the light a young man in camouflage uniform to look at his small pack. Behind him was some kind of a military truck. As I passed the barn I saw on the other side two even larger vehicles, which looked like they had tracks. As I was trying to figure that out, I approached the gate and turned my attention to the road; there, a few feet from me, was a soldier on guard, complete with rifle. I told him "Good morning," and walked on, wondering what was going on. I only see the local newspaper on a steady basis, which doesn't have a lot of international news; I wondered whether some war had broken out that I wasn't aware of.

Later I saw them again; the tracked vehicles were not actually tanks, but perhaps what we call Armored Personnel Carriers. They were around later in the morning, apparently on maneuvers. What arrangements they had made with the Abbey to come onto the property I am not sure of.


March 2, 2000

I didn't feel quite well on Tuesday - seemed like a 24-hour flu or something. I slept most of the day, but felt OK again yesterday. It's nice to have the leisure to take off a day when you need to!

Heinrich is coming to pick me up Sunday after Mass. I will spend Monday before Ash Wednesday with them, which is celebrated more than Tuesday.

I have started to make plans for my trip in May, writing to friends and contacts in Munich, Austria, Rome, Vienna, Paris and England. I also hope to get to Budapest for the first time on this trip.


March 10, 2000

The first signs of spring are the Snow Bells. They grow wild, scattered in clumps here and there, patches of green with small white bell-shaped flowers facing the ground. I have seen them for a couple of weeks now; they are obviously hardy plants, because they stand up to the frost and snow.

This morning I saw the first green leaves on a few bushes; but most of the trees are still holding back, their buds swelling, but still tightly packed against the cold.


March 11, 2000

Last week I jotted notes on the menu, to give some idea of the food at the monastery. Generally it is very good, and the guests make favorable comments on it. I remember one saying that he didn't expect to come to the monastery and find four different kinds of bread served for breakfast!

As I have mentioned, bread and cold cuts are served every day at both breakfast and supper, so I will take that for granted, and only mention what varies.

On Sunday at noon, which is usually the big meal of the week, we had beef cut into small pieces and served with prunes and mushrooms in a heavy brown gravy. If the combination sounds strange, it nevertheless went well together. There were potato dumplings, about the size of a large meatball, as well as regular boiled potatoes. The vegetable was a mixture of peas and carrots. For dessert there was a chocolate pudding with chipped nuts on the top.

Beer is served every Sunday evening; wine is usual at the noon meal, except on fast days. Fruit juice and bottled water also come at dinner, with milk and tea at supper. Breakfast offers coffee and hot water for tea.

Monday noon sliced meatloaf was offered, with rice and a red sauce with red bell peppers. Sauerkraut was served as a vegetable, and the dessert was again chocolate pudding. Monday evening we had, in addition to the usual bread and cold cuts, leftovers from the past two days: the meat and gravy from Sunday served with potatoes, and the meatloaf and red sauce from midday.

Tuesday I was not feeling well, so missed the noon meal. That evening we had some kind of spare ribs served with mustard. There was a lot of fat on them; I have noticed that colder climates tend to fattier foods.

On Wednesday - recall that no meat is served on Wednesday, Friday and Saturday - at noon there was tuna fish served cold, with spaghetti and red sauce. For supper the hot offering was what seemed to be something like oatmeal, eaten with a covering of fruit cocktail.

On Thursday I went to Muenster, so again missed the noon meal. At supper was served a cold salad of tuna, pineapple, and bell peppers, and something that tasted like cream cheese.

The Friday meal began with a green soup, which could have been cream of spinach, but I believe was another green. Scrambled eggs followed with boiled potatoes, and a vegetable which might have been creamed asparagus, but I believe was a cousin to asparagus. Dessert was a stewed apple with raisins and a white sauce to go on top. Supper was very plain, limited to cheese and bread.

On Saturday noon the main offering was what might be thought of as a pie, though it was served in rectangles as lasagna would be. The filling of the pie was basically potatoes - it is clear how largely they figure in the German diet - and the crust on top was a baked cheese. This was accompanied by a garden salad, usually served with oil and vinegar on it, but occasionally a cream dressing. Supper featured leftovers - the potato pie and the scrambled eggs.

Though I do not usually go, the guests are also offered coffee at 4:00 in the afternoon, corresponding to the English tea. One set of my relatives does this every day; the other seemed surprised to hear that, as they do so only on special occasions. At the monastery cakes or pastry are served sometimes; at other times bread, butter and jam.


March 15, 2000

I mentioned on February 9 a letter written from Iowa back to Germany by my great-great-grandfather, whose daughter married Johan Josef Tekippe. I finally got around to translating it.

Festina
December 2, 1873

Dear Relatives,

I can't neglect to let you know how things are going with us. Praise and thanks be to God, I am still quite well. So are my son and daughter with their families. Elizabeth [Elizabeth would be my great-grandmother, and Frederick my grandather] has three children, named Maria, Anna and Frederick, and three children to whom she is stepmother. They are John, 18, Christina, 14, and Klara, 11 years old. Franz has 5 children, Agnes 10, Joseph 8, Theodore 6, Christina 4, and Franz 2 years old.

Last summer we had here a great heat wave so that streams and rivers almost dried up, and in places there is still a lack of water. The wheat here has done very well, but the other crops, because of the great heat, did poorly. There are hardly any garden vegetables.

In Germany a person must wonder how a farmer can pay a workman and a maid such a good salary, but here everything is cheaper than in Germany. You can understand it well from the following. The farmers have more land and do everything here with machinery. Two men can reap and thresh here what it would take four men to do in Germany. Two men working here with a team of two horses work 100-110 acres of plow land. They grow 1000 to 1200 bushels of wheat, and the bushel costs on average about a dollar, sometimes more, sometimes less. It's already been as high as $1.50 or $2.00. At present it costs only 10 cents less. If a farmer has 1000 bushels of wheat to sell, and the bushel goes for a dollar, that makes $1000. There are also farmers here who grow 2000 bushels of wheat and each year sell 20 to 50 fattened hogs. The fattened hogs are presently cheap: 100 pounds go for $4. Nevertheless, if someone has 600 to 1000 pounds to sell, he can still make some money. We grew over 900 bushels of wheat and have 20 fattened hogs for sale. My son Franz reaped 1400 bushels of wheat. He has a man to help him with the work. For the harvest he took on additional help.

Now my dear relatives I must insist that you write us soon and tell us how everything is going with you and what new is happening in our old homeland. We read so much in the newspapers about the persecution of the Catholics in Germany; a person is tempted to anger and rage over the godless lawmakers in Berlin, who want to eliminate the Church in Germany. Like the Huns and the Vandals they have chased the best priests out of Germany, and made them missionaries. And now bishops and priests who refuse to follow the godless laws must live on less or pay large fines. It is hard to see all that without wanting to strike back. But it is best to pray and have patience. When the measure is full and the time is ripe, the good Lord will himself strike back. The good Lord will guide everything for the best. In fact, many from Germany, including Jesuits and Redemptorists, are now working in the vineyard here in America, bringing rich graces the whole year through. Thus is the Catholic Church in America beholden to the Berlin Journal (Bismack is the chief of the Huns).

With that I must close and send you heartfelt greetings. Praised be Jesus and Maria!

J. B. Thuente

We are hoping for an answer soon to the following address:

Mrs. John Tekippe
Festina, Winneshiek County
Iowa, N. Amerika


March 18, 2000

This past week I made an unexpected trip north of here. The abbey has a daughter foundation at Nuettschau, in the Hamburg area. On Sunday I had met a man who was a guest here last year; he is a retired musician, and had played the organ while the monk who usually plays was away. Before supper I spoke with him and Father Martin, one of the older monks who has always been very friendly. They asked me if I wanted to go with them to Nuettschau. We would stay over for two nights, and come back late on Wednesday. During supper I thought it over. It would be interesting to see how the Benedictine life is led in another monastery, and I hated to turn down such a friendly invitation; but I decided I should stay here and get some work done because three days was a long time. There was also a practical difficulty: Brother Mattaeus in the infirmary does my laundry on Wednesday morning, and said Thursday and Friday were not good for him. I didn't want to go a week without clean clothes!

But after supper I saw this gentleman and Fr. Martin again, and they really twisted my arm to come. So I agreed. I put what laundry I had in the infirmary, and told Br. Mattaeus he could do it anytime before Wednesday evening. I packed up what I needed and appeared at 9:00 on Monday morning.

I had envisioned us three going in a car, but found a bus waiting outside. It turned out to be a tour for the Oblates of St. Benedict. I later learned Fr. Martin had been disappointed by the low turnout, so perhaps that's why he was so determined to have me along. But it turned out my friend Mr. Eichhorn, who had been here as a guest, and had had me to his house for supper, was along, so we could sit togerher.

Our first stop, a few hours later, was near Dinklagen, where a group of Benedictine Sisters lived. It was an old castle surrounded by a moat, and was also distinguished as having belonged previously to the von Galen family; there the famous bishop von Galen, who would become known as "the Lion of Muenster," because of his preaching against the Nazis, was born. We joined the Sisters for the hour of Sext; it was sung in German in their chapel which appeared to be a converted barn, with all the old beams exposed.

We went to a restaurant in the vicinity for midday lunch; Fr. Martin said we would have a light lunch of soup. That was not quite the case; for a very reasonable price we had a hearty split pea soup, served with large platters of sausage and big pieces of pork which could be placed in the soup, followed by dessert.

We got to Nuettschau in time for Vespers. The monastery is dedicated to St. Ansgar, the apostle of northern Europe, and we stayed in the St. Ansgar house, a motel-like structure which was very comfortable, with private bath and shower.

The church was done in a modern style, a square building with low roof, but with seating in the round, sloping down to the altar like a theater. Behind the altar was a large free-standing glass wall depicting the Apocalypse, with Christ seated in the center, and the four evangelists, and the gates of the city on the four sides; surrounding this were angels with hands raised in prayer, and all through the waves of the River of Life. Mass and Vespers were celebrated together.

I am always amazed at how differently the one Rule of Benedict can be lived. At Gerleve the liturgy is very formal, and one has the impression that lay people are allowed to accompany the monks in prayer from a distance. In Nuettschau it is quite different. The monks sit in the pews closest to the altar, but the lay people are in the immediately adjacent pews. The liturgy of the hours and the Mass is practically all in German, so there is no language difficulty. Books are provided for everyone, and the pages are clearly announced, so that no one is lost. And in fact the monks and the lay people sing everything together.

That evening a monk of the monastery, Fr. Gaudentius, whom I had happened to meet here at Gerleve the week before, met with us and told us of the roughly 50-year history of the foundation. They have now about 15 monks; the smaller size of the community is no doubt one reason it is more informal and welcoming than Gerleve. After we had a party with beer and wine, which is a favorite German institution.

In the morning our group has its own Lauds, later than the monks, and then breakfast. After Fr. Gaudentius took us on a tour of the monastery. Most of the monks now live in a new wing, done in a very modern style, with that stark, bland concrete and exposed steel I once liked, but now find rather sterile. We also toured the old building, which was the castle itself; parts were in bad repair, but it carried within its walls much of the early history of the foundation.

In the afternoon we visited Luebeck, one of the famous old port cities of the Hanseatic League. Though we were only a few hours away from Westphalia, the architecture had quite a different feel, reminding me somewhat of Scandanavia. Memorable was the Marienkirche, now Protestant, but still dedicated to Mary. It was bombed during the war, and burned; in the bottom of the bell tower are still to be seen the huge bells, all smashed, lying where they fell during the fire.

Most interesting was a visit to the Sacred Heart church. The pastor took us downstairs to the crypt where there was a memorial to four minsters of the Gospel who were killed by the Nazis. Three were Catholic assistants, and one Protestant. One of their offenses had been to disseminate the sermons of Bishop von Galen. They were denounced to the authorities, imprisoned, and finally hanged. The pastor described all this in very moving detail, and then we were able to see some of their relics. One of the priests had written in his breviary, Hodie occisus sum - Today I have been executed.

We got back in time to join the monks again for Mass and Vespers. I concelebrated and had to pray some of the prayers of the Canon; everyone in the group was very complimentary on how well I had done with the German.

On the way home we stopped to see a church that had gone back and forth between the Protestants and Catholics a number of times. One of the group, trying to see some art work in the sanctuary, managed to set off an alarm, so there was quite a commotion. Later we stopped at another Benedictine house, the priory of St. Benedict in Damme, men who were missionary Benedictines. We saw a display of their houses all over the world.

What was most interesting was to talk to Mr. Eichhorn on the way back about his experiences during the war. He is in his 70's now, so was young then. He was only drafted later in the war, and trained in radio work for the Air Force. But by then there were no planes left, so he was detailed for regular service. Fortunately, however, he never saw real combat, but he was wounded and spent some time in a Russian prison.

He always hated the Nazis, he said, and thought of Hitler and his henchmen as criminals. But what was one to do? He had some friends with whom he could share these ideas, people of his own age; but one had to be very careful. When word got out that an attempt had been made on Hitler's life, but failed, someone exclaimed, "Too bad!" For that remark he ended up in prison. He also said they got no support from their priests. I realized that the priests were also in a difficult situation. Most of the bishops instructed their priests not to say anything in public against the regime; so that a priest would have to defy both the Nazis and his bishop to speak out. The bishops themselves were split on the best strategy to deal with the Nazis, whether to protest forcefully, or to work quietly to win some concessions for the Church.

The pastor in Luebeck had said that the Catholic bishop had supported his three priests, while the Protestant bishop and church had disowned the fourth minister. I asked Mr. Eichhorn about that, and he explained that the Protestant church was more closely aligned with the Nazis, for historical reasons, than the Catholic Church. Historically, Protestantism was only able to exist because of the princes who were looking for a way to get out from under Charles V; and I remembered that the Prussian State made Protestantism almost a national religion, while it persecuted the Catholics during the Kulturkampf.

My reflection was that many of these things seem very clear and sharp in retrospect; but that it must have been very confusing and challenging to have lived through them!


March 21, 2000

The night before last an almost full moon shone bright in a clear sky, as the bells pealed joyfully for the feast of St. Joseph, the patron of the monastery. The feast was transferred to the Monday, because it fell on a Sunday; and today we celebrate the feast of St. Benedict, so organ music, special meals with music playing, and beer for supper mark a break from the usual Lenten rigor.


March 22, 2000

It's been in the low 40's most of these past mornings, but today there was again frost on the ground. No wonder the buds are shy about opening quite yet. But it was a clear morning, and for the first time I saw the sun rise while on my walk, a huge red globe in the east. Later I saw a large jack-rabbit lope across the frosty field, and a woodpecker executing his rat-a-tat-tat against a tree.


March 25, 2000
Feast of the Annunciation

St. Patrick's doesn't amount to much here. But there was a big feast for St. Joseph, the patron of the monastery, and for St. Benedict. Today is the Annunciation; tomorrow is St. Liudger, who is the equivalent of St. Patrick, for northern Germany.

In the first week of April I will be traveling to Copenhagen to visit a couple I met years ago in Rome. On the way I will visit a Monika Jensen in Hamburg, who was also born a Tekippe - she is a 4th cousin. It was only by luck I got in touch with her. Last year I visited her sister in Muenster, and another sister in Athens, when I was in Greece. But I had forgotten all the addresses at home! I had mentioned that to a German friend here, and he managed, through the telephone directory, to reach the son of the one in Muenster, and get her phone number, which is unlisted. We paid her a brief visit, and got the address in Hamburg. I have already had a phone call from Monika; she is free on that day, and looking forward to seeing me.


April 1, 2000

Old Man Winter seems to be hanging on, even though April is beginning. The temperature in the morning has typically been 3-5 degrees (high 30's to low 40's). Almost always the wind blows here from the west, varying from northwest to southwest; but the last few days, by exception, it has been coming from the northeast. The Germans associate that with Siberia, which conveys to them, as to us, the idea of cold and of the Gulag - a Russian word that Solzhenitsyn has single-handedly made part of our language.

Last week for the first time, two days in a row, I saw the sun rise on my morning walk. But ever since it has been clouded over and dark in the mornings.

In spite of the cold and cloud, spring continues to advance. Particularly in town, which is a couple hundred feet lower than here, as I would estimate, flowering trees are already in full bloom. Here I watch especially one tree with large buds. They are large, because they will eventually reveal both leaves and flowers. At first they are fully covered in brown. Now a white and slightly green inner bud pushes more and more forward; eventually, the brown covering will be left as a few wisps at the beginning of a new branch. As of yet, however, the mystery is still tightly wrapped inside. I am reminded of the poem of Dylan Thomas:

The force that through the green fuse drives the flower...


April 13, 2000

On my way to Denmark I visited the cousin I hadn't yet met, Monika, the sister of Gisela in Muenster and Irmgard in Athens, who had grown up at the Anholt castle. We had a very nice visit; she lives out in the country, and even has two sheep!

The visit had one unexpected result. She had from her father some records of her ancestors. After studying them, I have come to the conclusion I misunderstood the relationship. I thought we were 4th cousins. Her great-great-grandfather Theodor would have been the brother of my great-great- grandfather Bernd Henrie Tekippe. That was the way Wilhelm Ritte always told the story - that a Tekippe left Dingden for Alt Schermbeck, and that the family later came back to Dingden. But the records made clear that there are two Theodors in question, one born in 1798 in Dingden, brother of Bernd Henrie, and another born in Alt Schermbeck in 1796. So I am not sure now of the relationship at all, and the same applies to Christa, as she is cousin to the sisters.

The next day I went on to Denmark, and was met at Ringsted. My friends live in Kalundborg, on the opposite side of the island from Kopenhagen. They live in a house originally built in the 1600's, so the neighborhood was very quaint; it is also in the shadow of an unusual 5-tower church. The house is fixed up very nicely inside, and we had a wonderful visit.

The first day we drove to the second island of Funen to visit the birth place of Hans Christian Anderson. He is the literary figure of Denmark, and revered something like a cross between Mark Twain and George Washington. It was interesting to learn something about his life, and how he gradually discovered that his vocation was writing fairy tales.

The next day I spent in Kopenhagen, while my friends had a meeting. I wandered the city by myself, but had lunch with their daughter, who lives in Kopenhagen. The houses have more color than those of northern Germany, and it was a nice sunny day. People were sitting outdoors in the cafes. I walked along some of the canals, visited some of the churches, saw the changing of the guard, and then visited the Little Mermaid, the famous statue in the harbor.

Later I met my friends at the brand new library, which is known as the Black Diamond for its unusual architectural shape. Everything is extremely modern, and it's all connected to the Internet, and I was able to check my e-mail.

The next day we went to Helsingor, or, as it is known in English, Elsinore, the famous castle of Hamlet. I had been very struck by it on my first visit to Denmark. It is north of Kopenhagen. Even on a sunny day, it is dark and brooding, and, when I first saw it, it was rainy. It's the perfect setting for Hamlet. The story itself is legend, but I did learn there was some historical connection: Shakespeare himself had visited there a couple of times. We got the complete tour, even down to the dungeons.


April 15, 2000

Cold nights and warm days - the perfect weather for maple syrup, as I remember from my time in Canada! It still starts out in the high 30's or low 40's in the morning (3-5 C), but can warm up into the 50's or 60's during the day. In the last two weeks we have had some very nice days, though some rainy days continue to punctuate them.

In the one week I was away in Denmark, spring seemed to come at a single bound. Flowers have sprung up, and all the fruit trees are in bloom. The buds of the tree I watch as a bench mark have now broken open, and the tender green leaves are beginning to open and spread.

In these northern climes the light advances rapidly to claim early morning and late evenings. Even the hour we set back our clocks for daylight saving time seemed hardly to hinder its progress. Now when I go out for my morning walk, it is too late to hear the owl; but the early light brings out dozens of song birds. They make merry even when the sky is gray. I hear the moan of a dove which I don't remember from home, but which always reminds me of Buddhist temples in Japan, where they live in the eaves.

On afternoon walks one sees in the fields the cows and horses which stood or lay in their stalls, invisibly, all through the winter...


April 19, 2000
Spy Wednesday

I remember my mother telling me the Wednesday of Holy Week was called Spy Wednesday, because Judas was busy at his sinister work. The term doesn't exist in German; but they do have the expression Karwoche for Holy Week, and so speak of Karmontag, Kardienstag, Karmittwoch, and so on.


April 22, 2000

Spring is now in full flower in Westphalia. The last couple of mornings the thermometer has for the first time gone over 10 C (mid 50's). Trees are in bloom everywhere. Bushes have filled out with green; what was once transparent to the sight has now become opaque, cutting off the view of the surrounding fields. Early crops are well started already, and farmers are busy plowing and spreading manure for the later ones. On the tree I particularly watch, the buds have burst open, and already stems as long as 6 or 8 inches bear a full complement of fresh, green leaves.

The other day I walked by a field, lined with some kind of bush or tree. It was a solid wall of small white blossoms. This was more like a high hedge, but the same plant grows into a tall tree, and one can see it by itself, or standing out amongst the taller trees of a woods, a patch of white against the green.


April 24, 2000
Easter Monday

The Holy Week and Easter Vigil services were beautiful, as I had expected. Easter Monday is an official holiday in Germany - everything is closed.

Spring has finally come to Westphalia. Everything is in bloom. It's in the 50's in the morning and, if there's sun, it can warm up very nicely during the day. The pear trees and Japanese cherry trees are particularly striking.

Georg and Christa came yesterday for the 10:00 Mass, then we went to an outdoor museum near Muenster where they had recreated a 17th and 18th century village, often with original buildings which were disassembled and reassembled there. It was very interesting to think of the conditions under which the Tekippe's and others lived before they emigrated.


April 25, 2000

On my morning walk it's now far too light to hear from my friend the owl. But sometimes at night, if I open my window, I can still hear his eerie call at midnight or 1:00 in the morning, and the other evening, as we had blessed the Paschal candle, and were processing into the church, I heard him again: whoo... wu... whoo whoo.

This year I learned of a custom I had missed last year. On Easter evening bonfires are lit. From my window I could see three or four on scattered farms; when I woke up at 1:00 in the morning the remains of them were still glowing. I was told that young people bring the fire from the Easter candle to start the blaze, and that people gather around the fires to sing songs. It reminds me of the fires along the Mississippi at Christmas time, though these are not so large.


April 27, 2000

As my time at Gerleve quickly runs out, I have been thinking about the monastery. What is a monastery? It strikes me that it is an attempt to create a Christian and Catholic community, from scratch. The constitutions and customs of other cities and states would be torn up, and one would begin afresh: What would a community based purely on Christian principles look like? Prayer would be the main order of the day. Order, regularity and discipline would be paramount. Every day would be a lesson in Christian living. A government of benign dictatorship would be adopted. The decision to adopt celibacy and live in single-sex communities would rule out from the start the temptations of the opposite sex and the complications of marriage, but also eliminate any natural growth from children; in this way the community would always be one of free will. Possessions would be held in common, as in the early church; no one would be personally wealthy. Of course, the best of plans and rules do not eliminate human sinfulness, and in time the monastery would itself become wealthy, by dint of organized cooperation, intelligent activity, and the continuity that can acquire inherited wealth. Also, no community can be entirely cut of from humanity; even when moving to remote areas, monasteries had to deal with secular powers. They were, perhaps, the first "gated communities," and had to withstand marauders. In time they came to serve subsidiary functions such as saving the remnants of a past civilization, handing on books, and starting schools.


April 30, 2000
Low Sunday

When I was in Denmark I was embarrassed to know so little about Hans Christian Andersen. The only memory I could recall was of a boy skating on a canal. But that didn't ring any bells with them, so I'm not sure if it's his. He wrote the story about the princess feeling the pea through 50 mattresses and the emperor's new clothes, and the little mermaid, connected with the statue in the Kopenhagen harbor.

I did some work in the Episcopal Archives in Muenster on the church books from Altschrembeck. I did find out that the use of the Tekippe name by that family goes back to at least 1815. There were also apparently a lot of connections between Altschermbeck and Dingden. But of the exact relationship I'm still not sure. Once you get back into the 18th century it gets fairly difficult.

The weather has been quite warm, getting up to about 80 one day. Everything is in bloom, and it's wonderful to take walks.

But my time is running out. I am thinking about packing and about travel arrangements. Heinrich is coming for me Tuesday afternoon. I will spend Wednesday with them, and then Thursday head for Frankfurt, and the beginning of a long trip.


May 1, 2000

And so my time at Gerleve comes to an end. Last night I heard my friend the owl all through the night, first at 10:30 PM, then a couple of times when got up. As I was shaving in the early morning, his lonely and mournful cry was still sounding. Perhaps he was saying good-bye!

Ironically, it was only in the last couple of days that I discovered a new walking path. It is just a dirt road. Last year I mostly stuck to the paved roads, as everything was too wet; but this spring it has dried out nicely. I had been on pieces of this trail before, but only a few days ago followed it out. On the way back, I took it again. As one tops a rise, the Abbey comes in sight, and the path heads straight for the Abbey, up to the main road nearby. In all, it's about an hour's walk, by farmsteads and through woods, where hardly another person is to be seen. I started a couple of deer, which are smaller here than at home. I also heard the cry of the cuckoo, pronouncing its name as clearly as you please, "Cuckoo! Cuckoo!" On the way back, I started a pheasant; I recognized it immediately by its brightly-colored head and the ring around its neck as a male. It flew low over the fields until far away.

I will miss the Abbey and the ready convenience of daily Mass and the discipline of times of prayer. There is a verse in the Psalms, "One thing I ask of the Lord, this I seek: to dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life." That wish seems eminently fulfilled in the Abbey.

I will miss the monks' garden to walk in. "Garden" is really too small; it is a number of acres of woods, pasture, cemetery and orchard, like a large park, that I have practically to myself every day. This morning I watched the rabbits hippity-hop through the tall grass and the woods.

I will also miss the peace of this time away, not just the quiet, but the lack of strife. It has been months and months since I have had a disagreeable argument with anyone. Because I have no responsibility here, I need make no public judgments nor take any positions. Perhaps that is a flight into irresponsibility, as such differences seem to flow naturally out of the responsibilities of ordinary life; nevertheless, it seems to me a share in the peace Jesus wished after the Resurrection, and an anticipation of the concord of heaven.

The next period of my stay in Europe included some traveling. I got as far east as Budapest, then as far south as Rome, before heading toward southeastern France, where the next part of the adventure would unfold.


May 13, 2000

Wuerzburg has lots of churches. I was only there for an overnight, so part of two days, but enjoyed it very much. The weather was good, as it was in Frankfurt; in fact, I've encountered very little rain since leaving Gerleve.

In Wuerzburg I attended two talks and met my friend Fr. Giovanni Sala. We took the train in the evening to Munich, where I stayed with him at the Jesuit house. The next evening I walked to the home of a young couple; he will be teaching at Loyola in the fall. Everyone said it was too far to walk, but it took me only an hour and twenty minutes, and I even walked back. The next evening was my last, so I took Giovanni out to supper.

I didn't see too much else. The Alte Pinatokothek, which has all the classical art, was closed on Monday, so I missed it. I did see the Glockenspiel at noon, and some of the churches.

Getting to Gaming in Austria was quite an adventure. In northern Germany the train people didn't have it on their computer, so I decided to wait until Munich to buy the ticket. At my first opportunity I went to the train information office to have a schedule printed up. The woman had trouble finding Gaming and trouble getting me there, but eventually worked out a combination of trains and buses. That took close to half an hour, counting the waiting in line, and then I still had to wait in another line to get the ticket printed.

That evening at supper I mentioned to Giovanni that I had to change trains at Villach. As he is originally from Italy, he knows all these routes, and said that was far south. I had looked up Gaming at Gerleve, and knew it made a triangle with Linz and St. P”lten, much further north in Austria. So I took his atlas and studied it, and came to the conclusion that a mistake had been made. Apparently there are two Gaming's in Austria! So the next morning I had to go early and try to straighten it out, which involved going through the same rigamarole again. This time there was a woman in the ticket line before me who took fully 20 minutes. But by then I had missed the early train, so was in no hurry. All day I was a little unsure if I had the right Gaming, but it was the one.

It's a small alpine village, just like in Switzerland. The houses look the same, and even the cows have the same bells. For centuries there was a very large Carthusian monastery there, founded in the 14th century by the original Hapsburgs, who later moved to Vienna. Their successor Joseph II closed the monastery as part of Enlightenment policy in the late 18th century: people who just prayed had no place in the modern world! About 15 years ago an architect bought it for $100,000 and then spent millions restoring it. A few years ago this new theological institute was founded there; Dr. Waldstein is the first director.

He and his wife have 8 children, and they invited me to stay at their home. It was like old times, when I was growing up with my 7 siblings! They range from about 20 to a few months. The weather was perfect and the scenery magnificent, and I had a wonderful time there. I also talked to Dr. Waldstein about spending one of my semesters there, and he was very open to it; so it may have some part in my future.

Now I am enjoying Vienna; I haven't been here since 1964. It is very international, as it was the seat of the Hapsburg empire. Last night a met a man whose grandparents were from Italy, Austria, Czechoslovakia and Slovenia.


May 21, 2000
Life on the Danube

I realized, looking back, that three of the cities I visited had something in common: the Danube flows through each of them. First I went to Vienna. It is a graceful old city; I hadn't been there since the summer of 1964. As the old center of the Hapsburg or Austrio-Hungarian Empire, it has an incredible number of palaces. Especially impressive is the Schonbrunn Palace; the garden covers acres and acres, and I believe it must dwarf Versailles.

Next I went to Budapest, the first time I had ever been there. By that time the Danube had become quite a big river.

Perhaps the most interesting thing I did there was to go to one of the Turkish baths, named Rodos. It has a plaque inside saying it was built in 1468 by Pasha So-and-So; it goes back to the time of the Turkish occupation. It was fascinating to think that people had been bathing here for over 500 years; I felt I was a part of history.

There was a hot pool at 49 degrees Centigrade (122 F); a cold pool at 28 degrees (82 F), and medium pools at 33 (91) and 36 (97) degrees. I remembered the Latin names - the calidarium, the frigidarium, and the tepidarium. There are also saunas, dry heat, of different temperatures, and a steam room.

It cost only a little over $2.50 for an hour and a half. When you go in, an attendant shows you to a locker, and gives you what looks like a small apron which ties in the back. On that you can tie your key. When you sit on the hot benches in the sauna or steam room you can turn it around to sit on.

Budapest still has some of the signs of Communist poverty, and the prices are still pretty reasonable; but on the whole it appears to be doing fairly well economically.

When I came into the train station I was besieged by people trying to sell me a room or a taxi. But I went to the official hotel service, and lucked out. They were able to arrange a room at a good price. Plus one of the girls lived nearby and was about to get off work, so she drove me to the hotel.

Unfortunately my tooth problem recurred, of all places, in Budapest. The first evening it hurt so I could hardly eat. I had to take one of my pain pills that night. But by the next day it seemed to be returning to "normal" - which means it doesn't feel quite right, but is not painful or much of a bother.

From Budapest I had to get to Rome, which I decided to break up into three days of 6-7 hour train trips. The first stop was in Salzburg; I don't know that I've been there since the summer of 1969. The Danube also flows through there, but as a much smaller river. It's very scenic and romantic, with the castle on top of the nearby hill.

The next stop was Venice; I don't think I had been back there since the summer of 1965. I had never warmed up very much to the place, but it seemed the obvious point to stop between Salzburg and Rome, and I decided to give it another try. It has its own bizarre kind of charm. I had supper at a restaurant with a terrace overlooking the Grand Canal. I realized the city was never built for cars; so the canals can be fairly wide, but the "streets" are mostly little alleyways, where only a couple of persons may pass. Unfortunately St. Mark's Cathedral was already closed when I got there, and I had to leave early the next morning.

Rome is all spruced up for the Jubilee Year. The front of St. Peter's is all cleaned, revealing different colors to the marble; and all the Bernini columns are sparkling white. There are new, air-conditioned street cars, and bus lines I never heard of, started just to take people to the basilicas.

I will probably leave here a week from tomorrow, and spend a couple of days in Genoa on the way to France.


May 27, 2000

The Italians do well with a deadline. Otherwise things seem never to get finished. But give a firm deadline, and they will rise to the occasion. The year 2000 has functioned preeminently as such a deadline, and largely, as though miraculously, all is ready. There are new tunnels under the Janiculum, new street cars, new buses, new express bus lines, and even a private bus company to take people between the basilicas. All over Rome, in fact, the churches gleam with newly-cleaned marble.

The Jubilee Year also brings crowds of visitors, of course. The Wednesday papal audience was not held in the Nervi audience hall, for example, which seats about 10,000, but in St. Peter's Square, with perhaps 50,000 visitors. Luckily I brought a cap to shield my head from the sun - everyone else seemed to be fashioning make-shifts out of paper. Yet the weather remains a wonderfully comfortable late spring temperature, and there was a cool breeze to help bear the sun. There hasn't been a drop of rain since I arrived, which is ideal for tourists, but perhaps not so good for the farmers.

The Pope is definitely showing his age. He is bent over almost like a hunch-back, and his voice is slurred, as though he were slightly drunk. But it remains strong, and his linguistic skills have not deserted him: he made major presentations in Italian, English, French, German and Spanish, and then briefer forays in Hungarian, Roumanian, Czech, Slovenian, and a few others.

The next period of my European sojourn took me to Gap in southeastern France. In the early 1900's a priest came to the Archdiocese of New Orleans from that area, Fr. (later Monsignor) Eyraud. He spent many years at a parish on the Mississippi River, in Reserve. He was so universally loved and respected in that area after his death that a committee from the parish is trying to have him canonized. I was asked by the pastor to do some research on his early life. I agreed to spend a month in Gap to see what I could find out.


June 2, 2000

Getting to France had its complications and adventures. I had decided to make a stop in Genoa, because I had an old friend there I had studied with in Rome in the 60's, and because from the map it looked like a mere hop, skip and a jump to Gap, my destination in France.

Complications began almost as soon as I arrived in Geneva. The first thing to do in a new city is always to find a hotel. Many larger cities have services where a room will be booked, according to your specifications, for a small fee. In Genoa the tourist information office could offer only a list of hotels. I checked off a couple near the train station which seemed moderately priced but sufficiently comfortable. I followed directions to one, but all the rooms were taken. Down the street I tried a second, but the story was the same. I went outside the hotel to reconnoiter, setting down the computer I was carrying on my shoulder beside the suitcase, and comparing the list of hotels with the map. I found another couple of possibilities in the vicinity, and took the suitcase and set off. I had rounded a corner and gone up a stairs when a man shouted at me. He pointed to someone behind me, who was carrying my computer up the stairs. I could hardly believe that I had been stupid enough to leave the computer laying on the sidewalk! I was certainly fortunate for the honest soul who brought it to me. I was reminded of Amanda in The Glass Menagerie, "I have always depended on the kindness of strangers."

That evening I went to the train station to get a plan for the trip to Gap. I was told that they couldn't help me, because the books on the French trains were outdated. It was the fault of the French train system (the SCNF), because they had never sent the books! So I asked them if I could study the old book. From the map it looked like a simple matter of going to Turin, only a couple of hours away, and then taking a train to Gap. Apparently, however, contrary to my map, there was no such connection. The only listings for Gap were to Marseille and to Paris. Studying my map and the book a bit more, I found a train from Brian‡on to Marseille that was the same as the one from Gap. So I asked them if they could get me from Turin to Brian‡on. Again, that proved to be impossible. I studied their map and did see a connection through Nice and Dignes. But the times didn't work out. In the meantime, they had an idea: I could leave on a train at midnight, get a connection at 4:00 in the morning to Grenoble, wait there six hours, and then get a train to Gap in the afternoon. I thought to myself I would rent a car before I did that.

In the meantime I saw there was a train in the afternoon from Marseille. One of the people at the information desk said there was a possibility to take a 5:42 AM train to Nice, and from there a train to Marseille, which would put me there in time to catch the train to Gap - that is, if the old books were still valid. It seemed the best information I could get. The woman gave me a number in Milan for the SCNF to verify the French train times. That seemed to be as much as I could do that evening.

The next morning I tried calling the number in Milan, as I had a telephone card that still had some money on it. I got the Deutsche Bank instead. The man told me the number had been changed three years ago, and No, he didn't have the new one! I went back to the train office, and they told me to call information. With the new number I tried again. I got a recording telling me all lines were busy, but to hold on. As I did so, I watched my money melt away - 1200 Lire, 1000, 800, 600, 400, 200... I decided this was hopeless.

I went back to the tourist office and asked if there were any bus connections to Gap. They gave me the address of a travel agent nearby. I went there, but they couldn't find the catalogue for Eurolines. But they directed me to another section of the city where all the buses left from, and to another travel agency. I went there. They could give me the times for a bus to Nice. It left 15 minutes later than my train, and arrived in Nice 15 minutes earlier. But they couldn't give me any information on buses in France. However, there was a telephone number...

One hears a lot of talk about a unified Europe, but my impression was that Italy and France were two separate worlds when it came to getting information on the other country. The whole trip I had in mind was probably less than going from New Orleans to Shreveport, but one would never guess that. The evening before the woman had reminded me that I was going over the Alps. It gave me a renewed respect for Hannibal's feat in getting elephants across the Alps!

I decided to invest another 5,000 Lire ($2.50) in a phone card. This call was to Nice in France. I tried the number as given, and kept getting a recorded message that the number was incorrect. But the message also gave me the number of an operator. She reminded me that I need to leave off the zero after the country code. I should have remembered that - you don't use the leading zero in the city, or when calling out of the country, but only when calling long distance within the country. Finally I reached a man who could tell me there were no buses from Nice to Gap. That was negative information, but helped me decide to give up on the buses. If I went to Nice on the bus, and then tried to get on the train, I might have to cross the city. I would stick with the train, and the information, however questionable, I had on it.

I had the hotel call me at 4:45 the next morning. I asked them to prepare the bill. I signed out and got the train. It was an "Express" which really means it stopped at every small station. When we got to Ventimiglia at the border with France, we stopped, backed up, went forward, stopped again. The wait seemed interminable; it was about 40 minutes. I knew there was only 30 minutes to play with between the two trains in Nice. I gave up making the connection. I would have to spend the night in Nice or Marseille, and call ahead to say I would be a day late. But I also prayed to Msgr. Eyraud. I told him that he could work a minor miracle to get me there; after all, this whole effort was on his behalf anyway.

It must have worked, because finally we left, and I discovered that we were only 20 minutes late when we got to Nice. An announcement on the PA gave the track for the train to Nice, and I was there in a few minutes, and was even able to find an unreserved seat. This was a better train, and made good time, arriving in Marseille in just a couple of hours.

In the station I was quickly able to verify that the train Marseilles-Gap ran according to my information. Now I had to buy a ticket, as it was only possible to get a ticket as far as Marseille in Genoa. At the ticket area there was a long line and only one window open. There was a machine that dispensed tickets automatically for regional lines, and one for the "grandes lignes." Was Gap regional? Would the machine take my Master Card? I decided it was worth a try. I got the destination, class, one-way, and everything else correct, but it wouldn't take the card, even though I tried putting it in four different ways. I gave it up, and got back in line. Luckily a couple of other windows opened up, and I was able to get a ticket.

The next three hours were according to the book. The train ran exactly according to the timetable I had gotten in Genoa. We left the coast and almost immediately began heading into higher country, following the bed of a river. At times it reminded me of a scene from a Western movie: large upthrusts of bare rock, sparse vegetation, the river a wide bed but without a great deal of water in it. At other times I was reminded of Switzerland, with a quaint, picturesque village among the mountains. Gradually we got higher and higher. Olive groves gave way to woodlands. In the distance, above the tree line, snow could be glimpsed. Finally a larger city than any of the small towns at which we had stopped came into view. It was Gap.

I knew this would be the next challenge. How to get from the train station to Notre Dame de Laus? This last had been a chance arrangement. I had originally, on the recommendation of Fr. Jules Vitte (a French priest who once worked in the New Orleans Archdiocese but now lives in that part of France), written to the shrine at La Salette for a room in the first 10 days of June. He gave me the impression the area might be crowded with tourists, and that I should book in advance. But they wrote back and said they were filled up the first three days of June. They were 55 kilometers (33 miles) north of Gap, and Notre Dame du Laus was only 20 km (12 mi) away from Gap. So I wrote there and got a confirmation.

Before arriving I asked the conductress on the train if she knew of any transportation from Gap to Notre Dame du Laus. She had apparently never heard of it. When I arrived at the station I verified there was no tourist office, and then went to the ticket window. The woman said there was no bus to Notre Dame, but that sometimes a car would come from there with a sign on it to meet the train. There was another train due in 20 minutes, and I should check then. As I left the station I saw a van picking up a woman, and wondered if possibly it was from the shrine. But the van had no sign on it, and the man drove off. I next checked with a taxi. As I had anticipated, it would be expensive: 218 Francs, or over 30 dollars. I explained to him that I had paid only 150 Francs to come all the way from Marseille, and it seemed a bit expensive. He said that the railroads were subsidized by the state, while taxis had no such support; anyway, the rates were set by the municipality.

I went across the street to a hotel, but found a sign they would be back at 5:30 PM. I wandered back to the station, and asked someone there where I could buy a telephone card. There are no pay phones any more in France, and my Italian card was also no good here. The man explained to me it was a feast day (the Ascension), and that nothing was open. So, impossible to buy a telephone card.

My next thought was that I had a card with an address on it, a religious community that had recently moved to Gap. They were the Canons Regular, and I had been told of them in Rome. I stopped at a gas station and got directions. It was only a block or so away, but it took a little while to locate. I rang at the door, and a voice answered over the speaker. I asked for the priest whose name I had. I heard on the speaker a phone ringing. No one answered. I figured this was a dry hole.

I went to a bakery that was open, and spoke to a young woman there. I had read that in France the magic words were, "J'ai un problem..., I have a problem..." Normally dismissive of strangers, the French take this as a challenge to meet and to solve the problem. She explained to me that it was a holiday, and everything was closed. So, I concluded, I have to wait until tomorrow to make a phone call! The French are nothing if not logical, and she agreed that was a valid conclusion. But then she relented and said I could use her phone in the back. I called the shrine, and the woman recognized my name. She said that she would look around to see if someone could pick me up, and that I should call back in 10 minutes. The young woman was agreeable to that, so I ordered a coffee. Ten minutes later I called back, and was told someone would pick me up at the station in 10 minutes. The woman said it was 6 Francs for the coffee, and 4 for the phone calls. I wanted to give her 20 Francs, but she insisted or returning the change. A few minutes later I was at the station. The same man in the same van arrived to pick me up! He said I was lucky that they had caught him at home.

So Msgr. Eyraud worked a minor miracle after all, and I arrived safely at Notre Dame du Laus. I reflected that I had this much trouble finding the place, and I knew the languages - how would someone manage who knew only English?

In the evening I went for a walk. Behind the shrine are hills rising up steeply; in the other directions the mountains are more distant, but higher. It is very striking scenery. I saw the room where Benoite Rencurel had lived; she was a 17th century visionary who had seen the Virgin Mary and had received instructions to build the shrine. As I returned I heard a cuckoo. The cows have bells just as in Switzerland. It is a very bucolic area, which also means it has the innumerable flies that go along with it. The room is small, but has a private bath and is very comfortable. With complete pension it is only 255 Francs, or some $37, which seems to me extremely reasonable.

Today I was extremely fortunate. I was wondering how I would get down to Gap to see the bishop, when I learned at the reception desk that he would be coming up for a meeting with his priests' council. So the mountain came to Mahommed! I not only met him, but also sat across from him at the dinner.

June 6, 2000

The shrine of La Salette is well known in the U.S.; the Blessed Mother appeared to two children here in 1846. Notre Dame de Laus, on the other hand, where I spent my first days here, is well known in France, but not in the U.S.; I had never heard of it. The Blessed Virgin appeared to a woman there between 1664 and 1718.

On the way here (two women who were going in this direction from Notre Dame de Laus were kind enough to drop me off) we located Le Glaizil, the little village where Msgr. Eyraud (whom I am researching) was born. We stopped and saw a woman working in the garden in front of her house. I told her that I had come all the way from the U.S. to visit Le Glaizil. She said, Par exemple!, an expression one also hears in Cajun French. La Salette is actually in the diocese of Grenoble rather than that of Gap, for which Msgr. Eyraud was ordained. I am sure, however, that the young Eyraud would have visited here.

My more practical problem at the moment is getting some laundry done. It has turned into a major production. On Sunday night when I arrived they told me there were no laundry facilities for pilgrims. On Monday morning I thought I was getting an early start on it. I asked at the reception desk, and was told I would have to go to either Gap or Grenoble to find a Laundromat. There are buses running from Corps, below here, to Gap and Grenoble, and back, so I got the schedules. The morning bus from Corps to Gap was at 9:30, with a return in the afternoon. Then you have to get from the shrine to Corps. The reception gave me the phone number for a taxi in Corps (which would cost about $20.) I also had to buy a telephone card so I could use the phone ($7).

It was now about 9:00. I called the taxi, but they explained it would take 20 minutes to arrive from Corps, and 20 minutes back, so there was no way to make the 9:30 bus.

Later I spoke to a couple who were driving down through Gap. They were leaving at 1:00, which might give me enough time to do the laundry, and catch the afternoon bus. They agreed to take me; but later the husband came back and said their son had a bum leg, and they didn't have enough room in the car. I believe he was rather embarrassed.

Around noon I spoke with a Filipino nun, whom I had met the day before, and who speaks English. I explained the problem to her. She said that the Sisters had a machine, and she could perhaps do it for me; but she would have to ask her Superior. Or, she said, there were machines in the basement for the volunteer workers, and she could get me tokens for the machines. But she would have to ask permission.

That evening I saw her, and she said she was told she would have to ask the Director of the Shrine. He was away, but would be back that evening.

At Mass today she told me that I would have to speak to the Director myself. She explained to me that everything at the Shrine was very formal, unlike the Philippines. She said when she was first here a priest asked her to say Mass. There was an open time, but when she called the priest in charge, he said Absolutely not, everything had to be pre-arranged. She said she felt bad for the priest, but had learned her lesson.

I decided, if they wanted to play this game, that I would make a full-court press, asking the Director if I could see him, showing him my letter of introduction from Archbishop Schulte, and telling him something about my research project, before I brought up the laundry. I tried him a couple of times before lunch, but he didn't answer the phone.

After lunch did not seem the time to call, so I thought I would try my luck in Corps. I had heard different stories - some people thought there would be laundry facilities there, others not. I went outside to see if I could hitch a ride down. I saw a friend I had met before, a Little Brother of Charles de Foucault. He had been waiting for friends to pick him up since the morning. It was very foggy; you couldn't see very far at all. While I was waiting I related my problem to him. He took me back to the reception desk, and explained to the girl I had come all the way from the U.S., was here for 10 days, and needed to do some laundry. I asked if there weren't somewhere close by where there was a small river, where I could do laundry in the old style, by beating it with a stick on the rocks. She said she went back and forth to Corps everyday, and could take me down when she finished work. I was told to come back in an hour.

When I came back, she said she was very busy working and couldn't get away. It turned out there was no Laundromat in Corps, but a woman who took in clothes. I could send them down tomorrow and get them back Saturday. I explained to her that I had no clean clothes left, and I needed something before Saturday. She then called up a colleague, who came to the office. They conferred for a while, mysteriously. The other woman came out to me and said she would do the laundry, but I HAD TO TELL ABSOLUTELY NO ONE! I promised to do that. She said if I would bring the clothes tomorrow morning at 8:00 or 8:30 to her friend, she would have them back in the afternoon. I assured her there was no ironing involved.

So now I'm washing some clothes in my bowl for tomorrow. If all goes well, this little project will only have taken 3 days to accomplish!


June 10, 2000
First Day in Gap

I had good luck getting down from La Salette (or is it Msgr. Eyraud keeping an eye on this project?). I met an Italian couple going back to Turin who were passing through Gap on their way home this morning. Most of the people I talked to seemed to be headed north to Grenoble.

I kept track of the mileage, and we saw the signs for Le Glaizil on the way down. By my calculations, it is only 25 km, or 15 miles, from La Salette. Probably the young Jean Eyraud was there many times.

On the way down I remarked that the young Eyraud must have often passed down this road many times on the way to Gap. We wondered if that would have been by car, by horse, or on foot.

They didn't know where to leave me, but we decided that the Tourist Office would be a good place. We saw signs for it, but it kept eluding us. Finally he saw a Hotel Ibis, which he recognized as a chain he had stayed in before. He recommended it highly. The price was posted outside, and it seemed reasonable. I asked at the desk, and they had a room. He wanted to come up with me and check out the room, which we did. It seemed very satisfactory, with toilet and bath included, and very modern- looking. So they were able to drop me off at the very spot. From my window I can see the spire of the Cathedral.

Then I stopped at the Cathedral to get the Mass schedules. I was struck that here, just about 96 years ago, Fr. Eyraud was ordained. As I came out of the Cathedral, I saw a street sign running from its side called Rue du Seminaire. I suppose the old seminary must have been somewhere around.

Then I checked out the Canons Regular, where I had gotten no answer the first time I was in Gap, and found out my contact was very sick. But I got the schedule for Vespers, and promised to come back.

In the afternoon I was reading the local paper. There was an article on young people being confirmed in one of the neighboring parishes. The first two children were named Eyraud! I had also been told at La Salette that there was a bus company by that name in Grenoble. The librarian at La Salette also gave me the impression it was a common name in the area.

When I returned to the Canons Regular, I was told their order was in the line of Augustine's clergy living in community. Something like the Premonstratentians, they are mid-way between diocesan and religious clergy.

The Vespers was the First Vespers of Pentecost, and it was done with fitting solemnity. The Abbot had mitre and crozier, and was flanked by two assistants with diaconal vestments in red. There was another minister with red cope; all these had a white biretta. Minor ministers carried the crozier, etc. Three priests wore white capes and white birettas. The only thing that seemed to be missing was the cappa magna (with a long train carried behind) and the buskins the Abbot at St. Ben's used to wear for pontificals. All the antiphons and psalms were sung fully in Latin according to a Liber Usualis printed in 1962. At the Magnificat we repeated the Antiphon after each two verses. The men would sing one verse, and the Sisters the next. At Benediction there were tones for the O Salutaris and the Tantum Ergo that I did not know. It all took an hour and twenty minutes.

Afterwards I was invited for the Mass and for the midday meal tomorrow.

In the evening I found a small restaurant near the hotel. The whole bill for a three-course meal came to 100 Francs, or about $14, which seemed very reasonable. I sat outside until it got a little chilly.


June 11, 2000
Second Day in Gap

I attended the solemn high Mass for Pentecost with the Canons Regular. The scene was much the same as yesterday: the Abbot dressed in full regalia, the deacon and subdeacon in vestments with white birettas, another minister in cope and white biretta, and three priests in white capes and birettas. I have not seen so much bowing and genuflecting in a long time. There was a minister with a candle we used to call the bougie, if I recall correctly, and one for the crozier. Each time he took the crozier from the Abbot, or gave it to him, he kissed his ring.

We sang everything in Gregorian Chant, including the splendid Sequence for Pentecost.

For the homily a chair was placed on the altar platform, and a cushion was placed on it. The bishop sat there with his golden miter, and a golden cloth was placed across his lap. The three ministers sat on either side of him; on the altar step below was the bougie, the crozier bearer, and another minister with a book, which covered his face.

The church was filled with worshipers, of all ages. It isn't a very large church - I counted 7 pews on each side, each of which holds 3 or 4 people; but they were standing all in the back; there was also a small balcony which was filled. The Order is also impressive. I counted some 16 men, most of whom are young, and none above middle age; there are also 10 Sisters, to whom the same applies. You may take this as you like - one gets the impression that the future of the French Church is in its past.

Though I love the Chant, I am no enthusiast for the pre- Vatican II liturgy. It really runs on two tracks, one for the priest, another for the congregation. While we are singing the Sanctus, the priest is beginning the Eucharistic Prayer. The Consecration is made known only by the bell; one doesn't hear even a whisper of the words of consecration. After the consecration the congregation sang a version of the O Salutaris, while I tried to read the rest of the Eucharistic Prayer. The great achievement of Vatican II was to restore the Eucharistic Prayer to the people.

When I went through the sacristy some minutes after the Mass, the Abbot, surrounded by his ministers, was still saying some prayers. There were buskins after all; I saw them on a silver plate!

Since I had been invited, I stayed for the dinner. There was cantaloupe, and a pate with some salmon in it, I think. This was followed by fried potatoes and vegetables, then cheese, and apple pie. The reading, in a singing tone, was from Pius Parsch on Pentecost. As usual, monks eat too fast. I was always behind, and in fact had not finished my dessert when prayer was called. After I met the Abbot, who was very friendly. I was invited back to the refectory for coffee, and to finish my dessert. The reader was having his meal, but told me he couldn't talk: they never talked in the refectory.

The guestmaster had at first asked me to come at 2:30 PM tomorrow, but I realized later that Pentecost Monday is a holiday in France, and that nothing would be open. Since I couldn't get any work done, I decided I would go instead to the Mass at Notre Dame de Laus I had read about in the paper. It was both the feast of Notre Dame de Laus, and also the day on which the diocese was celebrating the Jubilee Year. There was a bus going up at 8:30 AM, and coming back at 6:00 PM. I thought I would take it up, and find a way home. I told the guestmaster I might be able to make it for 2:30, but I wasn't sure. He said that was OK, as long as I got back before 6:00.


June 12, 2000
Third Day in Gap

I took the bus this morning at 8:30 to Notre Dame de Laus; it took about half an hour.

The Mass, at 10:30, was quite a celebration. The bishop was the main celebrant, and we began with a ceremony of opening the Holy Door. All the priests marched through, and out the side door, and then back to the outdoor platform and altar. The whole congregation followed, which took quite a while. In the meantime we started the prayer, the Kyrie and Gloria, and the readings. Today is the big feast day of No