50th Anniversary of the first Mass at Tarrawarra

Mass Celebrated by Archbishop Denis Hart
at Tarrawarra Abbey, Yarra Glen,
on Saturday, 6th November 2004

Introduction

Dear Brothers and Sisters,

Together with Archbishop Frank Little, Dom David Tomlins, Dom Kevin O’Farrell, and the Fathers and Brothers of the Tarrawarra community, I welcome Dom Kevin Daly (Roscrea), Dom Brian Keogh (Kopua, New Zealand) and so many friends. I am overjoyed and humbled to be with you fifty years after the celebration of the first Mass at Tarrawarra on 6 th November, 1954.

The arrival had been preceded for forty years by an invitation from Archbishop Mannix, who said that his invitation, renewed twenty years later, was finally granted by Providence, “Because Providence deals not with time but with eternity and in the Providence of God the Cistercians from Roscrea at last have come here. This is the culmination of my dream of nearly half a century ago.”

As we celebrate this Mass in wordless thanksgiving, we rejoice in God’s Providence which has brought the tremendous spiritual force of prayer, contemplation and monastic example into our diocese, unique among our whole country.

“This is what the kingdom of God is like, night and day, the seed is sprouting and growing, how he does not know.”
( Mark 4:26-7)

Dear Brothers and Sisters,

Today we look back on the rich history, which has existed here in Tarrawarra for fifty wonderful years. It is part of the living history of the spread of the kingdom and of the seeds of faith from Roscrea in County Tipperary, where Saint Carthage met Saint Cronan and advised him to move to Roscrea, which is on the highway from Meath to Munster, and where he founded a monastery soon afterwards. This Monastery remained until after 1000.

From the foundation of the Cistercian Order in 1098 by Saint Robert of Molesme at Citeaux, to the Irish Cistercian Foundation at Roscrea (1878), to the new world in the last century, has come the rich and gifted monastic tradition of the Cistercian Order. In the light of that tradition fifty years is a short time.

For Archbishop Mannix your presence was “the culmination of my dream of nearly half a century ago. I was delighted and proud to perform the blessing ceremony and turn the first sod for the new abbey that is going to last for hundreds and hundreds of years provided of course Australia survives. I hope it will. The last people to go down in Australia, if Australia ever goes down, will be the Cistercians. The Lord Abbot has said that you have come here to work and pray. I suppose that work and prayer are needed in all parts of the world, but I don’t think there is any part of the world in more need of hard work and earnest prayer than Australia.”

Twenty-five years and three archbishops later, Archbishop Little expressed the esteem of the Church, paying tribute to the witness of faith so generously given. “You are witnesses to the invisible God; you have shown that contemplation is possible … and that it responds to the deepest yearnings of the human heart.”

Tarrawarra has been enriched by the monastic fervour and constant praise of the community and of those who have shared in its life for a time, who have passed to their eternal reward, or have chosen other vocations. The life of the community and the rich care and spiritual comfort given to so many in the Archdiocese are an eloquent illustration of the words from Isaiah, “The word that goes out from my mouth does not return to me empty, without carrying out my will and succeeding in what it was sent to do.” ( Isaiah 55.11 )

The history given in the front of your booklet is a concise and understated unfolding of the value of a religious community to the Church and to this diocese. Like Archbishop Mannix, I am delighted that this community, whom I have known for forty years, exists in the Archdiocese of Melbourne, unique among the dioceses of Australia. Archbishop Little, as a young priest, recalls Father Eugene Boylan, who was staying at Carlton, being rushed to various sites by the indefatigable Dr. Percy Jones and Mr. Walter Broderick, finally to find Tarrawarra.

Your prayer and simplicity, your hospitality, your love of God are a timely reminder of the challenge which Pope John Paul II has given to the whole Church since the Great Jubilee. You are articulate, gifted and humble in leading the men and women who come to you to contemplate anew the face of Christ and to seek holiness.

From the contemplation, as from the Eucharist, the Lord asks us to remain with him so that there radiates into our mission in the Church and in the world an authentic contact with the Saviour, a contemplation worthy of Mary, the Mother of the Lord. The distinctive Cistercian tradition is at the same time contemplative and eucharistic and dynamic for the praise of God and the salvation of souls. Cistercians remind us that God is all in all.

As archbishop, Dom David I thank you for your constant and courageous witness, for your praise of God, which focuses the Archdiocese on its central reality and I thank you for the guidance given to so many souls, who have come seeking Jesus Christ, the Way, the Truth and the Life.

With Father Cronan Sherry, the first Superior of Tarrawarra, who returned in 1979 for the Silver Jubilee, I recognise the steady rhythm of prayer, work and study, which adds to the tranquillity of the Yarra Valley. I admire the sense of purpose and absorption into the age-old tradition, which leads to happiness and peace in the Lord. To the community of Tarrawarra Abbey I, too, with him wish many long and fruitful years.

+ Denis J. Hart,
Archbishop of Melbourne.