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NEWPORT NEWS, VA: LivingStone Anglican Monastery enrolls interns, residents

NEWPORT NEWS, VA: LivingStone Anglican Monastery enrolls interns, residents in new program
Mosaic Campus in Newport News opens its doors to all

By Vanessa Remmers
Special to the Daily Press
http://www.dailypress.com/news/newport-news
September 27, 2012

When it's warm outside, Brother Tim Luken prefers to leave his robes hanging up in his office at LivingStone Monastery. The Franciscan monk performs his Prior duties while wearing a LivingStone Monastery T-shirt. Luken did not always wear the robes of a monk. He once worked as the manager of Granby Theater before what he believed was a calling from God that prompted him to leave a life of stars and skipping lines for one of religious study and monastic obedience.

"When you work with Granby Theatre, we dealt with Missy Elliot, we dealt with Justin Timberlake, we knew these people," Luken said. "As manager of Granby Theatre, you would have thought I had it made. But there is more to life than partying and drinking."

Luken knew he wanted to live a monastic life since his early teens, but was not Roman Catholic and thus could not be admitted into a Roman Catholic monastery. It was three years ago, he said, that LivingStone Monastery off Harpersville Road welcomed him with open arms.

It took nearly two years of Franciscan study, counseling and monastic ministry before Luken was consecrated, taking vows of poverty, chastity and obedience.

Yet community members do not have to be a monk or even determined to live in a monastery for a lifetime to be received at LivingStone. The Newport News monastery is one of few monasteries in the country that offers an intern residential program.

"To my knowledge, we are one of the few in the United States, if not the only [with a seasonal residential program]," Luken said. "We are the only one that I know of that is open to all Christians."

Though it is Anglican-based, LivingStone and its adjoining food pantry and thrift store operate through a collaboration with multiple denominations. The only requirement to be a guest is to profess basic Christian tenants as well as a belief in heterosexual marriage, abortion as taking life and homosexuality as outside of God's will.

"We don't care [about denomination], we are here for people to press in to God. You don't have to wear the mask that you have to wear in the outside world," Luken said.

LivingStone's community used to be much more exclusive. It was first founded in 1956 as the Poor Clare Monastery, a cloistered Franciscan nun order. The only regular contact between the local community and nuns occurred when residents could listen to the nuns sing.

After the Poor Clares relocated to Barhamsville, Va. for greater seclusion, Hope Community Church took over the property in 2004.

Rivers Cross Anglican Church and the Company of Jesus partnered to take over the administration in January 2012. Though Hope still owns the property, Luken, along with the Company of Jesus and Rivers Cross, manages Monastery opens its doors to all the monastery.

The main income for the monastery, according to Luken, is guest fees. For $30 each night, a guest can sleep and eat at the monastery. The monastery includes single and double rooms as well as a family room that can hold up to nine people. Interns and residents take care of the guest as part of their house duties. All LivingStone inhabitants must adhere to general rules including no alcohol, 11 p.m. curfew, no new relationships in the first six months and no movies above a PG-13 rating.

Former Army Ranger Brad Shannon, 38, is one of the six residents currently living at the monastery. He plans to stay for an extended time and may eventually pursue priesthood. He was raised as a Roman Catholic. "I lost my mother and I was having a rough time," Shannon said of his decision to enter the monastery. "I know people who go to church every Sunday, and as soon as they walk out the door, it is a different story. Here, you have a full immersion into God."

The more intensive resident program provides room and board to those who agree to stay at least six months and perform basic house duties, which include prayer four times a day, Wednesday fasting, a silent period, spiritual director meetings and 25 to 35 hours of house-related labor.

Interns, who must undergo an application process, are not required to perform any of the house duties or labor requirements. For $600 each month, interns are provided room and board and simply encouraged to participate if their schedule allows. The only requirements are involvement in their church and regular meetings with an assigned spiritual director.

Nineteen-year old Jonathan Ely, a Pentecostal, started off as an intern in March after graduating high school. His adaption to the house rules, the lack of privacy, and constant work, he said, forced him to mature in a short period of time.

"At first, they [my friends] thought it was a little weird," Ely said. "My dad was a little skeptical since I was taking time off of college to come here. ... He supports me wholeheartedly now that he has seen how much I've grown."

While he plans to start college in the next year, Ely hopes that he will be able to live at the monastery during that time. Past interns, according to Luken, have included an active duty Navy man and an insurance adjuster. The diverse walks of life, according to him, point to the benefit of a more open monastery.

"We hope to provide that respite for people to deal with the outside world," Luken said. "You should sense something different when you come onto the property. There is a sense of security here."

Vanessa Remmers is a freelance writer based in Williamsburg

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