The Rabbi’s Advice

The monastery was ancient, and the few remaining monks were well along in years. The monastery had seen better times when a host of young men waited eagerly to be admitted and the chapel resounded with angelic voices at Vespers.

Those times had since passed, and the handful of elderly monks were no longer robust in their devotions. The abbot had struggled to attract novices, but to no avail. He fretted that the monastery would not survive after its residents had passed on.

The abbot was good friends with a rabbi who lived nearby and who, rumor had it, talked with God daily. At their next visit, the abbot told the rabbi about his concerns and pleaded, “The next time you talk with God, please ask Him what can be done to save the monastery?”

The rabbi agreed, and at their next meeting he greeted the abbot with surprising news. “God has told me that Jesus Christ is living among you.” The abbot was flabbergasted. “If it’s true,” he stammered, “who could it be?” 

“That is for you to discover,” the rabbi said. 

As he walked back to the monastery, the abbot thought of each of the monks. “It can’t be Brother Joseph, the gardener. He is a simple soul, not good with his Latin, and irritatingly tone-deaf at Vespers.”

“Could it be Brother Francis, the cook?” he pondered. “Doubtful,” he decided. “Jesus would give us better fare.”

That evening, he gathered the brothers and told them what the rabbi had said, whereupon they immediately began to treat each other with great respect and reverence. Brother Joseph the gardener expressed the common thought: “If my brother is Jesus, I want Him to know that I love Him.”

As the brothers continued to look for Jesus in each other, the atmosphere in the monastery became vibrant with devotion, and it wasn’t long until the cells were filled with dedicated young novices, their voices sweetly adding to the glorious harmony at Vespers.