Our Life
We are a group of men who have heard the Lord’s call for labourers in his harvest fields and have answered. We are a group of faithful men who follow the Rule of Saint Augustine; we live in common and pray the hours of the Divine Office together seven times a day.
We reside in the village of Concho, which can be found in Eastern Arizona. Some call Concho a “living Ghost Town”, because there are around thirty-eight people who live in the actual town. There are a few homes, a law office and a few tumbling down buildings, but the church of San Rafael is the life of Concho. We found their way to Concho entirely through the Lord’s guidance. At first they came for a three week retreat but, after much prayer and discernment, they felt the call of God to stay (if permitted by the local bishop) and begin to live fully the Canonical Life here in Eastern Arizona. The Bishop of the Diocese of Gallup, the Most Reverend James Wall, has given permission for us to live and pray in Concho for the foreseeable future.
We live in the rectory next to the church and take care of both the grounds and the buildings in the church yard. But their primary ministry is praying the hours of the Divine Office and serving in various liturgical ways in the parish of San Rafael as well as in the neighboring parish of Saint John the Baptist, and St. Rita's. We also work in the area of education by teaching CCD for both parishes as well as offering parish missions, retreats, and giving talks and conferences on the Church’s Sacred Liturgy and the Blessed Sacrament As well as teaching at the local Catholic School in Show Low, AZ.
All of us were studying for the diocesan priesthood before entering religious life. After some formation in religious life, we discerned a call to found a new religious order while still pursuing their vocations to the priesthood. Along with the desire to both pray for and serve the Church as priests, we felt the call not only to live a life of poverty but also to serve the poor. Many times when one thinks of the poor, one thinks of those poor and homeless in the large cities of America living on the streets and begging for money on the street corner. Though this form of poverty is pervasive, it is also the kind that is most ministered to. Seldom is the poverty of the country and rural places recognized.
In the rural places of America, such as Concho, one will find physical and monetary poverty to be sure, but even more one will find a life of spiritual and relational poverty. Here there are some who have been forgotten or left behind by the majority of people because of the rural environment that surrounds them. We have felt a call to serve and live out the Canonical Life with these people and to give the spiritual fruits of their prayer and lives to those they come in contact with.
We invite any and all who would come to join us in our prayers in the parish church, to take up the Church's Breviary seven times a day or however often they can join us. The bells in the church steeple call the faithful to either pause and pray for a moment or to stop their work and come to the church to pray with us. Through this regiment of prayer, our lives are ordered to a relationship with the Trinity and with one another.
We hope to continue our studies for the priesthood in the near future and then be able to live out the Canonical Life with the blessing of the hierarchy as Canons Regular according to the rule of Saint Augustine. When this becomes a reality, the life of prayer will still be the our main ministry and calling. Through prayer and living in community together in one place, we are able to seek to fulfill the universal call to holiness that Holy Mother Church desires for all Her children.
We sustain themselves through their work of handy crafts and (mainly) through the faithful financial support of benefactors. We sell items at various fairs and bazaars around the area of Eastern Arizona to raise money for their daily needs. The greater amount of funds that they need in order to sustain their work of prayer and ministry, however, comes from the Christian Faithful supporting them through donations and monthly giving. Our confraternity, The League of the Blessed Sacrament, is a registered 501c3 religious non-profit. Your donations and support are put to work through the living out of the Gospel and by supporting our life of prayer and ministry and is fully tax deductible.