In Memoriam: Sister Lucy

IN MEMORIAM

Sister Lucy Brydon OSB

Sister Lucy Brydon, long-time coordinator of the Great Britain-Ireland commission of Monastic Interreligious Dialogue, died on August 23, 2020 at the age of 80.

Sister Lucy spent the early years of her religious life as a Sister of Mercy in teaching and administrative posts in the north of England and Kenya. In 1991 she joined the Olivetan Benedictine Sisters of Turvey Abbey. Besides representing the Turvey nuns' community in interreligious matters, she served as Guest Sister, was involved in retreat and hospitality ministry, offered spiritual direction, and was one of the community's cantors. Her retreat and spiritual direction work was interreligious in its outreach.

In reflecting on her involvement in Monastic Interreligious Dialogue, Sister Lucy noted that she grew up in a fervent Roman Catholic family in a largely Protestant neighbourhood. In the 1940s and '50s, ecumenism had hardly been heard of, and yet her childhood experience was one of learning good neighbourliness and friendship with

people of “other religions”—in this case, Anglicans, Methodists, and Baptists. Even though she had opted for Comparative Religion for a Cambridge Religious Studies Diploma towards the end of the 1970s and had taken a course on Islam, it was not until she went to Kenya at the end of the 1970s that she came into personal contact with people of another religion.

One incident above all continued to stand out for her as an experience of grace. In an article entitled “Journey into Interfaith Dialogue 1939-2011” that she wrote for the first volume of Dilatato Corde (1:2 2011), she recalled that

One day, while visiting a Muslim family to speak to the parents of one of our students, I found myself alone in a room with the old grandmother as I waited for the mother of the girl to arrive. The old lady did not attempt to speak to me or welcome me. I do not think she was aware of my presence at all. She was completely immersed in an intense state of prayer, with the Holy Qur’an open on her knee. I will never forget the serene, recollected expression on her face. I had an awed feeling that I should take off my shoes, for I was standing on holy ground. The intensity of her contemplation made that small room into a mosque or, for me, an oratory. I prayed silently too, and I

felt we were somehow united. This experience of graced insight was broken by the bustling arrival of the mother, and we went on to talk school business, the old lady remaining wrapped in silent prayer. It was a small event which had then, and still has, an eternal significance for me.

In addition to the dialogues she participated in and organized in Great Britain, especially the yearly gatherings with the Buddhist monks and nuns at Amaravati, interfaith retreats at Turvey Abbey, and the annual meeting of the coordinators of the various European Commissions that was held in London in October 2010, Sister Lucy was able to participate in the first two international dialogues with Iranian Shi‘a Muslims that took place in Rome in 2011 and in Qum, Iran, in 2012. When the dialogue was held in England in 2019, the participants stopped at Turvey Abbey on their way from Ealing Abbey in London to Ampleforth Abbey in North Yorkshire to visit Sister Lucy and to take part in the Sunday eucharistic celebration.

In “Religious Experience in Dialogue,” the last of several articles that Sister Lucy contributed to Dilatato Corde, she reported on the annual day of dialogue that brought together Catholic and Anglican monks and nuns in England and monks and nuns from Amaravati

Buddhist Monastery. She introduced her report by reflecting that

It has become quite common to say that the interreligious dialogue of monks and nuns is especially focused on the “dialogue of religious experience.” This year I became much more aware of how important it is to speak out of and about our own experience, even though we may be very hesitant to do so—and that for any number of reasons: it’s too insignificant, too personal, too self-serving. . . . While it is true that we need to take care that interreligious dialogue not turn into a group therapy session, the greater danger may be that it will become little more than an abstract and arid discussion of religious theory and practice that has little value for our spiritual life. One way to keep monastic dialogue true to its calling is to be willing to speak of those experiences that for us have had religious/spiritual significance.

Because of pandemic-related restrictions, the chapel at Turvey Abbey will not be open to the public for the funeral, but the monastic community is planning to live-stream the service and the Office for the Dead. The date and times will be posted on the Turvey Abbey website when arranged. Links and sound recordings (mp3) will also be available on this page.

William Skudlarek, a monk of Saint John's Abbey in Collegeville, Minnesota, is Secretary General of DIM·MID.