ABBEY NEWS
Final Vote
By an overwhelming majority the community voted in favor of keeping the current experimental community schedule permanent. It has been in use since July and will continue without change although from time to time minor updates due to changing work schedule may have to be made as in the past.
New Arrival
After over 60 years of our Monks’ Bread operation the time has come to do some serious equipment replacement and updating. In fact, it is overdue. Thanks to the dedicated expertise of our maintenance men we’ve been able to keep going despite machine breakdowns. Some items have been repaired several times while others are obsolete. These need to be replaced.
A couple of years ago the divider (the machine that cuts the dough into individual loaves) was replaced and is doing well. This past week our horizontal mixer arrived and is being installed. Hopefully it will be up and running shortly. It will be the primary mixer we use while the current one will serve as a stand-by. Our production manager, Adam Barrett, gives us the following progress report:
Greetings Friends,
After significant research and travel our new Peerless Horizontal Mixer arrived today! We found this beauty at Employees’ Bakery Machinery Inc. in Billings, Montana. In November our Bakery and Maintenance Managers flew to Billings for a thorough inspection. After a smooth test run in their facility we made our purchase and had it shipped across country last week.
The new mixer will be phased in this winter to replace our old J.H. Day mixer from the 1960s. The Peerless will have a larger dough capacity, will run more efficiently, and has already created one new job! We’ll keep you updated as we continue with installation. (click photos to enlarge).
We’d also like to thank Boulter Industrial Contractors for taking such great care of our new machine. Their timely delivery, smooth installation, and professionalism on a snowy winter day were outstanding!
Dearth of Homilies
Those of you who visit our Homilies regularly each week will notice only two homilies this past week. The reason is we had a 
second round of rather serious colds going through the community laying the majority of the community pretty low. Things have returned to normal for the most part and we’re hoping that will take care of the colds for the rest of the winter. This past week we had our share of colder than usual weather, kind of like January in December.
Lectio Notebook
The doing of the will of God alone matters. It is the sole criterion of your response to Jesus. The entire mission of the one whom God has sent is to make this will of God known. This why he who came to dwell among us could say with absolute truth, My food is to do the will of him who sent me, and to accomplish his work (John 4:34); I can do nothing on my own authority. . .I seek not my own will but the will of him who sent me (John 5:30; 6:38).
Those who come to him, those who hear his word, must necessarily have the same disposition and keep the same end in view. They must be intent upon doing the will of God. Only thus can they recognize Jesus of Nazareth for what he really is: the one sent by God, the one whose whole being was bent on seeking the glory of him who sent him.
The Gospel of John
Stanley B. Marrow, SJ
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