The
Gratitude of Tragedy
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It was a Friday morning this
past November. Listening with half an ear to the morning news I overheard
that wildfires had broken out once again in Southern California—my home for the
past 20 years. This one started in Montecito, an exclusive community nestled
next to Santa Barbara.
Somehow I’ve gotten used to the reports of fires. Every year they arrive like
uninvited guests but always seem to stay at a safe distance from touching my
life here in Santa Monica.
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Diane Sawyer called it the Tea
Fire—such a civilized name for a catastrophic event. Montecito had already
lost some of its magnificent homes with more predicted to burn. It seemed
quite a distance from Mount Calvary, my 12-step retreat home up the canyon in Santa Barbara so I
wrote it off as yet another tragedy that struck others. For a brief moment I
realized that the monks might be in danger, but I went on with my day as
usual.
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Soon I learned I was wrong. My
cell phone rang around 10:30 that morning with a number I didn’t recognize.
It was from one of my fellow 12-steppers who had never called me before. “Mount Calvary was in the fire—not sure how
badly it was affected. We’re waiting for more information, but we know the
brothers all got out ok.”
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Utter disbelief. How could this
be? “The monastery is too far from Montecito,” I thought to myself. I held on
to a small thread of hope for the rest of the morning as my sheltered
knowledge of wildfires kept me momentarily safe from the reality of what
happened. By noon the news reports confirmed it, “Mount Calvary
destroyed.” That’s all the information I needed and the tears began to flow.
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It was May 1995. In retrospect I’m
not sure how I made it up the mountain the very first time, but I remember
seeing a flyer at a meeting, asking someone about the retreat and mustering
up the courage to make my first trek up the mountain. This turned out to be
one of the finest decisions I ever made.
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Driving up to Mount Calvary
was always an adventure for the newcomer because of its remote location. Once
you get to the Santa Barbara Mission, you wind your way up the mountain until
you reach Gibraltar Road—apropos
of such a cornerstone of recovery and healing. Mount Calvary
had been home to Benedictine monks since 1947 and my fellowship has been
embraced by the brothers since the late 80s with the utmost love, respect and
graciousness. Capacity for retreats is thirty and there’s always been more
than a 2-year waitlist illustrating the devotion so many 12 step and
community groups feel for this sanctuary perched up on the mountain.
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Memorial Day and Labor Day weekends
quickly developed into my twice-a-year-ritual and a pillar of my recovery. It
became tradition to leave behind my overly-scheduled L.A. life and retreat to this sacred space.
Having participated in more than twenty retreats at Mount Calvary,
I formed a more intimate connection to the 12 steps and to my comrades in
recovery. As a matter of fact, it became a private weekend getaway with my
Higher Power.
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I feel that I grew up at the
monastery and witnessed others grow up beside me. We shared meetings, stepwork, workshops, meals, hikes, movie reviews, tears,
laughter and the “Great Silence”. Always a welcome opportunity to slow down,
commune with Mother Nature and be embraced by the brothers and sisters of my
fellowship as well as the brothers of the Benedictine order. All the while
cradled on the Mount
Calvary mountaintop
with panoramic views of magnificent mountains and endless ocean vistas. The retreat had such a big heart matched
only by the serenity, unconditional love and warmth of the monastery and the
brothers.
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When CNN reported “Mount
Calvary Destroyed”, the floodgates of my heart opened, yet part of my
gratitude is my capacity to feel what I feel and share this with others. You
see -- there was a time early in my recovery when I couldn’t cry. Now as I
thaw more and more, recovery has given me back my feelings and my aliveness
and Mount Calvary has been one of the midwives
for this transformation.
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Two weeks after the fire I made
a final pilgrimage to Mount
Calvary to witness the
destruction of the monastery and to say goodbye to what I had known. We
trespassed through the fences around the remaining ruins and attempted to say
goodbye the best way we knew how. Along with the camaraderie of a few loving
men who share similar histories with Mount Calvary, we paid homage to the
site and then made our way down the hill to check on one of our beloved monks
who had been displaced to St. Mary’s, a convent next door to the Mission. A
chapter of my recovery was now over.
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Grief is such a personal
experience. Yet, my deeper healing comes from a communal experience of
sharing the loss— keeping the love and spirit of Mount Calvary
alive that resides within us and always will. Everyone grieves in their own
way, but I reject the idea that I just
have to get over it. That is the myth. It’s not about getting over
it—it’s about learning to live with the
loss—integrating this unfathomable ending into life’s experiences and
folding it into the texture of my 14 years of recovery.
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Mount Calvary
is gone forever in its physical form, yet its vast spiritual energy will
never go away as it resides within me and travels wherever I go. This is the
gift. I suited up and showed up and it was there for me to receive. The
future of Mount
Calvary is still
uncertain, but we can be sure that it will stay alive in each of us who
experienced its sacred energy. Gratitude rises from the ashes.
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Donations
for their continued support as a monastic community are urgently needed and can
be made to: Mount
Calvary, P.O. Box
1296 Santa Barbara,
CA 93102
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Andrew Susskind, MSW is a Recovery Coach,
licensed psychotherapist, and author with a private practice in Los Angeles.
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