Unum petii a Domino, hoc requiram:
ut inhabitem in domo Domini
omnibus diebus vitae meae (Ps 26, 4).
There is one thing I ask of the Lord,
for this I long,
to live in the house of the Lord,
all the days of my life (Ps 27:4).
As Norbertine Canonesses, we are especially dedicated to the solemn and reverential celebration of the Church’s Sacred Liturgy, which we celebrate in continuity with the tradition of our Premonstratensian Order, and upholding the traditions of Gregorian chant and the Latin language.
Following the Rule of St. Augustine, we joyfully live out our cloistered canonical vocation in community, within the monastic rhythms of the liturgy and lectio divina, of silence and recollection, of penance, manual labor and study.
Our monastery is nestled in a quiet valley in the heart of California’s Tehachapi Mountains, in the Roman Catholic Diocese of Fresno. It is here, amidst the natural beauty of God’s creation, that we seek to continue the 900-year-old tradition began by St. Norbert and his first followers.
Unum petii a Domino, hoc requiram:
ut inhabitem in domo Domini
omnibus diebus vitae meae (Ps 26, 4).
There is one thing I ask of the Lord,
for this I long,
to live in the house of the Lord,
all the days of my life (Ps 27:4).
“Faithful to the ‘apostolica institutio,’ your predecessors wished to make each Norbertine community an image of the primitive Jerusalem community, gathered around the apostles and the Virgin Mary. Through profession of the evangelical counsels and your vow of stability, you consecrate yourselves to the service of your [monastery] church in order to solemnly celebrate there the sacred Liturgy, offer to God the praise of the whole Church, and gather the Christian people around their Lord...so that the name of God may be glorified in every heart...”
– Pope St. John Paul II to the Norbertine Order
