From March 13 to 15, six members of the Order of Malta gathered at Westminster Abbey in Mission, British Columbia, for a Lenten retreat led by Fr. Pablo Santa Maria, JCL, Magistral Chaplain. The three days offered an opportunity for prayer, reflection, and fraternal fellowship within the rhythm of an active Benedictine monastic community.

The setting shaped the retreat from the outset. Participants prayed the Divine Office alongside the monks, celebrated Holy Mass both privately and with the monastic community, and shared time of fellowship with one another. The monastic environment provided a natural context for the themes that would unfold across four talks.

The first talk drew on the Benedictine tradition of ora et labora — the sanctification of the day through the Divine Office — as a framework for examining how the modern knight and dame of Malta might deepen their own life of prayer. The central point was straightforward: prayer is not a technique for producing interior states of calm or spiritual illumination, nor is it primarily an obligation. It is an encounter with a person. When that understanding is lost, prayer becomes a burden. When it is recovered, prayer becomes a joy.

The second talk addressed the challenge of living the Order’s vocation faithfully in the contemporary world, and in particular the temptation of discouragement. The Great Siege of Malta served as the historical touchstone: 600 knights and 8,000 other troops under Grand Master Fra’ Jean de Valette withstood a force more than five times their number, prevailing against all expectation. The lesson drawn was that the world consistently underestimates those who carry an ancient vow seriously — and that this remains one of the few consolations history reliably offers. The talk also underscored that the virtues of the Order are not ceremonial, and that the promises made within it are not contingent on results. The obligation is to fidelity, not to outcomes. Fidelity sustained over time carries a power entirely disproportionate to what it appears from the outside.

The third talk engaged the Lenten season directly through the parable of the Prodigal Son. The focus fell not only on the father’s mercy but on the son’s prior act of faith — the interior awakening that gave him the courage to turn around and return home. That movement, counter-cultural in every age, is the movement Lent invites. The talk served as a reminder that Lent is not a theoretical exercise but a lived opportunity for conversion, undertaken in the confidence of a Father whose mercy is without measure.

The fourth and final talk took up the virtue of hope — the disposition that must animate all the works of the Order. It is hope that makes it possible to put out into the deep, even after fruitless effort. The ultimate success of the Order’s endeavours rests not on human strategy or resources, but on God. That conviction is not a reason for passivity, but the most solid possible foundation for action.

The members of the Western Delegation also took this opportunity to discuss plans for the future including partnering with “The Door Is Open”, a downtown Vancouver Catholic drop-in ministry for those who are housing-insecure.

Everyone was happy to welcome to the retreat members of the Order of Malta from the Grand Priory of Bohemia and the Irish Association.