Harvard Square, a place typically inhabited by high-powered urban professionals, academics and anxiety-ridden aspiring world-rulers, has a little-known softer side. A haven for the burned-out, the thoughtful or those who are simply disgusted with the kill-or-be-killed real world can be found at the Society for St. John the Evangelist (SSJE), an Episcopalian monastery located at 980 Memorial Dr., just a five-minute walk from the River Houses.
But according to Brother Curtis Almquist, who is the mild-mannered, bespectacled superior of the monastery, the typical life of a monk is not one that lacks intensity. The monks have five prayer gatherings each day. Each monk also spends one hour in early morning meditation in his individual cell, which is a little smaller than the average Harvard single bedroom. Guest rooms, which are similar to the monks’ living quarters, are available to any layperson who desires to spend up to a week living a life of quiet reflection. The walls of each room are bare except for a cross and an icon. There is a reading desk, chair, neatly made twin bed and plain wooden dresser in each room. Almquist explains that the guests live here in complete silence. They take their meals with the monks in the refectory, eating their mostly vegetarian meals three times a day (silently). “During the midday and evening meals, there is usually a brother who reads from the prayer book,” Almquist says, “while we continue our silence.”
Almquist introduces another monk, Daniel Simons. Sporting a beard and wearing a green T-shirt and khakis, Simons is 37 but looks like a 25-year-old grad student. He comes from northern Wisconsin and attended Wheaton College, alma mater of Billy Graham. Most of the monks here hail from the Midwest, but “it’s just a coincidence,” Almquist says.
Asked why people desire the quiet, reflective life of a monk, Almquist says, “Many people are quite desperate to find transcendence, to get away from what they feel are meaningless lives.” Many people in the modern world attempt to find transcendence through the material world, he continues. “Advertising teaches us that if you use this cologne, drink this cola or drive this car, you will be beautiful, accepted, successful,” he says. “But most people naturally have an innate craving for something more.”
Both Simons and Almquist encourage stressed-out Harvard students to come down to meditate or pray in the chapel alone or with the monks, or to spend a night in the guest house. There is a suggested donation for a guest room (the reduced rate for students is $25), but “we don’t turn anyone away because of finances,” Almquist says. Anyone, no matter what his or her religious background, is free to come. Simons says there is something to be said for getting away from the busy world of academia to explore the greater things in life. “When you’re going crazy in school, even though we’re just two blocks away, we’re like a world away,” Simons says.
