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The New Zealand Tyburn convent is included in a newly released film by Michael Luke Davies, a former West End fashion and beauty photographer.
The film project entitled Tyburn Convent Gloria Deo, involved some five months of filming in Britain, Ireland, Italy, Peru, Colombia, Ecuador, Australia and New Zealand, and a process of editing that lasted nearly a year.
The film offers an authentic view of life in a cloistered, contemplative community based on adoration of the Holy Eucharist and the Rule of St Benedict.
Mother Xavier McMonagle, Mother General of the nuns, whose formal name is the Adorers of the Sacred Heart of Jesus of Montmartre, said she was delighted with the result.
“I hope that it serves to inform the general public that in the Catholic Church the monastic contemplative life is one of vibrant, joyous and holy dedication to God, a life well worth living – not only for the nuns themselves, but for all those people who are touched by glimpsing something of this life of hidden, godly dedication,” she said.
Mr Davies, who attended the launch, said he was “moved to tears many times by the beauty of what I was filming”.
The Tyburn Nuns came to New Zealand just 15 years ago and they now have a thriving monastery supported by the active enthusiasm of local people, including a 92-year-old man who has created a series of bush walks modelled on the Stations of the Cross which have become a pilgrimage destination for tourists.
The nuns are filmed in the New Zealand countryside, nursing orphaned lambs, harvesting herbs and crops and in silent contemplation.
Michael Luke Davies, a non-Catholic, said that filming the prioress sitting beside a river bank was for him the high point in the entire production. “I come from a fashion and beauty background,” he said. “I had been filming models all my life and then suddenly I found myself waist-deep in water filming this religious person by this river and I felt to myself: ‘This is what I am supposed to be doing.’ It was a massive moment in my life.”
Sources: Catholic Herald 1, Catholic Herald 2
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