We have heard today's gospel, John 15: 9-17, twice in the last few days. It's one I never tire of meditating on because it encapsulates much of what monastic life is about. Every vocation begins with the fact of the Father's love, with his surprising choice of this person and that. It is his love which sustains, nourishes, challenges and consoles throughout life— a lovely, luminous thought. But life is not all growing in the sunshine of God's love without a care in the world. We are to bear fruit; and fruit is usually harvested when summer is ended. It is when the shadow of the Cross falls across our lives that we (or more usually others) see what has really been going on. If we have become a friend of God, then we'll have taken on some measure of likeness to his Son and the Father will be able to see and love in us what he sees and loves in his Son. And if we haven't? John's gospel pulls no punches about the uselessness of branches that have been cut from the Vine. No wonder that today's Postcommunion prayer asks for strength. (Podcast will be posted later today and that will be the last for the next fortnight as Digitalnun will be on "garden leave".)