Who Are We?

The Sons of the Covenant Chaldean Monastery is a Chaldean Catholic men's monastery sui iuris of eparchial right in the Eparchy of Saint Peter the Apostle for the Chaldeans, dedicated to the Lord Jesus Christ through a life of contemplative prayer, community life with one another, and service to the faithful of the eparchy. We have a parish which we serve, St. John Chaldean Catholic Church, located at 1763 N. First Street, El Cajon, CA 92021.

With a strong devotion to our Mother, the Blessed Virgin Mary, we strive to imitate St. John the Evangelist, the Beloved Disciple, who was given to her as a son and who contemplated the love of Christ with a unique depth. We have as our patron St. Joseph, the foster-father of Jesus, who is our model of interior silence and virtue; and we desire to emulate St. Ephrem, one of our Church Fathers, himself a Son of the Covenant (the ancient proto-monastic movement of the early Church of the East), through deep theological study, teaching of the faithful, and liturgical worship. To achieve these ends, we freely and joyfully embrace the monastic virtues of poverty, chastity, and obedience, following Christ in that "special way" which, as Pope St. John Paul II says, "expresses in a particularly vivid way the Trinitarian nature of the Christian life and anticipates in a certain way that eschatological fulfilment towards which the whole Church is tending" (Vita Consecrata, 14).

What’s Our Mission?

The mission of the Sons of the Covenant Chaldean Monastery is to foster communion in the Monastery and to extend that to the People of God. Communion is the theology of unity between God and man, and between human beings with one another in God, mediated through the Lord Jesus Christ. The form of communion is prayer: in prayer, man is united to God. To do this in common in the Church means to go back to Eden, where humanity together walked with God in paradise. The monks pray individually in their hearts, but more especially, come together in prayer to offer themselves to God together. In our Monastery, all of our prayers are open to the public, so that the People of God can participate in this common union with the Almighty.

As an extension of this communion, and proceeding from an inner dialogue with God, the monks also work, each according to his own particular talents. Some monks study for the priesthood and permanent diaconate for ministerial service in the Church. Since we have a parish, the monks serve the parish in all of its liturgical and pastoral needs. Therefore, monks serve as youth ministers and sacristan, and they maintain the church, among other things. Some cultivate artistic talents for the edification of the people through iconography and woodwork. In the Monastery itself, the monks maintain the monastic quarters through chores, one of the monks serves as chef, and the social media — including the website of the Monastery and the Parish — are run by the brothers.

Our Monastery is active and contemplative, which means we have many duties, all of which flow out of a robust prayer life, and all for the sake of union with God, with one another, and with the whole Church.