The Monastery

In a small Christian household of God (1 Timothy 3:15) in the north of New Zealand, gathered by the Holy Trinity, St Enoch and St Elijah Monastery (SEASEM) is devoted to the Gospel of Jesus Christ, and living and teaching salvation through purification and purity of heart, illumination and union with God — theosis.

By God’s grace and providence, Prior Rob and Sister Irini, as they are known locally, have established a place set apart for a life ordered towards Christification and the lived reality of the Gospel. SEASEM offers its shared existence as a witness to prayer, repentance, healing, and transformation in Christ.

SEASEM draws inspiration from the Egyptian desert tradition of the fourth and fifth centuries, and from its shaping of the early Christian monastic life of Ireland and the British Isles and the Western churches of Anglican tradition. The community’s life is ordered around prayer, silence, Scripture, and the Divine Office, integrating contemplative devotion with creative work, hospitality, and the stewardship of the land entrusted to them.

The Divine Office is kept as the community’s daily rule of prayer, using locally composed devotional liturgies shaped by Scripture — including the Psalms and Gospels. These offices are offered as common prayer and may be shared with others who want to praise and worship God alongside the community. 

SEASEM is a Western, English-speaking community offering a place set apart from the world for prayer, reflection, and spiritual formation in visits and retreat. It is not a church open to the public. God has positioned SEASEM in Aotearoa — New Zealand —  as a place of welcome and healing for those who have become spiritually displaced within Western cultures. As such, the community extends its prayer life to accompany and gently orient believers and seekers of Christ towards fullness of life in the wider Church throughout the world.

SEASEM does not claim canonical status or formal teaching or sacramental authority within the institutional Church. In the history of the Church, lived grace and spiritual fruit have often preceded formal recognition, and the community entrusts the timing and discernment of such recognition wholly to God.

Through its teaching, writing, and retreat ministries — and through the repentant prayer life of each community member — SEASEM seeks to serve God’s will by cultivating the three pillars of theosis: purification, illumination, and union with God.

SEASEM arose in response to the divine calling given by Christ to Rob in 1994, to serve others by shepherding souls into deeper communion with the Father through Jesus Christ, the Logos by the Holy Spirit. Within this calling, Irini and any who abide in Christ within the community seek to live the devotional life entrusted to them — sharing in prayer, works, and trust in God’s providence and grace for each person and the monastery’s life and service.

The SEASEM community lives beneath the heavenly protection and intercession of the Holy Trinity, through its patrons Saint Enoch and Saint Elijah, offering its life humbly to God while awaiting formal ecclesial recognition, and serving wholly for the glory of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, One God. Amen