Restoration
Posted April 01, 1999:
April 1999
Archive of articles from the April 1999 issue of Restoration.
My Dear Family
YES, WE HAVE A FATHER
by Catherine Doherty
Jesus said, He who has seen me has seen my Father (John 14:10). Later he promised his disciples that he would not leave them orphans. He said, I will send to you from the Father the Spirit of truth who goes out from the Father (John 15:26).
So, from the words of Jesus Christ himself we get a glimpse of the Trinity. We have such a glimpse of the Trinity that it should make us reel with joy.
Consider everyday life, you who are lonely, who are seeking love, who feel rejected, who feel like orphans (even if you have parents), who feel alienated from society and from your family. Stop for one moment, and try to meditate on the words of Jesus Christ.
He tells us that we have a Father. He says that whoever sees him sees the Father. And when the apostles asked him how to pray, he gave them these beautiful words that begin with: "Our Father, who art in heaven …"
Do you hear that? Does your heart listen? "Our Father who art in heaven …" We have a Father—Abba! We are not alienated. We are not abandoned. We are not orphans. We are not rejected. None of these things really happen to us, simply because we do have a Father.
"Our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us. Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil."
Look at that prayer. Listen to it. Write it out. Savor every word of it.
We have a Father. How beautiful! How wonderful! All the strength that should belong to a father is in him whom we call ‘Our Father’.
Yes we have a Father; but we also have a Brother—and they are united! There is a deep sobornost [unity of mind and heart] between them, and he who sees the Son sees the face of the Father.
Jesus Christ was not content to leave us some kind of fantastic picture of a man with a big beard, as we have so often seen God pictured. No.
He told them, "Listen! Listen with your heart. Listen with your joy. Listen with your gladness. Listen with your sorrow. He who sees me sees the Father."
We have a concrete picture of the Father. True, you and I haven’t seen Christ. But others who lived in his time have seen him. They have looked at his face. And those who believed knew that the face of the Father was reflected in the Son.
Is it a double image? I don’t think so, and yet it might be. The mysteries of the Trinity are of such depth that no one can plumb them. I think that the icon of the Father is reflected in the icon of the Son.
In faith let us understand this clearly. Whenever we mention the word Trinity, we are entering the realm of faith. It might be dark for us, but not if we humbly rest before it, not trying to fathom it further than what Christ said: ‘He who sees me sees the Father.’
In the quiet of our rest, let us slowly take days (not minutes nor hours, but days!) to recite this glorious prayer: ‘Our Father, who art in heaven …’ We could spend a year or two on just that one sentence.
If the hands of your heart are folded on the lap of your heart, if your intellect has closed its wings, and if you are at rest—the rest that only God can give—then much of the mystery of the Trinity that the Lord desires will be revealed to you in various ways. But all of the time you will know that you have a Father, and that will change your life!
Yes, you have a Father who is in heaven. You have a Brother, Jesus Christ, whom the Father sent to redeem us—even unto death on the cross. (O blessed Cross, through which I have to pass always and forever into the resurrected Christ, how beautiful you are!)
Here also, we see the ‘soil’ from which sobornost springs; the soil in which its ‘roots’ are deeply buried. It is the soil of the Most Holy Trinity. We must be united to the Trinity, rooted in the Trinity!
Remember! We do have a Father, and we are united with him through Jesus Christ, our Brother. The incarnation, death and resurrection of Christ have made it possible for us to be one in the Father, and one with each other. They have made it possible to transplant some of the ‘roots’ growing in the bosom of the Trinity into our own hearts.
It is time that we make a deep commitment to God, to the Trinity. It is time we realize anew that, without risk, we cannot love! We certainly cannot love a God who, in the person of Jesus Christ, has risked so much for us and dies on a cross for us.
We are living in difficult times. Unless we become one with Christ, with the Father and the Holy Spirit, then we will perish. For tomorrow, or the day after, the time of reckoning will come. Those who stand with Christ will be safe in the heart of the Father; and those who have rejected him will not.
Indeed, this is a time of grave risk. All around us we see death abounding—murders, tragedies, wars—signs given to us by a loving Father. We must stop being wishy-washy about our lives! We must commit ourselves to him who loves us with a love beyond all understanding. He is continually calling us to this commitment!
We must watch and pray, for the days of tomorrow will weep over us if we do not. This is the time, the hour, to say ‘yes’ to God. If we don’t, we will inevitably say ‘yes’ to somebody else. This total commitment, this total ‘yes’ to God and his will, is true sobornost. May Our Lady help us to live it all the days of our lives.
Sobornost, pp. 153-162, (available from MH Publications)
Combermere Diary
WHERE THE PEOPLE GATHER
MH knows how to celebrate! Like any family, we look forward to those special events that take us out of ourselves and the ordinariness of our days. This year, we were able to combine two celebrations into one: the foundation day of Friendship House in Harlem, and our annual pre-Lent event.
You may be familiar with the foundation day on February 14. It’s the day that Catherine opened the first American Friendship House in Harlem, NY. But you may wonder what a pre-Lent event is all about! Well, it’s a little like a variety talent show, with music, skits, story-telling, etc., held just before Lent’s austerities begin.
This year, the acts were all about our MH life; hence, the title of our combined celebrations: Foundation Day Follies!
Real life, it is said, is funnier than fiction. It’s true! From demonstrations by ‘professor’ Denis Heames on the many ways to extract toothpicks from a holder, to songs by the kitchen staff about our healthy diet; from the dilemma of dropping important papers down an outdoor jon, and needing to retrieve them (yes, it really happened, folks!) to a illustration of the morning routines at the men guest’s dorm. It was a wonderful evening of fun.
Three days later, Lent began, as it always does here, with the words from one of our favorite hymns: "Open to me the doors of repentance, O Life Giver." We continue to sing it throughout the mornings of Lent. It is a powerful prayer.
The kitchen continued this ‘launch into the season’ by serving home-baked pretzels one evening. Mary Ellen, the head of the kitchen, explained that pretzels are a Lenten food from early Christian times. The faithful kept a strict fast during this season, eating pretzels along with their vegetables and fish.
It’s an appropriate symbol for Lent: it’s baked in the form of arms crossed in prayer, reminding us that Lent is a time of prayer. Made simply of flour and water, it proclaims Lent as a period of fasting.
Joan Bryant, an iconographer, gave us a class on the history and meaning of icons. This sacred art of the Eastern Church is part of Catherine’s heritage, and consequently part of MH’s as well. Our chapels are adorned with many icons, which are (as one book says) the "pictorial expression of the inexpressible."
From icons to pysanky eggs—another MH tradition in the days before Easter. Our handicraft department offers classes each Sunday during Lent for anyone wanting to learn this traditional Ukrainian egg decorating technique. Beautiful dyes and symbolic elements combine to make an inexhaustible variety of egg patterns. And even if you make a mistake, it still can look good (I speak from experience)!
As you know, our life in Combermere and in our field houses depends on the generosity of others. Each year, at this time, we send out a begging letter to raise funds for the coming months.
This year, we mailed out 16,000 envelopes. We had a ‘bee’ in our dining room one evening (which means the whole community worked together on the task) to fold and stuff the letters into envelopes.
Work bees of any kind are wonderful. Though we all live together here, there are so many of us that we’re often ‘ships that pass in the night’ to each other. The bees are a great time for us to sit and visit as well as work.
The fruit of our benefactors’ generosity can be seen in our newly built annex, Our Lady of the Visitation, which will serve the needs of older and infirm staff. The carpenters have almost finished their work, putting in the final window frames and cupboards. What a gift of love this building is to the community!
Our gift shop has also been a place of work and repair. Over the years, thousands of feet passing through the shop have worn down its floors. So Michael Huffman and his crew spent three weeks sanding and re-painting it.
As much as people come to us to experience our life, in recent months we’ve gone out to spread the Good News of the Gospel as we try to live it. Fr. Thomas Rowland gave six parish missions in Ontario and Michigan. Denis Heames, Nancy Topping, and Fr. Thomas Talentino gave a week-long mission at a parish in Etobicoke, Ontario.
Maria Cristina Coutinho and Maria Victoria Fausto took part in a mission-awareness program at a Niagara Falls school. They were among many groups of missionaries who spoke to groups of children, aged 5 to 13, as well as to parents and teachers.
Cynthia Donnelly has gone the farthest afield, traveling to England for four performances of A Woman in Love, the play about Catherine Doherty’s life.
Another way that people learn of MH and our life here is through our books. MH Publications has begun having ‘a book table’ at some of the missions and talks that our staff give.
This new development is in response to a word they feel the Lord has given them, to "go where the people gather."
As I write this diary, we’re experiencing a blizzard outside! It’s hard to believe that spring is on the way, but Mary Davis has started some flower seeds—begonia, geraniums, impatiens—always a hopeful sign.
On the farm, Charlie Cavanaugh has started lettuce and onion plants in the greenhouse. Soon the maple sugar crew will tap the trees.
By the time you receive this issue, it will be Easter. May the joy of the Risen Lord be yours, and may his light and truth fill you with peace and hope.
Some of you may be interested in our pretzel recipe, even though Lent will be over by the time this paper reaches you. Here it is:
4 cups flour
1 t. salt
1 large egg, well beaten
some coarse salt
1 T. dry yeast
11/2 cups warm water
a bit of honey
Combine the last three items, and let sit for ten minutes. Add flour and salt. Knead at least eight minutes, until smooth. Place in bowl, covered with wet towel, in a warm place. When doubled in size, punch down, and knead lightly.
Cut dough into 12 pieces. Roll into ropes, then shape into pretzels. Let rise on greased sheet for 10-15 minutes, covered. Brush with egg, and sprinkle with coarse salt.
Bake at 425 for 12 to 15 minutes, or until brown.
Enjoy!
Washington, D.C.
PRAYER HOUSE ON THE HILL
MH Washington opened in 1981 at the invitation of Cardinal Hickey. Originally, Catherine Doherty wanted us to go to a very poor area of this city. But poverty comes in many forms; so, at the Cardinal’s urging, we opened a prayer house right on Capitol Hill.
Our mandate is to pray and fast for the government, and to make ourselves available to meet the spiritual needs of those who come to the house. We are here to be ‘one’ with the people in spiritual poverty.
Our house is next door to the local parish church, which in turn is kitty-corner to the Senate office buildings. We’re just a few blocks from the Capitol building itself.
People come to pray in our chapel, or to use one of our four poustinia rooms. They may pop in for a cup of coffee and a chat, or to be prayed with. We have a meeting room where groups can come together for days of recollection, study or prayer.
When the house was first opened, the directors of MH insisted that we not get involved with ‘issues’ so that people from all parts of the political spectrum would feel welcome here. We’ve seen beautiful things happen when people let go of their political persuasions and opinions and meet in Christ. The issues really fall away.
There’s so much happening in Washington each day, we can never keep up with all that goes on. There are many demonstrations at the Capitol, with thousands of people gathered just a few blocks away from us. But we never know about it—unless we happen to walk over and see.
Spiritually, though, we feel the repercussions of some of these demonstrations; so we have to be on guard. Some days we feel ‘heavy’ or burdened somehow, and aren’t sure why. Or we start snapping at each other for no apparent reason. We have to cultivate an awareness that there’s more going on here than meets the eye.
There’s also the ‘District of Columbia’ to pray for. Washington is both a seat of world power and a city of great poverty, a suffering city.
The infant mortality rate is one of the highest in the nation, as is the per capita homicide rate. There’s a constant barrage of violence, and thousands of homeless people. I can’t begin to describe the state of the public school system. It’s a city of great contrasts.
We are here in this city simply to be a ‘presence’: to fast, pray, and atone; to listen and to love. Catherine Doherty said that loneliness is the greatest disease gripping our society today, one that crosses all strata of society.
We don’t have a lot of programs set up here. We follow a simple rhythm of life for those times of the day when God doesn’t send us people or other things to do.
We begin with adoration and morning prayer, followed by breakfast and communal spiritual reading.
The day unfolds, with people coming or calling. There’s always laundry, cleaning, and office work. We go to Mass at the parish next door, unless we have Mass in our own little chapel. We’re blessed to have a few priests who come regularly to celebrate with us.
Sometimes people stop by on their lunch hour, or on the way home from work. One of our regular friends recently expressed her anguish and frustration in trying to live the Gospel in her work place.
She said: "I don’t think I’d have been able to keep my job if I didn’t have this place to come to and let this stuff go. It’s too much to carry constantly."
So that’s what we do as we go about our day, running the vacuum cleaner or washing the poustinia linens: we lift our friends up to the Lord. They are able to leave their burdens here and return to work.
Last year, a Jewish congressman said that Christians are "the most persecuted group on Capitol Hill"—so we try especially to keep in our prayers those members of congress, and their staff, who are trying to preach the Gospel with the lives.
We spend a lot of time on the phone. People want to talk or to request prayers. One of our friends, who calls regularly, says that it is "God’s minute" for her. It’s often the same for us, too, since we’re on the receiving end of a new insight she’s had, or an uplifting or humorous quote from a devotional book.
Another friend, who owns a gas station a couple of blocks away, has been very generous in taking care of our car. I called him one day, as he was doing his book work. He said: "I have this card sitting in front of me. Do you know what it says? Go into the marketplace and stay with me. Pray. Fast. Pray always. Fast. This means that Jesus is here, right now! Jesus is right here in this gas station! And that’s what I have to give to my employees."
He was so excited that I got excited too. That’s what it’s all about. Jesus is right there in the gas station, and in the halls of Congress, and here with us in this house. That’s exciting—if only we had eyes to see it!
Last year we began having monthly mornings of recollection with our friends, using themes following the Holy Father’s letter on the third millennium. The feedback we’ve been getting is that this time is a chance for some to re-focus, a time of spiritual renewal leading into the year 2000. This gives you a little taste of our life here in a prayer house on Capitol Hill.
Over the years here, I’ve found so many people in Washington who are praying for this city, the government, and the world. We’ve met faith-filled people of all denominations, crying out for the same thing: Come, Lord, in your beauty, in your justice, in your great love; and have mercy on us all.
Love One Another - Part 8
THE GLORY OF OBEDIENCE
This column explores the dimensions and challenges of being a committed, dedicated, loving Christian in today’s world.
I want to talk this month about the glory of obedience.
Christ was totally obedient to the Father. Since he is our model, our leader, our savior, then it’s crucial for us to realize how the infinite Word of God become man, obeyed his Father. In Rublev’s Trinity icon, you see a loving submission among the three divine Persons.
What is really the essence of life, of reality? We are told many things—reality is power, control, wealth, etc. The reality in which we actually live, though—whether we are conscious of it or not—is the infinite love of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit.
The Trinity surrounds us. We live on Earth, a little planet in an immense universe, but right here is an even more immense universe: the love of these three Persons.
And what is their relationship? The Son says, "I don’t have anything, except what I have received from my Father." The Holy Spirit, we are told by the Son, knows nothing except what he’s been told by the Father and the Son.
St. Bernard calls the Holy Spirit the ‘kiss’ between the Father and the Son. His gift is to see to it that we allow ourselves to be embraced in that kiss. And this ‘kiss’ consists of our being obedient.
Do you follow? When we think of obedience, we think of something nasty and miserable, which puts us down. People correct us, saying: "Do this, do that. Don’t do this, don’t do that."
We find this degrading, but if we want to understand obedience, we have to look at God, and the union of love—the ‘kiss’—of the Trinity.
Why obey God? So as to be embraced in this kiss. And what is obedience? It’s being part of the kiss between the Father and the Son, through the Holy Spirit.
Are you aware of the Holy Spirit in your life? He is hidden. Why is this? Because he is so humble. The Holy Spirit is hard at work in each one of us, hoping and trying to make of us into lovers. Into lovers who become gradually divinized, capable of sharing in the life of the Trinity.
That’s what we’re called to do; that’s what we begin to live when we’re baptized. The moment we’re baptized, we enter into this glorious relationship with the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, to which every human being is called.
We think we have to assert ourselves, to be big shots, but Jesus told us that whoever makes himself as little as a little child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven (Matt 18:4). He told us this over and over again: not somebody who asserts himself, but one who is totally dependent.
Who is the greatest saint? The one who’s most dependent upon the will of God; the one who’s the least self-centered and selfish; the one who opens himself or herself to God and says, "Thy will be done."
Obedience is not a nasty thing. When we obey the will of God, life may not be easy. We know that God’s will led Jesus to the Cross. We know that the same thing will happen to us, and so we’re afraid.
Every day of our lives some kind of crucifixion takes place. We’ve all had some kind of crucifixion today: a problem to face, a relationship, an emotional upset, a physical problem, whatever. That’s our cross if we accept it and offer it to God. Through it, we become less arrogant, less sure of ourselves and more sure of God.
If we could only believe that the essence of reality consists in loving submission to God; that this is real living; and that it prepares us for eternity. Here on earth we enter into a relationship with God at the moment of our baptism, into this tremendous relationship of submission, of receiving love and giving love.
When I saw the original icon of the Trinity in the Tretiakov Gallery in Moscow, it took my breath away. I came around a corner and there it was, in a state museum. I said, "O my God, that’s love on a canvas."
The artist, Andrei Rublev, is a saint of the Orthodox Church. He was a monk who died around 1420, and was so holy that he captured on canvas the love of the Trinity.
We are made not to have our own way or seek things for ourselves, but to seek the good of others. In heaven we will be totally for others: loving others, thinking of others, being excited by every person. It’s like falling in love. When you fall in love, you become ecstatic over the other person. You haven’t a selfish thought.
Falling in love is what each of us needs to do and is meant to do. It’s what is intended by God, his will for us.
to be continued
Our Lady of Combermere - Part 15
THE HEART OF THE MATTER
The main purpose of this column is to remind you of the love and tenderness of God and his Mother, Our Lady of Combermere, for you.
Our Lady is also Our Lady of Forgiveness. Near the cross of Jesus stood his mother and his mother’s sister, Mary the wife of Clopas, and Mary of Magdala. Seeing his mother and the disciple he loved standing near her, Jesus said to his mother: "Woman this is your Son." Then to the disciple he said: "This is your mother." And from that moment the disciple made a place for her in his house (John 19:25-27).
At the cross Our Lady embraced the whole human race, even the torturers and murderers of her Son. She forgave them just as he had. She witnessed her Son atoning for the very sins they were committing against him, and for the sins of the whole human race. How deeply his act of infinite forgiveness penetrated her whole being.
As he offered his whole self for us, so also did she take each of us into her heart, not only forgiving our sins, but interceding with the Father as she had just seen Jesus do for all sinners, even for those most closely connected to his crucifixion.
God and Mary have already forgiven us all our sins. What is needed on our part is to acknowledge this and ask to receive the forgiveness already given.
We must in turn forgive those who have injured us. What does it mean to forgive? It means: "You have injured me but I will not make you pay for it."
The law of justice—an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth—has been abolished by Jesus. To be a disciple of his requires total forgiveness of our enemies from our hearts.
More than that, we are commanded to love our enemies: You have learned how it was said, you must love your neighbor and hate your enemy, but I say this to you: Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you. In this way, you will be sons of your father in Heaven (Matt 5:43-45).
This is the heart of the matter. To be a true disciple of Christ, you have to forgive and forgive and forgive—from the heart.
How often must a wife forgive her husband? A husband, his wife? How often does a member of a religious community have to forgive the other members? And vice versa?
Would you say 20 times a day? That’s what Catherine Doherty said. She was a great example to me of total forgiveness. She had the ability not only to forgive, but to forget. If an injury had been done to her on Tuesday and it was mentioned to her on Wednesday, she’d look at you with a blank stare and say, "What are you talking about?"
Being so conscious of God’s total, complete, constant, ongoing forgiveness to herself, she withheld none of her love from anyone who injured her. On the contrary, she went out of her way to do something good for them.
She knew her sinfulness. "Daily I face the abyss between what I really am and what I seem to be. And my soul almost breaks under this burden, I who have really suffered much, oh so much more than I speak about. I cry out in agony to the Lord of all, to take off my tired soul that insufferable burden.
"Yes God has given me a talent that is all his. I can move the hearts of people with the imagery of words. Under their spell, they see many of the old truths of Holy Mother the Church renewed and resplendent. They ‘catch fire’ as you say. But I, I see myself reflected in a hundred eyes and the picture of me as I see it there is what I should be, but alas I am not.
"Vividly before me stands my life. Endless are the graces showered on me by God. And I—poor sinful creature that I am—have wasted so many, never used others, lost those I gathered. I look at the crucifix and weep." (March 31, 1938—a letter to her spiritual director.)
When we judge and condemn others or refuse to forgive, the best thing is to stand before a crucifix, look at the Lord Jesus, and ask him to reveal to us our sins, so that we can forgive as we have been forgiven.
Throughout her life, Catherine was a shining example of total forgiveness, so much so that Eddie, her husband, quipped: "If you want Catherine to love you, be sure to insult her! She’ll go out of her way to make you feel at home."
She experienced tremendous rejection. First of all from Mother Russia, through the Communists. It took her years before she could speak about them or think of them without shaking. They had stolen her motherland, raping and destroying it and throwing her out of it.
It is only after her death that we discovered how much her husband Boris had abused her. She forgave him from the heart and was thrilled when he called her from his deathbed to ask her forgiveness. She was happy for him, really.
When a commission of priests abolished Friendship House Toronto in 1936, her first great apostolic endeavor, she went into shock and walked the streets for hours. But the next day she wrote to her spiritual director a most poignant, beautiful letter of heroic and total forgiveness.
Then came her second failure, in 1946, when she was thrown out of Friendship House, U.S.A. The stress of this brought about a painful heart condition which lasted all her life; but she forgave totally, receiving at MH any of those who had been involved in it.
If someone asked her how to become a saint, she’d immediately retort, "How well do you love your enemies?"
May the whole human race repent. May each of us forgive one another from the heart. May we pray to Our Lady of Combermere for her tenderness towards each person.
She not only forgave the torturers of her son, she embraced them as her own sons.
Let’s conclude this column with our usual prayer, saying it together:
Father of Our Lord Jesus Christ, we thank and praise you for giving us Our Lady of Combermere to be our mother, guide and director.
May we entrust our wills to her so that your divine will may be accomplished in us, that each of us becomes another Christ and that all of us together be formed into a living icon of love reflecting the love you share with your Son and the Holy Spirit. We ask this confidently through Christ our Lord. Amen.
A Vision of Painting - Part 1
THE JOY OF SIGHT
This article was originally part of a lecture series offered at MH entitled A Christian Vision of Culture.
I was tempted to title this talk ‘A Christian Vision of Painting’, but ‘Christian’ is a large word. This is really only a personal perspective, a personal vision of painting and the act of painting, by one who happens also to try to be a Christian. The vision I’d like to present could be applied to any occupation or way of life.
Painting is not an extraordinary vocation. There is within it the phenomenon of genius. But I want to talk about ordinary discipline and response, the vocation of the artisan who requires order and ritual to produce a small glimmer of felt delight through the beauty of creation.
I’ll try to explain a little about painting, about the process and the tools, the subject and the viewer, the reason I paint, and what it means to me to be a Christian painter.
Throughout my life as a painter, different concerns and questions have caused me to seriously evaluate this task at which I toil. For instance: in a world that is stricken with injustice and poverty, why do I paint? As a member of an apostolate that is continuously faced with great needs and much work, how do I justify standing out in a field somewhere, mixing colors?
Is not painting a luxury, for the rich and bourgeois? Could I not serve God better by some other task, or at least by painting icons or ‘religious’ artwork? Why am I living in a community, painting still-lifes and oversized figure compositions? In spite of these questions which have gnawed at me, I paint nevertheless.
I have no choice but to paint, for I am compelled by the joy of sight. The beauty of light and color calls me, and the challenge to perfect my craft never lets me rest.
I have entered a struggle, a tussle to discover the language of paint. For years, I have explored and experimented, adopted and discarded, studied and assimilated the richness of tradition throughout the history of art and the Church. But I have continuously returned to what for me is the source of my work: the experience of perception and the revelation of an inner force which I find permeates all creation, a mystery which quivers recognition in the realm of the fine arts.
I could say that the above statement is my personal vision of painting. I looked up the word vision in a dictionary. It means: "the act or faculty of seeing, sight; perception of things by means of the light coming from them which enters the eye."
This is a good explanation of what I am trying to say, but I’d add one thing more: that the light which enters our eyes enters also our minds and souls, our whole being. This is the thrust and focus of painting. It is ‘making the invisible visible’ through our experience of the visual world.
This is a key word: experience. It implies something more than mere recording. Whether we paint abstract or figurative, the art work is about our inner experience; the finished piece is our response.
Painting is a journey of pondering and poetry, of discovery and rediscovery, penetrating the visual window. It leads us on a search to know the fragile beauty of existence, resonating on canvas.
Painters, especially figurative painters, should not try to copy nature (is it possible to copy creation?); we are not cameras recording a motif’s outer veneer. Nor can we hope to duplicate the interior movement of a subject; rather, we continue it, as we continue nature. We are to create a new experience, to discover the response within the paint itself.
The first happening in this process is the relationship which evolves between ourselves, the motif, and our tools. The second happening is the attempt to communicate, to describe what cannot be expressed in any other way or medium. Archbishop Raya often quotes Martha Graham, the dancer, who was asked what was the meaning of her dance. She replied, "If I could say it in words, I wouldn’t have danced it." This is also true for painting.
Art is a synthesis of the mind and soul, of technique and perception. We search for a manifestation that is both personal and absolute, reaching beyond ourselves, beyond the forms presented, to communicate with each other, eye to eye, soul to soul, without words.
This is all, therefore, certainly not about ‘expressing oneself’—a common notion—nor is it about living continually in the atmosphere of a poetic muse, working only when inspiration visits. No, it is about discipline and struggle, tussling with limitations and inner visions that defy execution.
As in the spiritual life, to embark on such a journey is to enter a battle. Yet it is also about joy, and the thrill of realizing beauty. It’s about the excitement of being able to paint—and loving it!
to be continued
Compassionate Love - Part 3
RESTORING THE LIKENESS
There is a special classification of saints in Russia called prepodobny.
These saints are characterized by a restoration of the true likeness to God. Their name comes from the Russian word meaning ‘like’ or ‘likeness’. They are, you might say, ‘likeness saints’.
The Bible begins by saying God made man in his image and likeness (Gen 1:26). The Church Fathers observed that the likeness to God was lost through sin, and that the image, therefore, was distorted. This image of God, then, is the potential to be like God; and ‘likeness to God’ is the realization of that fact—the actual living of a divinized life.
‘Likeness saints’ are those who have returned to the likeness of God. St. Seraphim of Sarov is one. If you read his life, it’s obvious what this likeness consists of.
He had umilenie: this tender compassion, this all-welcoming love. Thousands of people used to throng to talk to him.
Let’s look more closely at the idea of likeness. Why is it there? In Leviticus 19:2, God—as he gives his people the law—tells them its meaning and motivation. Be holy, because I, the Lord your God, am holy.
God is holy; holiness is a unique, special quality of God, a purely divine attribute. No one and nothing else is holy.
It is this divine majesty that overwhelms Isaiah as he says: Oh, woe is me. I am a man of unclean lips and I live among a people of unclean lips and I have seen the Lord of Hosts, the Holy One of Israel (Is 6:5).
He is ‘crushed’, you might say, by this experience of God’s holiness. But God says, in effect: "You are my people; so you must become holy. You have to be like me."
In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus describes the Father’s love, telling his disciples they must do the same. I tell you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, that you may be sons of your Father in heaven. … If you love those who love you, what reward will you get? (Matt 5:44-46).
Pagans love those who love them. That’s easy; anyone can do that. This other kind of love is much harder. St. Seraphim forgave the thieves who beat him up and left him bent over and crippled for life.
There are many other saints whose holiness consisted in forgiving those who hurt or persecuted them. They had a tender feeling towards their persecutors, a sorrow for their suffering and for whatever was in them that drove them to sin.
Be perfect … as your heavenly Father is perfect (Matt 5:48). It’s the same basic rule, the same fundamental law as in Leviticus 19. The perfection described here is in the context of love: a love so immense that, if you draw its boundary, no one is left out. All—good and bad, friend and enemy—are gathered within the boundary of this love.
One more scriptural quote: Ephesians 4:31 through 5:2.
Get rid of all bitterness, rage and anger, brawling and slander, along with every form of malice.
Be kind and compassionate to one another, forgiving each other as God, in Christ, forgave you. Be imitators of God, therefore, as dearly beloved children, and live a life of love, just as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us, as a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God.
We see here the same command, basically: "Be imitators of God … live a life of love … be kind and compassionate to one another."
If I understand her correctly, this is what Catherine means when she says that MH is to be a ‘wounded heart’, a listening heart.
We can become this only by relying on faith. We need to believe—profoundly, in the depths of our hearts—that God is full of hesed, of tender compassion towards us. Because he really is, you know!
It’s wise to ponder this divine quality until it becomes more and more real, and dominates our minds, and gets rid of all the illusions about God’s harshness, or indifference, or anger, or rejection, or whatever other falsehoods we nurse in our hearts .
He will do his part to take these lies out of us. Once we have the truth of God’s love firmly grasped, we can imitate it. Or try to, again and again, every day. Day after day, year after year; decade after decade. It’s a long, hard road.
St. Seraphim entered a monastery before he was 20 years old. It wasn’t until he was in his 70’s that he came out of solitude and began to show this divine quality to others. He went through long years in the crucible of preparation.
For a time, he lived with his face veiled. He wouldn’t allow himself to look anybody in the face because he was trying to break down, or allow God to break down, all the resistance and coldness and indifference in himself.
We need to let this operation be done in us, to stay under the knife as this wound is opened up in us. The divine surgeon will do the job.
A piece of iron must stay on the anvil while the blacksmith pounds on it. The smithy will do the job; but we have to stay still. If we keep moving off the anvil (or operating table), he can’t do his work.
In a way, this mystery of umilenie, of compassionate love, is already a part of us. It is covenanted with us; it has been conferred in baptism. I am the vine, and you are the branches (John 15:5). By our baptism, we are united with Christ as the branch is to its trunk.
Just as the life which animates the trunk also flows into the branch and animates it—to bring forth the leaf, the blossom, the fully ripened fruit—so the life which animates Jesus is flowing into us, energizing us, bringing forth in us the good fruits of Jesus’ life.
Above all, it enkindles in us the same merciful love that was the motivating force in Christ, the quality of everything he did. It flows from his wounded heart to our wounded hearts, as a continual source of renewal and communion.
It is hard and painful; there is no question about it. It is only if we can see it as a fullness of life, the peak of living, that we can take it on.
Be imitators of God as dearly beloved children, and live a life of love (Eph 5:1).
Do this and you will live (Luke 10:28).
India Diary - Part 1
PASSAGE TO INDIA
"If you look out the left side of the aircraft, you will see several white peaks on the horizon. Mount Everest is in the middle."
It was at this point, even more than when we’d landed in New Delhi the day before, that I realized I had entered one of the most mysterious parts of the world—Nepal, Bhutan, Northeast India—and was nearing our destination of Assam where Theresa Davis, Mark Schlingerman and I were to give two retreats.
How did Madonna House ever get invited to Assam? First of all, get out your map. Find the northeast corner of India. It’s bordered by Bhutan and China on the north, Bangladesh on the west, and Myanmar (Burma) on the east.
The region comprises ten dioceses, with more than 60 tribal groupings. There’s no traditional common language. We were impressed, as we got to know the priests and religious there, at how they are able to learn several languages for their missionary work.
How did we come to be invited there? The story really starts when Archbishop Thomas Menamparampil was a Salesian seminarian who’d read of his founder in The Triumphant March of Don Bosco, a book by a Eddie Doherty. At the time, he didn’t know about Eddie, Catherine, or MH. But later, as Bishop of Dibrugrh in Assam, he was traveling around India and met Linda Lambeth and Helen Schreiner, two MH staff who were visiting friends there. They travelled together for over a week. That’s when Bishop Thomas met MH.
He began getting MH books and financial aid for his missions. He later visited Combermere on two occasions.
Bishop Thomas is one of the outstanding missionary bishops of India, and was chosen to be secretary of the 1998 Asian Synod in Rome. He is much in demand throughout Asia to speak on the subject of missions. In fact, just after our retreats in his diocese, he was off to Myanmar to give a retreat himself.
Even more than these indications, it was the enormous amount of time he gave to us during our stay that revealed his fatherly care. He came to all our retreat sessions, had many meals with us, and took Mark and me on a tour of some of his missions. We all know how busy bishops are, and yet he gave us most generously of his time.
Generosity and zeal are the words that kept coming to us during our stay, not only regarding the bishop but the many priests and religious we met as well.
I met a priest who had baptized 43,000 people. He was over 70 years old, and in the process of learning yet another language so he could enter a new missionary area.
Another priest I met had baptized 23,000; and I’m sure many other priests, religious and catechists have large numbers of baptisms to thank God for. It seems that the whole Church eats, sleeps, prays, and thinks evangelization.
We encountered a new, young Church, moving outward with great zeal and love to preach the Good News of Jesus to the tribes of the Northeast. Many of the priests and sisters come from Kerala, the Catholic South of India.
No doubt they could have a more secure, less demanding life in that more populous Catholic region, but they choose to spend their lives helping to spread the Gospel in this newly tilled soil of the Lord’s vineyard.
A growing majority of sisters and priests are native to the Northeast, and this fact bodes well for a Church solidly rooted in its own soil.
Many missions are accessible only on foot. Often the sisters go to a mission for several weeks, and then train catechists to continue the instructions. Priests are scarce. One parish had over a hundred mission stations to cover, so the priests get to each one only every few months for the liturgy and sacraments. Often, marriage ceremonies are performed en masse at the main parish.
To work in this area takes great courage. You may have read recently about acts of terrorism in this part of the world. In Assam, it’s not so much a religious persecution (though such is being instigated now from outside) but rather people seeking money who believe the Church is wealthy. I met three priests who’d had guns put to their heads for money.
Recently a priest was kidnapped, held for a number of weeks, then (happily) released. We were impressed not only by their zeal, but also by their courage. The bishops give them the option to leave. But most of the clergy and religious stay, saying that the people suffer from these acts of terrorism, and they want to stay united with them, to help them and suffer with them.
This gives you a taste of the kind of Church we were entering as we flew past Mount Everest. Now for the details.
We were in India in the fall of 1998. Since first meeting Linda and Helen, Bishop Thomas had become the archbishop of Guwahati, a large diocese where the international airport is located.
In keeping with his great hospitality, he himself met Theresa and me at the airport. (Mark arrived a few days later.) After we had a few hours of rest and relaxation, he drove us from the extreme heat there to cooler Shillong, a mile-high city to the south, where we were to give our second retreat after Guwahati.
As he was scheduled to attend a bishops’ conference in Shillong, the timing worked out well for him, and the coolness for us. The city was one of those cool ‘resorts’ the British had discovered. You can still see their golf courses, sports stadiums, mansions, and government buildings.
Theresa and I stayed at the major seminary, and were impressed with the large number of vocations. In three days we gave talks to a various groups—the seminarians themselves, some novices of several religious congregations, and a number of sisters.
Theresa and I were taken to meet the bishops who were in conference. So, within a few days of our arrival, we met the Church of the Northeast in the persons of its bishops, seminarians, and many religious.
to be continued
The Father’s Plan - Part 4
TOWARD THE PROMISED LAND
May the joy of the Easter celebration fill the hearts of each of you.
Many of you, I know, will receive this issue of Restoration during or after the Easter Triduum. Did you notice how the special readings of the Easter Vigil celebrate the plan of salvation that God promised us and promoted during the history of the Old Testament? It is this mystery of God’s love that we hope to continue exploring in this column throughout the rest of the year.
Last month we discussed the great moment in history when God called Abraham to be the father of God’s chosen people. This event was the great sign of faith in God and trust in his promises.
The Vigil readings recall Abraham’s great faith, shown in his willingness to sacrifice his son Isaac, even though it seemed contrary to what God had promised. God, of course, stopped Abraham before any blood was shed. This incident was always regarded as a key moment for our Jewish forefathers. The Church Fathers saw it as a foreshadowing of God’s willingness to let his own Son be killed for us.
This month, we look at the next stage in this growing relationship with God. As we read in Deuteronomy 26, each member of God’s people coming to make an offering of the year’s harvest to God was to recall their common history, saying: My father was a wandering Aramean; he went down into Egypt and lived there as an alien, few in number, and there he became a great nation mighty and populous. These events happened to the twelve sons of Jacob, the great-grandchildren of Abraham.
In Genesis 37, we see how God brings good out of evil. Joseph has been sold by his brothers to a passing caravan, and taken to Egypt to be auctioned off as a slave. But God’s gifts to Joseph cause him to become an official in the Pharaoh’s government and be placed in charge of the country’s food supplies.
Because of a drought, his brothers come from their land to get food. Since they do not recognize Joseph, he is able to trick them into bringing their father and the rest of their family on a return journey to Egypt.
He then reveals who is really is, and works it out so they all can stay in Egypt and live there. This enables them to grow from a wandering tribe into a populous nation.
Deuteronomy 26:6-10 tells how, later on, God lets this prosperous tribe be oppressed and forced into slavery. God knows that human beings tend to become more united and concerned for each another when they’re forced to work together for their very survival. In this way, the Israelites develop into a close-knit group and are ready to leave Egypt when God raises up their next great leader, Moses.
We all know the story: how the baby Moses was placed in a basket at the edge of the Nile River so he’d be found by the Egyptian princess and taken into her household.
Thus, God—in his loving plan for his people—helps Moses learn something about governing a nation and prepares him for the special work he is to do.
When the time is ripe, God—working through Moses and his brother Aaron—gets Pharaoh to allow the children of Abraham to leave Egypt.
In the readings of the Easter Vigil, we recall how the Lord leads his people through the Red Sea, and lets the waters flow back and drown the army of Pharaoh that had been sent to stop them from leaving.
The desert experience was difficult for the people but, with God’s help, Moses brings them to Mount Sinai. There, God enters into a new covenant with them, giving the Ten Commandments to Moses.
When these directives are explained to the people, they agree in solemn ceremony to enter into a new covenant with God: he is to be their God and they are to be his people.
Under Moses’ leadership, God now would lead them toward the Promised Land, which he had once pledged to Abraham, where they are to serve God in freedom and prosperity.
Unfortunately, the initial fervor of the people doesn’t last long. While Moses is back up the mountain, working out the details of this new covenant with God, the people begin to get tired of waiting. So they collectd golden utensils and jewelry, and make a golden calf to be their god.
This difficulty is eventually resolved and the covenant restored; but it sets an unfortunate pattern of behavior among the people.
Later on, despite the leadership of Moses, they begin to complain of their hardships in the desert, and demand to be taken back to Egypt. They do not trust God, and refuse to enter boldly into the Promised Land given the opportunity.
Because of this, God requires them to live out in the desert for a longer time, and keeps them alive there with a daily ration of manna from the sky. After a 40-year sojourn in the desert, God lets them cross the River Jordan and enter the Promised Land.
From the hills on the eastern side of the Jordan, Moses can see this new land in the distance, but he dies before it can enter it. It is Joshua, their new leader, who brings the chosen people into the Promised Land—and they finally establish themselves in the place which God had promised to Abraham.
All of this is recalled in the offering prayer of Deuteronomy 26:6-10.
The Lord brought us out of Egypt with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm, and with signs and wonders; he brought us into this place and gave us this land, a land flowing with milk and honey.
So now I bring you the first of the fruit of the ground that you, O Lord, have given me.
Next month we will see how the covenant between God and his people develops as they grow into a nation in this land that God had given them; and how they prepare for the fulfillment of God’s promise to send them a Savior.
St Benedict’s Acres
LIGHTED OFFERING
At Easter, I’m struck that, in a darkened chapel, one may more easily see how brilliant and far-reaching the light from the Paschal candle is.
This candle is but a cylinder of wax and wick until, blessed by the priest, it is touched by the living flame of the new fire, and the light of Christ erupts.
We’ve waited many days for this moment. The holy night has arrived. Christ takes possession of this wax candle. His light blazes out and pushes back the darkness.
It also penetrates the top several inches of the wax, illuminating it from within.
We, as the body of Christ, are like that wax. The flame uses the wax to shine out more brightly. The light of Christ penetrates our ‘wax’, takes possession of it.
Yet there is a portion of the candle, of us, that remains darkened, beyond the reach of the light. It awaits his light.
Slowly, during this season of Easter, the light reaches into the deeper places of our hearts, and sends its pure glow throughout our lives.
His light penetrates us and illumines the night of the world all around us. The candle burns for a long time, yet it—and we—are slowly being consumed, transformed.
Our wax is spent in feeding the light. We become a lighted offering, all light, a living flame. This light is a witness to the grace that has illuminated us and possessed us, has taken up its rest in us.
My prayer this Easter is: "Come, Lord, take possession of my heart. Come, Holy Spirit, take possession of the wax of my life. Jesus, take up thy rest in my heart, that I may always rest in thy heart."
The Pope’s Corner
LOVE STRONGER THAN DEATH
We continue to print excerpts from the papal encyclical Dives in Misericordia (Rich in Mercy) in this Year of the Father.
In the section, the Holy Father writes of how the passion, death, and resurrection of Christ are the most definitive and profound demonstration of the merciful love of God the Father.
The death of Christ on Calvary is a witness to the strength of evil against the very Son of God, against the one who, alone among all the sons of men, was by his nature absolutely innocent and free from sin, and whose coming into the world was untainted by the disobedience of Adam and the inheritance of original sin.
Here, precisely in Christ, justice is done to sin at the price of his sacrifice, of his obedience ‘even to death’. He who was without sin, God made into sin for our sake (2 Cor 5:21).
Justice is also brought to bear upon death, which from the beginning of man’s history had been allied to sin. Death has justice done to it at the price of the death of the one who was without sin and who alone was able—by means of his own death—to inflict death upon death.
In this way, the Cross of Christ, on which the Son, consubstantial with the Father, renders full justice to God is also a radical revelation of mercy, or rather of the love that goes against what constitutes the very root of evil in the history of man: sin and death.
The Cross is the most profound condescension of God to man and to what man—especially in difficult and painful moments—looks on as his unhappy destiny.
The Cross is like a touch of eternal love upon the most painful wounds of man’s earthly existence; it is the total fulfillment of the messianic program that Christ once formulated in the synagogue at Nazareth: the revelation of merciful love for the poor, the suffering and prisoners, for the blind, the oppressed and sinners.
In the paschal mystery, the limits of the many-sided evil in which man becomes a sharer during his earthly existence are surpassed: the Cross of Christ, in fact, makes us understand the deepest roots of evil, which are fixed in sin and death.
Thus the Cross becomes a sign of the end times. Only in the final fulfillment and definitive renewal of the world will love conquer, in all the elect, the deepest sources of evil, bringing as its fully mature fruit the kingdom of life and holiness and glorious immortality.
The foundation of this ‘eschatological fulfillment’ is already contained in the Cross of Christ and his death. The fact that Christ was raised on the third day constitutes the final sign of his messianic mission, a sign that perfects the entire revelation of merciful love in a world that is subject to evil.
At the same time, it constitutes the sign foretelling a new heaven and a new earth, when God will wipe away every tear from their eyes, there will be no more death, or mourning, no crying, nor pain, for the former things have passed away (Rev 21:1,4).
In this eschatological fulfillment, mercy will be revealed as love; while in human history, which is at the same time the history of sin and death, love must be revealed above all as mercy and must also be actualized as mercy.
Christ’s messianic program, the program of mercy, becomes in turn the program of the Church. At its very center there is always the Cross, for it is in the Cross that the revelation of merciful love attains its culmination.
Until the ‘former things pass away’, the Cross will remain the point of reference for the other words of John: Behold, I stand at the door and knock; if anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in and eat with him and he with me (Rev 3:20).
Christ, precisely as the Crucified One, is the Word who does not pass away, and he is the one who stands at the door and knocks at the heart of every man, without restricting his freedom, but seeking instead to draw from this very freedom love, which is not only an act of solidarity with the suffering Son of Man, but also a kind of ‘mercy’ shown by each one of us to the Son of the Eternal Father.
In the whole of the messianic program of Christ, in the whole revelation of mercy through the Cross, could man’s dignity be more highly respected and ennobled, for, in obtaining mercy, he is in a sense the one who at the same time ‘shows mercy’?
The paschal mystery is Christ at the summit of the revelation of the inscrutable mystery of God. It is precisely then that the words pronounced in the Upper Room are completely fulfilled: He who has seen me has seen the Father (John 14:9). In fact Christ, whom the Father did not spare for the sake of man and who in his passion and in the torment of the Cross was denied human mercy, has revealed in his Resurrection the fullness of the love that the Father has for him and, in him, for all people.
He is not God of the dead, but of the living (Mark 12:27). In his Resurrection Christ has revealed the God of merciful love, precisely because he accepted the Cross as the way to the Resurrection. It is for this reason that—when we recall the passion and death of Christ—our faith and hope are centered on the Risen One.
Here is the Son of God, who in his Resurrection experienced in a radical way mercy shown to himself, that is to say, the love of the Father which is more powerful than death. And it is also the same Christ, the Son of God, who at the end of his messianic mission—and in a certain sense, even beyond the end—reveals himself as the inexhaustible source of mercy, of the same love that, in a subsequent perspective of the history of salvation in the Church, is to be everlastingly confirmed as more powerful than sin.
The paschal Christ is the definitive incarnation of mercy, its living sign. In the same spirit, the liturgy of Eastertide places on our lips the words: Forever I will sing the mercy of the Lord (Ps 89:2).
A Meditation
DOWNLOADING GRACE
Adoration… I look at the Blessed Sacrament. The monstrance reminds me of a microphone, like something one can speak into. Early microphones resembled monstrances very much—the active or live element being in the center of an elaborate holder.
Modems… are devices used to move information from one place to another by changing its form.
Eyes… are a form of modem. They transmit light and motion, sending huge amounts of information to our brains.
Microphones… are another form of modem. They move a voice over a wire. Monstrance, microphone, hmm, I wonder:
Is the monstrance, too, ‘modem’; one that transports grace? It certainly looks the part; like a microphone, it seems ready to be spoken into. A device for two-way communication.
Scripture says that the eye is the lamp of the body (Matt 6:22). The latest modems now use light to transfer information, instead of electricity.
In adoration, I keep my eyes fastened on the Blessed Sacrament in the monstrance. I ask myself why. Perhaps the two modems—eye and monstrance—are connected by the simple act of looking.
I can connect with another person across a crowded room, just by looking at them. Yes, eyes are a type of modem, enabling us to communicate.
I need to look at television, to experience the show. I need to look you in the eye to really ‘hear’ all you’re saying.
Adore… The shepherd came to lay down their gifts and adore Jesus in the manger. They looked at him, not briefly, but steadily. They gazed intently—fully attentive to his every movement and expression. I ask myself: When am I ever in such a state of adoration? And what (or whom) do I adore in this way, attentive to every movement?
Worship … This word is related to adoration. What does it mean to worship idols? I ponder these words: monstrance, microphone, modem, eyes … looking, connecting, adoring, worshiping.
Considering all this, I look steadily at the Blessed Sacrament in the monstrance. I see a piece of bread; my eyes—my God-given ‘internal modem’—are connected to the Blessed Sacrament for the rest of the hour.
I have a friend who used his computer to ‘download’ a file for me, via his modem. It was slow—it took an hour!—but a large amount of information was exchanged.
As I gaze at the Blessed Sacrament, I think: I’m ‘downloading’ too (so to speak). I’m receiving grace and peace, understanding and knowledge, friendship and love—and Jesus himself!—during this hour while I’m ‘connected’ to him via my eyes, my God-given modem, the lamp of my body.
I continue to gaze. I make an effort not to close my eyes, but to keep looking intently and to stay connected for a whole hour. I am focused, speaking slowly (in my heart) into the ‘microphone’—the monstrance. It is time of listening, speaking, listening again; of staying connected.
I want that file. I want it so badly! I want it saved in my heart.
It takes an hour.
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