A Tour of the Madonna House Training Centre

Artists, Artwork and Handicrafts

Now, let's proceed on our tour of Madonna House to St. Raphael's, the building where our artists work in weaving, pottery, painting and any number of various handicrafts. How their work is a part of living the Gospel has its roots in Catherine Doherty's ideas. Let's listen now, to her thoughts about this area:

I see the Madonna House artists as humble, merciful, tender, and gentle to all they meet, to each other, and to themselves. I see them forming a community of love where they work, which blends into the larger community of love in Madonna House. They must also share their talents, as the rich man must share his gold with those who have nothing.

Their medium for sharing is the clay of their humanity. Their talent is God's own spittle. They mix the two together and put it on the eyes of others, to give sight to the blind who do not yet understand or appreciate what art is — who do not know that creativeness is one of the needs of man and one of the gifts of God to man. Yes, to create is to be at peace, for in creating one is joined with the Creator.

The artists of the handicraft department in Madonna House are charged by Christ with two things. First, to gather up the fragments lest they be lost. It should be very important for them to help sort donations. They must not turn up their noses when they see what appears to them ‘junk.’ The ‘junk’ God puts into their hands is, again, a sort of clay. He says, ‘Behold, I took clay and fashioned you. Now I give you lumps of clay. Fashion beauty for me, the beauty I saw in man when I first fashioned him. Let your beauty reflect some of my own glory, some of my own beauty.’

It is their task to gather up the fragments and to restore, to make new. This is what God does — he constantly restores us, constantly makes us new.

Secondly, the artists of Madonna House must be ingenious with the ingenuity of love. They must be able to use materials that other people might reject. One man's scrap is another man's gold. Artists know they are creatures. They know they have to lean on God. They know that God is the great Artist. They know that if they are in love with God, they too will be ingenious with the ingenuity of love.

No matter which way the vision of the apostolate grows, it will always deal with little things, humble things. It may be a chair, a tool, a lump of clay, a few stones. Our blind eyes at first do not recognize such things as beauty wrought by God's hands. The artists must help people to recognize them.

The artists must also be aware of the abundant material in nature — flowers and driftwood for example, out of which they can fashion beautiful things.

Every person in Madonna House — but in a special way the artists — must live in the truth. They must live in truth with God, with themselves, and with the world, because it is to the world that they have to convey the truth. What form this truth will take will depend on each individual artist. But whatever it is, it must be expressive of the Word — the Word in ceramics, the Word in painting, the Word in charcoal.

Now, by this I do not mean that we should only do religious art. We have a member of our staff who weaves primitive pictures about nature, to which she feels very close. They convey the presence of God in this world. They convey the sense of truth and a strange reality which, by the grace of God, passes through the mind, heart, and imagination of a young girl. They are very beautiful. They are not religious art in the strict sense of the word. Yet, they remind people that God is the Creator.

Let our apostolate, then, be proficient in all kinds of art and handicrafts. As our vision of the apostolate grows, we realize more deeply that we are pilgrims of the Lord, walking with prayer as our staff and charity and service as our cloak.

You can view some of the works of our Madonna House artists on our “Special Features” page.

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