Here There Are Lions

Happy Candlemas!

2010-02-02T12:19:00.001-05:00

Here's a re-post of the podcast I did a couple of years ago at Candlemas. It's the second anniversary of our parochial vicar's passing from this life.

~A reflection on when a priest dies on the Feast of Candlemas.

Click here to listen

A Song for Simeon

~by T.S. Eliot

Lord, the Roman hyacinths are blooming in bowls and
The winter sun creeps by the snow hills;
The stubborn season has made stand.
My life is light, waiting for the death wind,
Like a feather on the back of my hand.
Dust in sunlight and memory in corners
Wait for the wind that chills towards the dead land.

Grant us thy peace.
I have walked many years in this city,
Kept faith and fast, provided for the poor,
Have taken and given honour and ease.
There went never any rejected from my door.

Who shall remember my house, where shall live my children’s children
When the time of sorrow is come ?
They will take to the goat’s path, and the fox’s home,
Fleeing from the foreign faces and the foreign swords.

Before the time of cords and scourges and lamentation
Grant us thy peace.
Before the stations of the mountain of desolation,
Before the certain hour of maternal sorrow,
Now at this birth season of decease,
Let the Infant, the still unspeaking and unspoken Word,
Grant Israel’s consolation
To one who has eighty years and no to-morrow.

According to thy word,
They shall praise Thee and suffer in every generation
With glory and derision,
Light upon light, mounting the saints’ stair.
Not for me the martyrdom, the ecstasy of thought and prayer,
Not for me the ultimate vision.
Grant me thy peace.

(And a sword shall pierce thy heart,
Thine also).

I am tired with my own life and the lives of those after me,
I am dying in my own death and the deaths of those after me.
Let thy servant depart,
Having seen thy salvation.

A Good Confession

2009-01-01T18:14:00.000-05:00

The chains that have bound me are flung to the wind,
By the mercy of God the poor slave is set free;
And the strong grace of heaven breathes fresh o’er the mind,
Like the bright winds of summer that gladden the sea.

There was nought in God’s world half so dark or so vile
As the sin and bondage that fettered my soul;
There was nought half so base as the malice and guile
Of my own sordid passions, or Satan’s control.

For years I have borne about hell in my breast;
When I thought of my God it was nothing but gloom;
Day brought me no pleasure, night gave me no rest,
There was still the grim shadow of horrible doom.

It seemed as if nothing less likely could be
Than that light should break in on a dungeon so deep;
To create a new world were less hard than to free
The slave from his bondage, the soul from its sleep.

But the Word had gone forth, and said, Let there be light,
And it flashed through my soul like a sharp passing smart;
One look to my Savior, and all the dark night,
Like a dream scarce remembered, was gone from my heart.

I cried out for mercy, and fell on my knees,
And confessed, while my heart with keen sorrow was wrung;
‘Twas the labor of minutes, and years of disease
Fell as fast from my soul as the words from my tongue.

And now, blest be God and the sweet Lord who died!
No deer on the mountain, no bird in the sky,
No bright wave that leaps on the dark bounding tide,
Is a creature so free or so happy as I.

All hail, then, all hail, to the dear Precious Blood,
That hath worked these sweet wonders of mercy in me;
May each day countless numbers throng down to its flood,
And God have His glory, and sinners go free.

~Frederick W. Faber

The Grandeur of Death

2008-12-30T17:06:00.003-05:00

The row of windshields coruscated in the spent afternoon light, shadows lengthening at the summer day's end. A long line of flashing taillights warned that I was imminent upon a funeral procession. Cars in the opposite direction were stopped along the side of the road, a final salutation to the soul whose body was about to be laid in its final resting place. Other cars rushed past almost in protest at the languorous pace of traffic, as if the precious moments of courtesy would cheat them out of their urgent destination.

It was a jarring sight, those cars failing to stop at this moment of solemn passing: a human being whose earthly course had run was now returning to his Creator. A soul loved by God as no others could have loved, pursued and wooed to the end by the God whose very thought created this being. How could anyone fail to stop and acknowledge this moment of grandeur? But perhaps in the failure is an element of denial, a frenzy that keeps at bay the overarching fact that each of us, too, must meet this fate.

I wondered if this person had died in the friendship of God, if he had responded to the impulses of grace freely given, if he learned to speak with God with a quality of intimacy and ease that he had with his loved ones. Or did he die in rejection of the untiring call of God? At least, judging by the number of cars in the procession, he was held in esteem by a good number of people. Enough of them understood this auspicious moment of passing.

The procession snaked its way in the country lane, passing through towering spires of cornstalks rustling in the warm, gentle breeze. How many times did this person pass through these roads? Did his eyes behold these sights of rural beauty? And did he breathe in the joys of the life of simplicity so steadfastly lived in these bucolic parts? Or were the cares of the farming life so burdensome that death, in a way, was a welcome rest from the unrelenting pace?

I will never know the answer to the questions. But that did not stop my wondering as I slowed my car to match the mourners’ pace. Behind me, more cars added to the length of the line. Lord, have mercy upon him, this sinner whom you have called back to yourself, I prayed. May angels greet him at his coming.

The procession turned off at a major branch in the road. Soon, I was released from my brief role as mourner in this drama of death, returned to my own exigencies to arrive at my own temporary destination. Yet for the brief moment, time was suspended in the contemplation of the story of this soul, his pilgrimage ended. How easy it is to overlook the import of moments like these, wrapped up as we are in our own rituals and personal dramas. It is the genius of civilization that we have funeral customs of acknowledging the significance of the life just ended.

I have often contemplated what it means to be in the friendship of God. St. Gregory of Nyssa wrote about being a friend of God, the end of all intelligent creatures is the restoration of the original condition. Friendship expresses the absence of hostility or animosity. There is a likeness in thoughts and desires, and even more than likeness, a sharing of sympathies and compassions. The words "sympathy" and "compassion" imply a deep awareness of another's feelings and passions. To be friends with God then, is to long for the things he longs for, to care deeply for the things that he cares for. Both Abraham and Moses are described in Scipture as being friends of God.

Friendship involves an abiding in each other's lives. And this abiding calls to mind what Christ said about the True Vine. In this rich imagery, Christ gives us a picture of clinging, of growing, of being nourished upon the True Vine. This clinging quality is borne out in the virtue of faithfulness to God. So in the end, friendship with God is faithfulness and loyalty to God in all things. We must constantly ask ourselves if we as branches show forth the fruit of God's constant and meticulous care. Do we see and find God in all circumstances? And do we live the deep joy that comes in knowing him as he is, all adorable and all true, God in his all-surpassing greatness?

Or are we like the vines that bore bitter fruit or no fruit at all whom the Vinedresser mourned over as he pruned them off the Vine? Do our words and actions bespeak of the faithfulness of God in our lives? I often think that we rather like to dwell in the perversity of our anger and bitterness because that is all we are familiar with. In clinging to our anger, we cut off the grace that God desires to pour into our lives so that we may grow. What is reflected back to us is full of anger and anxiety that is far from the reality of life in Christ. And yet God constantly calls us to fruitfulness that reflects the hope of glory even in the most adverse of conditions. The holiness to which we are all called to live as Christians must show forth fruit if we truly believe in the Resurrection power of the Cross. Indeed, the daily dying to ourselves and our passions is an abandonment to the Holy Spirit who roots out the bitter passions of our former life as slaves to sin and death and refashions us into the image of the Son who bore the bitterest of passions for our sake. It is a cosmic paradox, this dying to take up eternal life hidden in the life of Christ.

In death, we are confronted with the only question that matters. Did we live the life of grace that bore fruit in

The Confirmed

2008-05-21T12:05:00.006-04:00

In honor of our Confirmation Class who is receiving the Sacrament of Confirmation this evening from our Bishop, here is Rainer Maria Rilke's poem which was composed in Paris in May 1903. The photo is from the Liturgia website of Schola St. Cecile on the occasion of Confirmations at Saint-Eugène in France.

In white veils the confirmed enter
deeply into the new green of the garden
They have survived their childhood,
and what comes now will be something changed.

So let it come! Does not now the interim begin,
the wait for the next striking of the hour?
The festival is gone, and noises fill the house,
and more slowly the afternoon drags by...

That was an arising to the white gown
and then through the streets an adorned walking
and a church, cool inside like silk,
and the long candles were like avenues,
and all lights glittered like jewelry
gazed at by festive eyes.

And it was silent when the chant began:
like clouds it rose inside the dome
and grew bright in its descent; and softer
than rain fell into the white children.
And their white fluttered as in the breeze,
and grew lightly colored in its folds
and seemed to hold hidden flowers--:
flowers and birds, stars and strange figures
from an old ring of stories, far away.

And outside was a day of blue and green
with a shout of red at bright places.
The pond kept retreating in small waves,
and with the wind came a distant flowering
and sang of gardens outside at the city's edge.

It was as if things wreathed themselves,
they stood brightly--infinitely light and calm;
a feeling was in every housefront,
and many window opened up and shone.

~from The Book of Images, Rainer Maria Rilke

In Hora Mortis Nostræ Podcast

2008-02-20T13:38:00.008-05:00

Click to listen

A deviation from our normal poetry podcast, here is a reflection on my experience at a prayer vigil for life.

It is late on the night of the tenth day of the 40 days for life prayer vigil. The half-lidded moon shines down upon us, thin clouds veiling its cold white light...but the pale yellow light from the street lamps dimly illuminates our faces. The bare branches of the oak tree eeriely silhouetted against the darkened inky blue sky, the branch tips splayed like gnarly fingers.. We are praying the rosary, eight souls standing at the bottom of the hill facing the darkened menace of the tower beneath which was housed a killing place. Our prayers fall softly from our lips, the night air muting our voices. We finish the Sorrowful Mysteries and after a short parting conversation, we disperse, our relief crew walking up the hill. We know that tomorrow, we will return.

Summer's Day Podcast

2008-02-12T11:46:00.000-05:00

For Valentine's Day, I'm reposting the podcast that started it all....

Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?
Thou art more lovely and more temperate.
Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,
And summer's lease hath all too short a date.
Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,
And often is his gold complexion dimm'd;
And every fair from fair sometime declines,
By chance or nature's changing course untrimm'd;
But thy eternal summer shall not fade
Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow'st;
Nor shall Death brag thou wander'st in his shade,
When in eternal lines to time thou grow'st:
So long as men can breathe or eyes can see,
So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.

~William Shakespeare

If you want to listen to me read the sonnet:

Stopping by the side of the road whilst traveling through Tuscany one brilliant morning in May

Nunc Dimittis Podcast

2008-02-06T23:24:00.000-05:00

~A reflection on when a priest dies on the Feast of Candlemas.

Click here to listen

A Song for Simeon

~by T.S. Eliot

Lord, the Roman hyacinths are blooming in bowls and
The winter sun creeps by the snow hills;
The stubborn season has made stand.
My life is light, waiting for the death wind,
Like a feather on the back of my hand.
Dust in sunlight and memory in corners
Wait for the wind that chills towards the dead land.

Grant us thy peace.
I have walked many years in this city,
Kept faith and fast, provided for the poor,
Have taken and given honour and ease.
There went never any rejected from my door.

Who shall remember my house, where shall live my children’s children
When the time of sorrow is come ?
They will take to the goat’s path, and the fox’s home,
Fleeing from the foreign faces and the foreign swords.

Before the time of cords and scourges and lamentation
Grant us thy peace.
Before the stations of the mountain of desolation,
Before the certain hour of maternal sorrow,
Now at this birth season of decease,
Let the Infant, the still unspeaking and unspoken Word,
Grant Israel’s consolation
To one who has eighty years and no to-morrow.

According to thy word,
They shall praise Thee and suffer in every generation
With glory and derision,
Light upon light, mounting the saints’ stair.
Not for me the martyrdom, the ecstasy of thought and prayer,
Not for me the ultimate vision.
Grant me thy peace.

(And a sword shall pierce thy heart,
Thine also).

I am tired with my own life and the lives of those after me,
I am dying in my own death and the deaths of those after me.
Let thy servant depart,
Having seen thy salvation.

Blow, blow, thou Winter Wind

2008-01-19T21:06:00.000-05:00

Blow, blow, thou winter wind,
Thou art not so unkind
As man's ingratitude;
Thy tooth is not so keen,
Because thou art not seen,
Although thy breath be rude.
Heigh ho! sing, heigh ho! unto the green holly:
Most friendship is feigning, most loving mere folly:
Then heigh ho, the holly!
This life is most jolly.

Freeze, freeze, thou bitter sky,
That dost not bite so nigh
As benefits forgot:
Though thou the waters warp,
Thy sting is not so sharp
As friend remember'd not.
Heigh ho! sing, heigh ho! unto the green holly:
Most friendship is feigning, most loving mere folly:
Then heigh ho, the holly!
This life is most jolly.

from As You Like it, by William Shakespeare

photo from Argent's collection

Wounded by love

2008-01-16T15:08:00.000-05:00

Oh, I so need this quote from yesterday's Divine Office.

What, I ask, is more wonderful than the beauty of God? What thought is more pleasing and wonderful than God’s majesty? What desire is as urgent and overpowering as the desire implanted by God in a soul that is completely purified of sin and cries out in its love: I am wounded by love? The radiance of divine beauty is altogether beyond the power of words to describe.

~from St. Basil the Great's Rule for Monks

I am simultaneously reading John Saward's Beauty of Holiness and the Holiness of Beauty and von Balthasar's Glory of the Lord. There is so much in me that needs purifying, the interior burning up so that I may be more receptive to hearing God clearly. It's so easy to fall into the trap of self-satisfaction. How much I need humility. I suppose that's why I'm grateful to be teaching because it's always a reminder that to be a truly good teacher, one must first be a student.

Tonight, we will begin discussing the Our Father using Pope Benedict's Jesus of Nazareth. Zadok asked me before Christmas to meditate on how Christ's earthly ministry was a continuous prayer and dialogue with the Father. I thought about how that relates to the Our Father. What a privilege then it is to prayer it as Christ himself gave us the words. And in Pope Benedict's book, he says that

...we must also keep in mind that the Our Father originates from his own praying, from the Son's dialogue with the Father. This mean that it reaches down into depths far beyond the words.

Pope Benedict goes on with his catechesis in showing that in Jesus' submitting himself to God's will, we come to know the mind and will of God himself, most eloquently in the Garden of Gethsemane and on the Cross.

Imminent

2008-01-08T21:50:00.000-05:00

As if I needed another excuse to go to Rome, this event I wouldn't miss for the world.

Beatification of Cardinal Newman imminent.

Update:
Beatifications are now done at particular churches, so this beatification won't be in Rome. Although the Beatification of the Spanish Martyrs which happened just recently was at St. Peter's Square. The Church is returning to the former practice of beatifications at the local church and then Canonization at St. Peter's. Thanks to Fr. Z's explanation.

Against the Grain

2008-01-07T13:18:00.000-05:00

We are in the season of Epiphany, though in the Ordinary Form of the Mass it's back to "Ordinary Time". My family still celebrates the season according to the Old Calendar.

So our Christmas tree remains in place until the Feast of the Purification of the Blessed Virgin Mary also known as the Feast of the Presentation. We normally don't put up Christmas decorations until after Advent IV, but since we were away this year for Advent IV and Christmas, our house was bare of Christmas joy. So when we returned within the Octave of Christmas, the house was greened and Christmas cheer was put in place just as the neighbors were tossing their trees out and putting up banners of hearts and the like.

We're feeling quite counter-cultural, conspiratorial almost, being out of step with the world's chronos, but feeling just right in kairos.

It was amusing, at first, to see the giant inflatable Christmas decorations, especially those of the Grinch. But the amusement turned to distaste after a house, which we drive by everyday, displayed a giant inflatable creche. How totally crass, to cutify the Nativity in such a banal way...yes, it was in between a giant polar bear and a giant snowglobe. Then the cold snap came, deflating them. I may have to confess the sense of gloating that I indulged in.

Egg nog is on sale, and we're happily buying up quarts. And Christmas songs and chants still ring through our home. The mantle still has boughs of Frazier pine and red berries, and the window lights still shine to welcome the Christ Child.

Very, very soon, we will celebrate Septuagesima Sunday when the Alleluia will be buried and be put away in preparation for the austerity of Lent.

We have a few weeks yet of celebrating which will then be closed with the chanting of the beautiful Lumen ad revelationem gentium, one of my favorite plainchants.

Lumen ad revelationem gentium, et gloriam plebis tuæ Israel. Nunc dimittis servum tuum, Domine, secundum verbum tuum in pace. Quia viderunt oculi mei salutare tuum. Quod parasti ante faciem omnium populorum.

A Light revealed to the Gentiles and the glory of Thy people Israel. Now Thou dost dismiss Thy servant, O Lord, according to Thy word in peace; because my eyes have seen Thy salvation, which Thou hast pre¬pared before the face of all peoples.

Happy Second Day of the Octave of Epiphany!

UPDATE:
Zadok just tried to post a comment and somehow Blogger isn't co-operating. Here's what he said (thanks for the illumination, Z):

We're not back into Ordinary Time yet. The week after the Epiphany is still Christmastide according to the liturgical books. White vestments are worn and the Christmas or Epiphany prefaces are used.

Seeking the Light

2008-01-06T12:09:00.001-05:00

Happy Feast of the Epiphany of Our Lord, dear friends! Forgive the dearth of posts here. Multiferous tasks abounded the past quarter. Enjoy the day. We're emerging from a deep freeze (well, for us here in the South it's a deep freeze) and the water in the garden fountains and birdbaths are liquid again.

Journey of the Magi

2008-01-06T12:04:00.000-05:00

'A cold coming we had of it,
Just the worst time of the year
For a journey, and such a journey:
The ways deep and the weather sharp,
The very dead of winter.'
And the camels galled, sore-footed, refractory,
Lying down in the melting snow.
There were times we regretted
The summer palaces on slopes, the terraces,
And the silken girls bringing sherbet.
Then the camel men cursing and grumbling
And running away, and wanting their liquor and women,
And the night-fires going out, and the lack of shelters,
And the cities hostile and the towns unfriendly
And the villages dirty and charging high prices:
A hard time we had of it.
At the end we preferred to travel all night,
Sleeping in snatches,
With the voices singing in our ears, saying
That this was all folly.

Then at dawn we came down to a temperate valley,
Wet, below the snow line, smelling of vegetation;
With a running stream and a water-mill beating the
darkness,
And three trees on the low sky,
And an old white horse galloped in away in the meadow.
Then we came to a tavern with vine-leaves over the
lintel,
Six hands at an open door dicing for pieces of silver,
And feet kicking the empty wine-skins.
But there was no imformation, and so we continued
And arrived at evening, not a moment too soon
Finding the place; it was (you may say) satisfactory.

All this was a long time ago, I remember,
And I would do it again, but set down
This set down
This: were we led all that way for
Birth or Death? There was a Birth, certainly,
We had evidence and no doubt. I had seen birth and
death,
But had thought they were different; this Birth was
Hard and bitter agony for us, like Death, our death.
We returned to our places, these Kingdoms,
But no longer at ease here, in the old dispensation,
With an alien people clutching their gods.
I should be glad of another death.

~T.S. Eliot, 1927

Nativity

2007-12-25T18:39:00.000-05:00

Immensity cloistered in thy dear womb,
Now leaves His well-belov'd imprisonment,
There He hath made Himself to His intent
Weak enough, now into the world to come;
But O, for thee, for Him, hath the inn no room?
Yet lay Him in this stall, and from the Orient,
Stars and wise men will travel to prevent
The effect of Herod's jealous general doom.
Seest thou, my soul, with thy faith's eyes, how He
Which fills all place, yet none holds Him, doth lie?
Was not His pity towards thee wondrous high,
That would have need to be pitied by thee?
Kiss Him, and with Him into Egypt go,
With His kind mother, who partakes thy woe.

~John Donne

Random thoughts from a tired mind

2007-11-16T11:57:00.000-05:00

....Deer season...On my way home from a meeting in another town last night, I was made more aware of my guardian angel hard at work....The route wound around in the back roads, quickest route, but this time of the year, fraught with dangers of deer encounters of the close kind. "Deer-in-headlights" is an appropriate expression, not only for the fear that is reflected in Bambi-type beings, but for the paralysis that momentarily takes over said creature and human driver as well. Thank you, St. Michael and all angels for the extra hard work last night in keeping me safe. Three deer was plenty to keep me awake

....Incongruities...I drive past this Tae Kwon Do studio everyday which advertises on its marquee board all sorts of specials. This week it's: Get rid of the holiday fat, sign up for classes! God is Love. You see, no matter what the special or ad, always at the bottom is this reminder that God is Love. Sometimes it's comical and other times, in the midst of bumper-to-bumper traffic, the little reminder burrows into my consciousness and helps me bear the exigencies of living in a city with ever-expanding population stresses.

....Worst job in my book...also daily, I drive past a person in a smiling giant mobile phone costume waving at traffic. I am sure the person is a he by the vigor of the wave. There is a specific rhythm to his wave, a flinging from the wrist of quick, slow, slow, slow. Throughout the dreadfully hot summer season he was out there waving at cars passing by. I wonder how much business he has actually garnered, and what logic his boss might have used to rationalize such an excruciating torture. There are some days where I will wave back at him and he raises his arm to break that monotonous waving rhythm in acknowledgment. I hope that he is paid well for the effort. If not, then perhaps some day he'll remember the arduous work and appreciate all of life's gifts.

....Autumn colors....how they're more brilliant on grey days. And when you look up as wind sweeps down, the falling leaves almost remind you of falling snow. When it's rainy, and a wet sweet gum leaf falls on your face, it's almost like a hand caressing your face. Yesterday, it was wet, overcast, and cold. Today, it's windy, sunny, and loud with rustling. I love autumn.

....Angels among us...the youngest son of one of my closest friends loves the Mass. He is quite young and yet knows in his heart that he wants to be a priest. The day revolves around "playing Mass" with most prized possession, a child-sized Mass kit. For all his love of the liturgy, during the Canon, he becomes excruciatingly agitated and has to be taken out to be comforted. Finally, last week, my friend asked him why and he said, "Well, I see Jesus and the angels behind Father during the Prayer." It's easy to dismiss this statement as "precious" or "cute". But I wonder...Unless you become as a child...

....Still, small voice...sometimes, in the midst of life's crises, when one comes to the point of wondering how to manage the weight, God breaks through in the most exquisite stillness and quiet. There is an elegant simplicity to God's answer that makes you stop and breathe again, to make you realize that you have been holding your breath too long with the strength of your own efforts. "Come away, my love," he says. "Oh, but the field needs plowing," you say. "And who will bake the cakes if I don't." "Take my yoke upon you...." Yes, Lord.

....May your Friday devotions lead you to a greater love for the Cross of Christ and the Eucharist that makes Christ present.

Elegy Podcast

2007-11-07T23:25:00.000-05:00

I haven't forgetten the poetry podcast. In honor of November being Holy Souls month, the next one will be Rainer Maria Rilke's First Elegy from the Duino Elegies. Here's an excerpt.

The First Elegy from The Duino Elegies

It is truly strange to no longer inhabit the earth,
to no longer practice customs barely acquired,
not to give a meaning of human futurity
to roses, and other expressly promising things:
no longer to be what one was in endlessly anxious hands,
and to set aside even one’s own
proper name like a broken plaything.
Strange: not to go on wishing one’s wishes. Strange
to see all that was once in place, floating
so loosely in space. And it’s hard being dead,
and full of retrieval, before one gradually feels
a little eternity. Though the living
all make the error of drawing too sharp a distinction.
Angels (they say) would often not know whether
they moved among living or dead. The eternal current
sweeps all the ages, within it, through both the spheres,
forever, and resounds above them in both.

Relics of St. Andrew at Sant'Andrea, Amalfi, Italy

Why did I leave?

2007-11-05T15:14:00.000-05:00

It never fails that when a person continually rubs you the wrong way and challenges your ability to love, one day, out of the blue, they'll surprise you with the most piercing statement. And all the animosity which, you know you must for Christ's sake hold at bay, melts away like ice on a hot day.

She hobbled through the door last spring a half hour into class time. She made such an entrance that I knew here was Christ disguised. She was a fallen-away Catholic having spent decades dabbling, first with the Pentecostals, and then with the Mormons. She was trouble spelled out with capital letters.

Every question she asked was just this side of insane, but it was my duty to answer with as much charity and intelligence as I could muster. Eyes were upon me and I prayed constantly for patience. The times she was absent were times that I was relieved and the class seemed to be relieved as well. There was no pattern to her attendance, absent for weeks and then suddenly making an appearance, my heart sinking when she struggled into her seat. Then lifting bright eyes toward me, I would think that she looked suspiciously manic.

Incomprehensibly, she has an affection for me and treats me with warmth and respect. Guilt would wash over me whenever annoyance toward her would rise up. She would smile and say, "Hey, sweetie! How've you been?"

One of the more infamous discussions we had occurred when she wanted to know what little thing she needed to do to get the "prayer machine" to give what she wanted. It took all my self-control to not answer with sarcasm. My husband keeps reminding me that God brought her to this place and to this time and that I was "standing in the gap" for her. I am reminded of Isaiah: "A bruised reed he will not break, and a smoldering wick he will not snuff out."

She is that for me, that tender bruised reed trampled upon by life's vicissitudes. But desire for God smolders within her and though people tell me she doesn't belong in RCIA, I know my husband is right, that she is here now for a purpose.

I have spent the last three weeks teaching the catechumens about Real Presence and Eucharistic Adoration. I invited them to come to Holy Hour to learn about adoring Christ in the Blessed Sacrament. My Bruised Reed objected and demanded to know why she had never heard of Eucharistic Adoration before. She peppered me with questions as to how to go about making a Holy Hour. "How can you just stare at it for an hour? Isn't that like wasting time?" she asked. Silently, I gave thanks to Romano Guardini and said, "Yes, it is an hour of wasting time for God's sake." I gave her the simple Jesus Prayer to try doubting that she would come.

I should know better than to doubt, because last week, she came. And all throughout the hour her head was bowed in concentrated effort. After the Benediction, she hobbled toward me, embraced me and clung to me. She said, "That was the most beautiful thing I'd ever experienced. I just kept telling Jesus that I love him. Was that alright?"

Emotion caught in my throat. Yes, indeed, telling Jesus over and over about her love was adoration in its simplest and humblest form. She put me to shame with my stack of devotional books and purposeful Holy Hour. "Unless you become like a child..." I thought to myself. And here was my Bruised Reed with that simplicity of heart.

Yesterday at class she stunned me when she said, "Why did I leave the Faith? It's so beautiful. How could I not know how beautiful it is? Where was I all these years? I had it all along but didn't know it."

I caught my breath knowing it was a moment of transcendent encounter. I smiled at her and said, "Welcome back." Tears were running down her cheeks.

I knew then that we were there for each other's salvation.

Letters

2007-10-25T11:58:00.000-04:00

I'm having a long-running e-mail conversation with one of the Inquirers. He has an exacting mind, having been in military intelligence, and now is a trial lawyer. Whenever I receive a question from him, there's always a sense of exhilaration and trepidation at the same time. One of the things that I'm learning to exercise is the "listening" part to the questions. There's listening...hearing or reading the sequence of words and finding a corresponding answer from the knowledge base...and then there's perceiving what the real question is. This is where relying on and listening to the Holy Spirit comes in. Invariably, I'll ask him a question to make him clarify what he's asking. Which leads to more questions and eventually, we'll arrive at the heart of his question. I think he enjoys that I always answer him with a question and not a direct answer. I don't think he's trying to bait me because he's too intent on learning the Catholic faith.

For example, the "Why-does-God-allow-evil-to-exist" question which I thought he threw out in a casual manner and which I challenged him on, two exchanges later ended at "What's the real meaning of my life? Where am I going?" I answered him with the theology of the Mass. It was an unexpected answer for him, but one he cogitated over.

During class times, he'll surprise me when, in the usual round-table discussions, he'll answer a classmate's question with something that we had discussed in the e-mail letters, all the while looking me straight in the eyes with that trial-lawyer intensity making sure that what he was saying was on the right path. I'll answer him with a slight smile, then he'll lean back into his chair, put his steepled forefingers to his lips, and continue to stare at me. It's as though he's trying to will all that I know out of me. Most disconcerting at the beginning, but now it just amuses me.

Whenever he misses class, he'll make arrangements to make up that session, not wanting to miss anything, not even one crumb of class material. I'm humbled by his focus. His wife is a skeptic and so our conversations have changed to how to live the Catholic life with a spouse who doesn't believe. It's a subtle change, but a revolutionary one, from the casual inquirer to his Yes. On the other hand, there's nothing casual about him. The nonchalance is an opening gambit, putting out the feelers, so to speak.

Now, he has questions about St. Thomas More, discerning whether to ask him to be his patron saint. And he also wants to put his children in CCD. Last year, I may have greeted that with hesitation, but our new CCD director has changed focus with a return to the Baltimore Catechism.

I'm glad I said Yes to this job.

In Full Swing

2007-10-24T12:16:00.001-04:00

RCIA season is in full swing, and because we have a year-round program, I am teaching multiple tracks at the same time. Someone asked me once if I ever felt burned out by the sometimes fever-pitch of the teaching pace. It seemed an odd question then as it does now. Because if one were doing the will of God, then the grace to accomplish the task is infused into the doer of the task.

And certainly, being the unexpected catechist that I am, there is a greater reliance on my part on the grace of God for me to even begin to imagine how to go from day-to-day with the mounting responsibilities.

There is the legitimate question, however, of how does one nourish one's soul so that the teaching, an act of giving, doesn't become burdensome? Pope Benedict XVI's catechesis today on St. Ambrose, a saint whom I love and admire, had this to say about Ambrose and in it had a message for all catechists:

There was always a long line of people waiting to speak to Ambrose hoping to get comfort and hope. When Ambrose was not with these people (and these were only for short periods of time), it was only because he had to eat ['restore his body with the necessary food'] or feed his soul by reading.

In this respect, Augustine expressed wonder because Ambrose read Scriptures silently, only with his eyes (cfr Confess. 6,3). Indeed, in the early centuries of Christianity, reading Scriptures was thought of strictly in terms of being proclaimed, and reading aloud facilitated understanding even for the one who was reading it.

That Ambrose could read through the pages with his eyes only indicated to Augustine not just a singular manner of reading but a familiarity with Scriptures.

So, reading 'in a whisper'- where the heart is involved and achieves a knowledge of the Word of God - is the icon I referred to, in which one can see the method of Ambrosian catechesis: it is Scriptures itself, intimately assimilated, that suggests the content of what one must announce in order to achieve conversion of hearts.

Thus, going by the magisterium of Ambrose and Augustine, catechesis is inseparable from the testimony of one's life. The catechist may also avail of what I wrote in Introduction to Christianity about theologians: He who wishes to educate others in the faith cannot risk appearing like some sort of clown, who recites his lines by rote. Rather, to use an image dear to Origen, a writer who was particularly appreciated by Ambrose, he should be the like the beloved disciple, who rested his head on the Master's heart and there learned how to think, speak and act.

In the end, the true disciple is he who proclaims the Gospel in the most credible and effective way.

God's Grandeur Podcast

2007-10-13T13:50:00.000-04:00

Brodick Bay, Arran, Scotland

Click here to play

The Windhover
To Christ our Lord

I CAUGHT this morning morning’s minion, king-
    dom of daylight’s dauphin, dapple-dawn-drawn Falcon, in his riding
    Of the rolling level underneath him steady air, and striding
High there, how he rung upon the rein of a wimpling wing
In his ecstasy! then off, off forth on swing,
    As a skate’s heel sweeps smooth on a bow-bend: the hurl and gliding
    Rebuffed the big wind. My heart in hiding
Stirred for a bird,—the achieve of; the mastery of the thing!

Brute beauty and valour and act, oh, air, pride, plume, here
    Buckle! AND the fire that breaks from thee then, a billion
Times told lovelier, more dangerous, O my chevalier!

    No wonder of it: shéer plód makes plough down sillion
Shine, and blue-bleak embers, ah my dear,
    Fall, gall themselves, and gash gold-vermillion.

Pied Beauty

GLORY be to God for dappled things—
    For skies of couple-colour as a brinded cow;
       For rose-moles all in stipple upon trout that swim;
Fresh-firecoal chestnut-falls; finches’ wings;
    Landscape plotted and pieced—fold, fallow, and plough;
       And áll trádes, their gear and tackle and trim.

All things counter, original, spare, strange;
    Whatever is fickle, freckled (who knows how?)
       With swift, slow; sweet, sour; adazzle, dim;
He fathers-forth whose beauty is past change:
          Praise him.

God's Grandeur

THE WORLD is charged with the grandeur of God.
    It will flame out, like shining from shook foil;
    It gathers to a greatness, like the ooze of oil
Crushed. Why do men then now not reck his rod?
Generations have trod, have trod, have trod;
    And all is seared with trade; bleared, smeared with toil;
    And wears man’s smudge and shares man’s smell: the soil
Is bare now, nor can foot feel, being shod.

And for all this, nature is never spent;
    There lives the dearest freshness deep down things;
And though the last lights off the black West went
    Oh, morning, at the brown brink eastward, springs—
Because the Holy Ghost over the bent
    World broods with warm breast and with ah! bright wings.

Little Gidding Podcast

2007-09-24T19:29:00.000-04:00

Click here to listen

From Little Gidding in T. S. Eliot's Four Quartets

IV

The dove descending breaks the air
With flame of incandescent terror
Of which the tongues declare
The one discharge from sin and error.
The only hope, or else despair
Lies in the choice of pyre of pyre—
To be redeemed from fire by fire.

Who then devised the torment? Love.
Love is the unfamiliar Name
Behind the hands that wove
The intolerable shirt of flame
Which human power cannot remove.
We only live, only suspire
Consumed by either fire or fire.

V

What we call the beginning is often the end
And to make and end is to make a beginning.
The end is where we start from. And every phrase
And sentence that is right (where every word is at home,
Taking its place to support the others,
The word neither diffident nor ostentatious,
An easy commerce of the old and the new,
The common word exact without vulgarity,
The formal word precise but not pedantic,
The complete consort dancing together)
Every phrase and every sentence is an end and a beginning,
Every poem an epitaph. And any action
Is a step to the block, to the fire, down the sea's throat
Or to an illegible stone: and that is where we start.
We die with the dying:
See, they depart, and we go with them.
We are born with the dead:
See, they return, and bring us with them.
The moment of the rose and the moment of the yew-tree
Are of equal duration. A people without history
Is not redeemed from time, for history is a pattern
Of timeless moments. So, while the light fails
On a winter's afternoon, in a secluded chapel
History is now and England.

With the drawing of this Love and the voice of this
Calling

We shall not cease from exploration
And the end of all our exploring
Will be to arrive where we started
And know the place for the first time.
Through the unknown, unremembered gate
When the last of earth left to discover
Is that which was the beginning;
At the source of the longest river
The voice of the hidden waterfall
And the children in the apple-tree
Not known, because not looked for
But heard, half-heard, in the stillness
Between two waves of the sea.
Quick now, here, now, always—
A condition of complete simplicity
(Costing not less than everything)
And all shall be well and
All manner of thing shall be well
When the tongues of flame are in-folded
Into the crowned knot of fire
And the fire and the rose are one.

Cloister, San Paolo fuori le mura, Rome

Fern Hill Podcast

2007-09-17T14:26:00.000-04:00

Summer's heat has finally abated and autumn is in the air. So, here's a farewell to the waning days of summer. Our guests in this podcast are Romano Guardini and Dylan Thomas.

Apologies

2007-09-13T12:43:00.001-04:00

...for the lack of posts. I am in intense rehearsal time ahead of Summorum Pontificum inaugural Mass tomorrow. The whole diocese is attending. So needless to say, I am in my organ shoes and practicing hard.

I promise to return this weekend with a couple of podcasts. Promise!

UPDATE: 16 September, 2007 20:10 EDT
I'm in production with those podcasts.

Summer's Day

2007-09-02T22:14:00.000-04:00

Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?
Thou art more lovely and more temperate.
Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,
And summer's lease hath all too short a date.
Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,
And often is his gold complexion dimm'd;
And every fair from fair sometime declines,
By chance or nature's changing course untrimm'd;
But thy eternal summer shall not fade
Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow'st;
Nor shall Death brag thou wander'st in his shade,
When in eternal lines to time thou grow'st:
So long as men can breathe or eyes can see,
So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.

~William Shakespeare

If you want to listen to me read the sonnet:

Stopping by the side of the road whilst traveling through Tuscany one brilliant morning in May

Fern Hill

2007-08-28T23:02:00.000-04:00

Now as I was young and easy under the apple boughs
About the lilting house and happy as the grass was green,
    The night above the dingle starry,
         Time let me hail and climb
    Golden in the heydays of his eyes,
And honoured among wagons I was prince of the apple towns
And once below a time I lordly had the trees and leaves
         Trail with daisies and barley
    Down the rivers of the windfall light.

And as I was green and carefree, famous among the barns
About the happy yard and singing as the farm was home,
    In the sun that is young once only,
         Time let me play and be
    Golden in the mercy of his means,
And green and golden I was huntsman and herdsman, the calves
Sang to my horn, the foxes on the hills barked clear and cold,
         And the sabbath rang slowly
    In the pebbles of the holy streams.

All the sun long it was running, it was lovely, the hay
Fields high as the house, the tunes from the chimneys, it was air
    And playing, lovely and watery
         And fire green as grass.
    And nightly under the simple stars
As I rode to sleep the owls were bearing the farm away,
All the moon long I heard, blessed among stables, the nightjars
    Flying with the ricks, and the horses
         Flashing into the dark.

And then to awake, and the farm, like a wanderer white
With the dew, come back, the cock on his shoulder: it was all
    Shining, it was Adam and maiden,
         The sky gathered again
    And the sun grew round that very day.
So it must have been after the birth of the simple light
In the first, spinning place, the spellbound horses walking warm
    Out of the whinnying green stable
         On to the fields of praise.

And honoured among foxes and pheasants by the gay house
Under the new made clouds and happy as the heart was long,
    In the sun born over and over,
         I ran my heedless ways,
    My wishes raced through the house high hay
And nothing I cared, at my sky blue trades, that time allows
In all his tuneful turning so few and such morning songs
    Before the children green and golden
         Follow him out of grace,

Nothing I cared, in the lamb white days, that time would take me
Up to the swallow thronged loft by the shadow of my hand,
    In the moon that is always rising,
         Nor that riding to sleep
    I should hear him fly with the high fields
And wake to the farm forever fled from the childless land.
Oh as I was young and easy in the mercy of his means,
         Time held me green and dying
    Though I sang in my chains like the sea.

~by Dylan Thomas

Teepee made by children as a birthday gift to me.

The Call

2007-08-26T21:45:00.000-04:00

Come, my Way, my Truth, my Life!
Such a Way as gives us breath,
Such a Truth as ends all strife.
Such a Life as killeth Death.

Come, my Light, my Feast, my Strength!
Such a Light as shows a feast,
Such a Feast as mends in length,
Such a Strength as makes his guest.

Come, my Joy, my Love, my Heart!
Such a Joy as none can move.
Such a Love as none can part,
Such a Heart as joyes in love.

~George Herbert

Apse mosaic of the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception, Washington DC

On Via Appia Antica

2007-08-24T00:53:00.001-04:00

The Roman Road

The Roman Road runs straight and bare
As the pale parting-line in hair
Across the heath. And thoughtful men
Contrast its days of Now and Then,
And delve, and measure, and compare;

Visioning on the vacant air
Helmeted legionnaires, who proudly rear
The Eagle, as they pace again
The Roman Road.

But no tall brass-helmeted legionnaire
Haunts it for me. Uprises there
A mother’s form upon my ken,
Guiding my infant steps, as when
We walked that ancient thoroughfare,
The Roman Road.

~by Thomas Hardy

Via Appia Antica on a perfect late spring morning

Summer Rain

2007-08-18T23:27:00.000-04:00

Before Summer Rain

Suddenly, from all the green around you,
something-you don't know what-has disappeared;
you feel it creeping closer to the window,
in total silence. From the nearby wood

you hear the urgent whistling of a plover,
reminding you of someone's Saint Jerome:
so much solitude and passion come
from that one voice, whose fierce request the downpour

will grant. The walls, with their ancient portraits, glide
away from us, cautiously, as though
they weren't supposed to hear what we are saying.

And reflected on the faded tapestries now;
the chill, uncertain sunlight of those long
childhood hours when you were so afraid.

~Rainer Maria Rilke

King and Saint

2007-08-16T12:36:00.000-04:00

Monarchists, arise. Today is the feast day of St. Stephen of Hungary, Christian King and Saint exemplar.

Stephen divided Hungary into forty to fifty counties and continued the work of his father Géza by applying the decimal organizational system of his ancestors. He set up ten dioceses in Hungary, ordering every ten villages to erect a church and maintain a priest. He founded the cathedrals of Székesfehérvár and Esztergom, the Nunnery of Veszprém, the Benedictine Abbey of Pannonhalma, and the Monastery of Saint Peter and Paul in Óbuda. In the abbeys and monasteries, schools were established, and they became important centers of culture. Saint Astricus served as Stephen's advisor, and Stephen also had Saint Gerard Sagredo as the tutor for his son Imre.

Stephen discouraged pagan customs and strengthened Christianity with various laws, including ending the use of the old Hungarian runic alphabet and making Latin the official language of the royal court. Stephen donated generously to the churches, visited them often, and supervised their construction. He often disguised himself as a peasant whenever he traveled and freely gave money to any poor people he met (in one account, Stephen was beaten and robbed by a group of beggars to whom he was giving alms, but he forgave them and spared their lives).

St. Stephen's Holy Crown

The upper part of the crown, called Latin crown, which is cross-shaped and overarches the Greek crown in an angle of 90 degrees, indicates more modern and less exquisite workmanship, mediaeval implementing. Its denomination is due to the Latin inscriptions surrounding the figures. The four gold plates were fit to the sides of the middle square, which depicts Christ Pantokrator and is obviously part of the Greek crown though the symbols of the sun and the moon are present on it. The polychrome enamelled images of the standing figures of eighth apostles Peter, Paul, John, James, Bartholomew, Philip, Thomas and Andrew were set onto the cross-connecting bands. The pictures are lined with pearls and almandine and their sides are decorated with zoomorphic motifs. It is difficult to determine the place and age of the making of this crown, it may have been fashioned somewhere in Hungarian territory in the late 12th century.

The uniting of the two crown took place in a rather simple fashion, without any modification of the adjoining parts, using rivets whose points can still be seen on the smooth surface of the gold plate. This assemblage was probably done during the reign of Béla III (1171-1196), perhaps the Latin crown was meant for him. The cross on the top came into being later, presumably in the middle of the 16th century, replacing an earlier one, made in the time of Béla III or on the occasion of the coronation of Endre III in 1290, but this is still disputed. It is also uncertain exactly when the cross was damaged, which is now bent into an angle of 12 degrees, it might have happened between 1613 and 1793 .

St. Stephen's Right Hand

The king's right hand, known as "The Holy Right", is kept as a relic. His body was mummified after his death, but the tomb was opened and his hand was separated some years later. Except for this, only some bone fragments remained (which are kept in churches throughout Hungary). Catholics honour the first king of their country on annual processions, where the Holy Right is exhibited.

Stephen was also canonised by the Eastern Orthodox Church in 2000, thus became the first saint recognised both by Orthodoxy and Catholicism since the Great Schism.

The Assumption

2007-08-15T06:59:00.000-04:00

Its flowers are too stainless to remain
Concealed in the dark caverns of the earth,
But must be lifted up by God again
To know a second spring - a glad rebirth!
How could Christ leave her body in the tomb
Who was above all other women blest,
Who gave Him refuge in her virgin womb,
And fed Him on the lilies of her breast?
Is she not fairer far than any flower?
What bloom could ever boast her loveliness?
What fragrance rose in its sequestered bower
Has ever vied with her in spotlessness?
Truly the Lord, her God, the Holy One,
Has placed His tabernacle in the sun.

~Thomas E. Burke

On the Eve of the Assumption

2007-08-14T14:49:00.000-04:00

Announcement of Death to the Virgin

Parting from St. John

Parting from the Apostles

Death of Mary

Panels from the Maestà, by Duccio di Buoninsegna, 1308-11

~An excerpt from Rainer Maria Rilke's, Of Mary's Death from Life of Mary

They came with heavy hearts and entered fearfully.
There lay, in a narrow bed, the one, enigmatically
steeped in being chosen and vanishing,
unharmed, as if never used, and paid attention
to angelic chant. Now that she saw them all,
waiting behind their candles, she tore herself
from the excess of the voices and gave,
from her heart, the two dresses she still owned,
raising her face to one and another...
(O fount of nameless tear-brooks).

She however laid down into her weakness and
pulled the heavens so close to Jerusalem
that her soul, leaving, only had to stretch a little:
already he, who know everything about her,
nudged her into her divine nature.

~Translation by Gerald Augustinus Naus

The Sacred Streets

2007-08-10T12:40:00.000-04:00

The corn has turned from grey to red,
Since first my spirit wandered forth
From the drear cities of the north,
And to Italia's mountains fled.

And here I set my face towards home,
For all my pilgrimage is done,
Although, methinks, yon blood-red sun
Marshals the way to Holy Rome.

O Blessed Lady, who dost hold
Upon the seven hills thy reign!
O Mother without blot or stain,
Crowned with bright crowns of triple gold!

O Roma, Roma, at thy feet
I lay this barren gift of song!
For, ah! the way is steep and long
That leads unto thy sacred street.

II.

And yet what joy it were for me
To turn my feet unto the south,
And journeying towards the Tiber mouth
To kneel again at Fiesole!

And wandering through the tangled pines
That break the gold of Arno's stream,
To see the purple mist and gleam
Of morning on the Apennines

By many a vineyard-hidden home,
Orchard and olive-garden grey,
Till from the drear Campagna's way
The seven hills bear up the dome!

III.

A pilgrim from the northern seas--
What joy for me to seek alone
The wondrous temple and the throne
Of him who holds the awful keys!

When, bright with purple and with gold
Come priest and holy cardinal,
And borne above the heads of all
The gentle Shepherd of the Fold.

O joy to see before I die
The only God-anointed king,
And hear the silver trumpets ring
A triumph as he passes by!

Or at the brazen-pillared shrine
Holds high the mystic sacrifice,
And shows his God to human eyes
Beneath the veil of bread and wine.

~Oscar Wilde, from Rome Unvisited

Tu es Petrus

2007-08-09T13:01:00.001-04:00

Today's Gospel (Matthew 16:16-19) in Latin:

Respondens Simon Petrus dixit: Tu es Christus, Filius Dei vivi.

Respondens autem Jesus, dixit ei: Beatus es Simon Bar Jona: quia caro et sanguis non revelavit tibi, sed Pater meus, qui in cælis est. Et ego dico tibi, quia tu es Petrus, et super hanc petram ædificabo Ecclesiam meam, et portæ inferi non prævalebunt adversus eam. Et tibi dabo claves regni cælorum. Et quodcumque ligaveris super terram, erit ligatum et in cælis: et quodcumque solveris super terram, erit solutum et in cælis.

Circles

2007-08-06T10:59:00.001-04:00

I live my life in growing rings
which move out over the things around me.
Perhaps I'll never complete the last,
but that's what I mean to try.

I'm circling around God, around the ancient tower,
and I've been circling thousands years;
and I still don't know: am I a falcon, a storm
or a great song.

~Rainer Maria Rilke, Book of the Hours

2007-08-06T10:58:00.000-04:00

Goldfish found in the fountain pool of Santi Quattro Coronati, Rome (click on image for larger resolution). The cloister in Santi Quattro was simply enchanting...not necessarily for orderly perfection, but for the surprising serenity that one finds there. The fountain is from the 12th century and has whimsical lions' faces carved on the stone.

Whiting Bay, Isle of Arran, Scotland

2007-08-03T18:35:00.000-04:00

Listen to Capercaillie's I Will Set my Ship in Order

One of my favorite places in the world...it's Scotland in miniature, from the Highlands in the north to the rolling hills of the south of the Isle of Arran. I love its solitude, the windswept hills, the heather-covered mountains, the weathered ancient stones whose writings have faded, and the silly sheep grazing without care. I wish I could describe for you the brilliant sapphire blue skies. There's a loneliness there that gives one room to breathe.

The Unremembered Gate

2007-08-01T19:45:00.001-04:00

Gate to Traquair House, near Peebles, Scotland

With the drawing of this Love and the voice of this
Calling

We shall not cease from exploration
And the end of all our exploring
Will be to arrive where we started
And know the place for the first time.
Through the unknown, unremembered gate
When the last of earth left to discover
Is that which was the beginning;
At the source of the longest river
The voice of the hidden waterfall
And the children in the apple-tree
Not known, because not looked for
But heard, half-heard, in the stillness
Between two waves of the sea.
Quick now, here, now, always—
A condition of complete simplicity
(Costing not less than everything)
And all shall be well and
All manner of thing shall be well
When the tongues of flame are in-folded
Into the crowned knot of fire
And the fire and the rose are one.

~T. S. Eliot, from Little Gidding

Monte Cassino

2007-06-27T15:44:00.001-04:00

Please forgive the dearth...famine...lack of posts here in this lions 'blog. I'm going through gigabytes of photos that I took and am finding myself overwhelmed. A friend sent this picture that he took while on retreat at Montecassino (what is that like to go on retreat where St. Benedict and St. Scholastica trod?). Thanks, B.

Take a virtual tour of the Abbey of Montecassino

Lions everywhere

2007-06-01T09:28:00.001-04:00

Here's one at the Cipro Metro stop that is part of a sarcophagus.

Lions at St. Peter's

2007-05-31T08:24:00.000-04:00

The spiral stairs at the Vatican Museum

I don't mean to overuse the lions theme here. But I just can't resist. So please indulge me. These are lion finds at the Vatican Museum

Lions in Siena

2007-05-28T08:46:00.000-04:00

Oh, so what did you expect me to look for in Siena but more lions.

Guarding the door of the Cathedral

Found at the library in the Cathedral

Floor lions

Lucca Lions

2007-05-28T08:40:00.000-04:00

We visited the medieval city of Lucca on the way to Florence. We found lots of lions everywhere.

A lion guarding the path atop the city wall

A lion at the cathedral door

A sentinel lion with a feathered friend

A lion who refuses to be trampled over

Leaving on a jet plane

2007-05-22T16:34:00.000-04:00

To quote the Walrus, "The time has come...to talk of many things, of saints and popes and flying ships....of pilgrimages and kings..." Well, something like that. I'm off to Italy for three weeks.

I'll try to post pictures here and there. Especially in Caput Mundi, Città Eterna, Bella Roma.

God bless.

Three Book Meme

2007-05-17T11:41:00.000-04:00

~Forgive my inactivity in the land of lions this past week. There are lots of loose ends to tie up before I leave for Rome on Wednesday. Edmund has tagged me for the Three Book Meme, so I thought here's a good place to respond. With the handy-dandy Google Book Search, you can preview a book.

Three non-fiction books everyone should read:

1. The Western Canon by Harold Bloom (What makes a book great? What is the Great Conversation?)

2. On the Incarnation by St. Athanasius (since Edmund took Confessions by St. Augustine, here's the other book that guided me into the Catholic Church.)

3. The Story of Civilization by Will Durant (yeah, 11 volumes--only a couple of summers’ reading material, vero?…found the whole set in a second-hand store called The Dusty Bookshelf for $50)

Three books of fiction everyone should read:

1. The Wind in the Willows by Kenneth Grahame (who can resist a Mole, a Rat, and a Toad being friends? and how about the chapter “The Piper at the Gates of Dawn”…and the opening paragraph: Spring was moving in the air above and in the earth below and around him, penetrating even in his dark and lowly little house with its spirit of divine discontent and longing.)

2. Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen ("excessively diverting")

3. A Soldier of the Great War by Mark Helprin (a book to be savored page by page)

Three authors everyone should read:

1. William Shakespeare (please, if my kids can enjoy reading the plays out loud, you can, too. My daughter was reading Ophelia's part in Hamlet when she was seven)

2. St. Augustine (I'm going to sneak in Confessions here and City of God)

3. St. Francis de Sales (Introduction to the Devout Life is one that I have in my backpack everywhere I go)

Three books no one should read: (I won't even link these.)

1. Purpose-Driven Life by Rick Warren

2. Purpose-Driven Church by Rick Warren (these two were required reading for vestry when I was still an Anglican.

3. Anything Dan Brown and if you think he’s the best writer of all time (which an acquaintance of mine said after reading DVC), you’re not reading the right books.

Tagging: Kira, Dim, and Fr. Z

Lost, all lost in wonder at the God thou art

2007-05-07T19:30:00.000-04:00

Godhead, I adore thee fast in hiding; thou
God in these bare shapes, poor shadows, darkling now:
See, Lord, at thy service low lies here a heart
Lost, all lost in wonder at the God thou art.

Seeing, touching, tasting are in thee deceived;
How says trusty hearing? that shall be believed:
What God's Son has told me, take for truth I do;
Truth himself speaks truly or there's nothing true.

~from Gerard Manley Hopkins' S. Thomae Aquinatis

The scent of incense greeted me as I entered the door, the rosary was being prayed. My weekend wanderings brought me to our diocese's only indult parish. A friend, Edmund C., was singing in the choir providing the music for today's Tridentine High Mass, so I made the almost two-hour drive to hear and to taste and see once again the beauty of 'heaven on earth'. It had been almost a year since I was last here.

I put on my chapel veil, relishing the scalloped edges in my peripheral vision, and slid into a pew. The little chapel was almost full at a half-hour before the Mass. I took out my rosary and quickly fell into the rhythm of the prayer...Hail, Mary, full of grace...as I gazed on the Crucifix, there was Our Lady's statue in front, a crown of flowers ringing her head.....the Lord is with thee....I glanced above at the cerulean-blue ceiling. I had remembered it to be a darker shade, but here, together with worshipers gathered from around the region, the sky-blue somehow seemed fitting, as the prayer proceeded to Mary's Assumption and Crowning as Queen of Heaven and Earth. Gradually, we were being prepared to delve into the mystery of Christ-come-down-to-earth as Victim and Priest. Yes, we had come to meet with the Lord here in this holy place. Through Mary, the earthly cares were shed and put aside.

At the end of the prayer, there was silence, a pregnant waiting. Then the Introit began, in that timeless chant: Jubilate Deo, omnis terra...., the solemn procession moved toward the altar. Vidi aquam egredientem a latere dextro, alleluia. Ah, living water, it is still Easter and we were sprinkled with the waters that reminded us that we were brought out of death into life. We had barely begun, and already my heart was full. Tears pricked my eyes as the chant washed over me. I closed my eyes to try to make out Edmund's voice from among the voices. But the liturgy bid me to open my eyes and pay attention.

Kyrie eleison, Christe eleison, Kyrie eleison, Mozart's Mass ensconced in its proper place within the liturgy. Further and further we were drawn and our hearts were lifted to God...Gloria in excelsis Deo....glory to God in the highest...laudamus, benedicimus, adoramus, glorificamus...we praise you, we bless you, we adore you, we glorify you. A tinge of regret, why can't we sing in this reverent manner each Sunday. But then, I remember where God has called me to serve and I am grateful for this one moment in time to praise him in this way, in beauty and in holiness.

The Mass moves forward and then the drama of the altar began--the incense, the music, yes, it is indeed fitting and right, our duty and our salvation to give thanks to you, O Holy Father. Agnus Dei...Lamb of God we remember your Passion, your Sacrifice, You, Victim most Holy, most Perfect, Bread of Eternal Life. At the altar rail I knelt, knowing of my unworthiness to receive such a gift, humbled that my God should come to me as Bread upon my tongue. For this I am thankful for the veil that covers my head--I am in the presence of the holy.

I returned to my pew and knelt, such a simple action denied to us in my parish in obedience to diocesan norms, but so right after the gift of so great a magnitude. All too soon, the Mass comes to a close, Salve, Regina is chanted, the prayer that was my companion in my conversion into the Church. Vita, dulcedo, et spes nostra, salve. The tears that had been held back finally trickled down my cheeks. Sweet Virgin Mary, bid me to go into the world again, your Precious Son within me, if only for this brief moment.

We emerge out into the late afternoon sun, the brisk breeze helping to lift the veil off my head. Father imparts a blessing as we shake hands. How do I return to my ordinary existence after that?

Traveling

2007-05-07T08:02:00.000-04:00

...I have been on the road for the last few days and will be home this evening....will post tonight.

Modern Conveniences

2007-05-03T09:14:00.000-04:00

It was the morning rush-hour and I was negotiating a multi-lane left turn when the piercing dah, dit, dit, dit alarm jolted me. Annoyed, I glanced over at my handbag sitting on the passenger seat, realizing that it was my new Palm/Blackberry wannabe telling me to be on my way to an appointment. I was rounding the turn, so there was no way that I could turn it off. It chirped again soon after I was on the straightaway.

"I know, I know," I told it impatiently. Still, it chirped on. "That's where I'm going now." I ground my teeth, bidding the image of my husband cheerfully programming in the different alarm sounds. "He meant well, really, he meant well." I said to myself trying to overcome a rising resentment.

Dah, dit, dit, dit answered my Palm. I growled feeling the urgency of changing lanes in a quarter of a mile or miss my exit and the need to quiet that thing which was supposed to be a help but was now adding to my road rage.

"Stop it," I yelled, and at that instant realized the utter absurdity of a grown woman trying to argue with a dumb Palm. I burst out laughing, I'm sure the people in the cars next to me must have thought me mad. Once safe in the parking lot of my destination, I pulled out the shiny Palm and turned off the alarm.

"Really, you are more trouble than you're worth," I said to it. What was I doing talking to inanimate objects that were meant to be aids to my existence? I sighed thinking of how I used to never have to write anything down, that I could remember things with clarity and ease. In school, I never took notes because of a near-photographic memory. It drove everyone crazy that I could remember conversations word-for-word, and that I could quote pages and pages of books verbatim. But each subsequent child and their myriad activities, on top of all my obligations wore out my ability and I increasingly had to rely on Post-it notes. Where would I be without Post-it notes?

But progress, you know, has a way of infiltrating your life, and early on in the life of PDAs, I sported one, if just for the convenience of having an alarm to remind me of my next duty. Each time it would ring, the children would pipe up and say, "Your purse is talking to you, Mama."

And then there were the upgrades, oh, the latest bells and whistle, how can you do without them? Finally, I decided to return to my Post-its and a planner. It was lovely to not have a constant chirping companion that intruded in the most inconvenient times to remind me not to be late.

But all that ended, when a box arrived and there it was....the latest. I can check my emails with it, make phone calls, organize my shopping list, keep abreast of the latest news. Ah, what's not to like? Spam-on-the-go served anytime, anywhere.

I'm sure I'll find a way to like it. But for now, it's one more thing to remind me of my rootedness in time, the tyranny of the urgent pressing upon me. How much I need daily Mass and Eucharistic Adoration to remind me of the country to which I belong, the time-outside-time that creates room for me to breathe in the Divine, to say, with the choirs of angels and archangels, "Holy, holy, holy, Lord God of Sabaoth." Here am I, mortal that I am, direct me, use me for your greater glory this day.

Child's Play

2007-04-30T08:00:00.000-04:00

After morning Mass, he sidled up to me in all his three-and-a-half-foot glory, hands in his jean pockets, hazel eyes twinkling and said, "Can I come over to play at your house?" I looked down at his smiling face, freckles like brown sugar sprinkled across his nose and cheeks, how could I say no? Though there were a thousand things clamoring for my attention, somehow the prospect of children's happy noises was a welcome one.

I bent down toward him and said as solemnly as I could, "Would two o'clock this afternoon suit?"

"Oh, yes," he answered emphatically. And the smile that I thought would break his face, grew even larger. Off he bounded to his brothers, curly paprika-red hair bouncing with each step.

"She said yes!" he declared triumphantly to his brothers. The three boys rushed toward my daughter standing at my side, grabbed her hand and dragged her outside to celebrate. His mother, mortified, came up to me and asked tinged with not a bit of desperate embarrassment, "What did he say to you??"

I laughed as I reassured her. Relieved that her son didn't ask anything embarrassing, she was pleased to have some time to herself while the boys were at our house.

The doorbell rang a little after two. When I opened the front door, the three boys were pressed against the glass of the storm door with grins that could have melted the sheet of glass between us. Within the blink of an eye, if that, the shoes were discarded and they had flown up the stairs to the second storey. Did their feet touch the floor at all? Oh, to have joy like that to make the mundane task of going up and down the stairs into a exercise in defying gravity.

Soon, the floor is strewn with Playmobil princesses sitting down to dinner with Confederate soldiers. Unicorns trot alongside bunny rabbits. Union soldiers guard the Magi's box of gold for the Baby Jesus. Whole worlds and stories are lived out in my livingroom. I return to the kitchen to bake the children some cookies.

Soon, all is hushed and I hear the oldest boy say, "The Lord be with you."

"And also with you," answer the rest.

"The Gospel according to John," he continues solemnly, "now Jesus went into Galilee and he saw people there. They were hungry and he told them to sit down and then he fed them."

I slowly creep back to the livingroom and surreptitiously peer in. This is deeper child's play, these children who attend daily Mass, their souls nourished by the liturgical action that is now being mirrored.

"This is a miracle, you know. God does that. Miracles. Like feeding lots and lots of people."

Indeed. Our Daily Bread, give us this day.

What do children miss, when they're relegated to the nursery? From their infant days, my children were always with me in church. I had my Mary Poppins bag full of books, crayons, papers, little soft toys, and we would sit in front so that they could see what was going on. They learned quickly what was acceptable behavior. People used to come up to them to compliment them on their exemplary behavior.

Recently, there was discussion why our parish didn't have a nursery or a crying room. I was gratified to hear mothers speak up to say that children belonged in the church learning the liturgy, and that children who don't participate grow up to be adults who don't participate.

So, at daily morning Mass, it gives me immense joy to see very young children right alongside adults, the whole spectrum of generations come to greet the Lord on this new day.

Rilke on contemplating Rome

2007-04-27T08:34:00.000-04:00

I don't know how much I'll be able to blog whilst in Italy. I hope to at least post a picture or two every other day. Somehow, spending time on a computer (that prosaic daily activity to which we're tied) while in the midst of much to do and see seems like a waste of precious time. But, there's also the idea of joy extended when others who can't be at the glorious sites can share the experience through the extended lens of the internet. So, I'll have to find a way to balance it all.

My parents are perturbed that we're returning after a year-and-a-half since our last trip. I find it amusing since they lived in Rome in their salad days, and would have reunions with university friends in Rome every so often. But I think since we're bringing all of the children, there's an element of danger that unsettles them.

Embedded in all this is that age-old struggle that parents have of how to view their adult children. There's still the memory of the irresponsible youth that has to be melded into the present reality. I should bristle, but it's all endearing to me. I try to reassure them and tell them what a great opportunity it is for the children and to remember when once they saw with wonder the Baths of Caracalla, or the Catacombs of San Callisto, or St. Peter's Dome.

Anyway, if you were to ask me who the influences were in my writing, one would have to be Rainier Maria Rilke. His ability to capture living breathing moments with words that shimmer and sing with the beauty of internal cadences...well, I'll just stop here and let you read.
+ + +

~from a Letter to a Young Poet, October 29, 1903 [paragraph breaks added for readability]

We arrived in Rome about six weeks ago, at a time when it was still empty, the hot, the notoriously feverish Rome, and this circumstance, along with other practical difficulties in finding a place to live, helped make the restlessness around us seem as if it would never end, and the unfamiliarity lay upon us with the weight of homelessness.

In addition, Rome (if one has not yet become acquainted with it) makes one feel stifled with sadness for the first few days: through the gloomy and lifeless museum-atmosphere that it exhales, through the abundance of its pasts, which are brought forth and laboriously held up (pasts on which a tiny present subsists), through the terrible overvaluing, sustained by scholars and philologists and imitated by the ordinary tourist in Italy, of all the disfigured and decaying Things, which, after all, are essentially nothing more than accidental remains from another time and from a life that is not and should not be ours.

Finally, after weeks of daily resistance, one finds oneself somewhat composed again, even though still a bit confused, and one says to oneself: No, there is not more beauty here than in other places, and all these objects, which have been marveled at by generation after generation, mended and restored by the hands of workmen, mean nothing, are nothing, and have no heart and no value; - but there is much beauty here, because everywhere there is much beauty.

Waters infinitely full of life move along the ancient aqueducts into the great city and dance in the many city squares over white basins of stone and spread out in large, spacious pools and murmur by day and lift up their murmuring to the night, which is vast here and starry and soft with winds. And there are gardens here, unforgettable boulevards, and staircases designed by Michelangelo, staircases constructed on the pattern of downward-gliding waters and, as they descend, widely giving birth to step out of wave. Through such impressions one gathers oneself, wins oneself back from the exacting multiplicity, which speaks and chatters there (and how talkative it is!), and one slowly learns to recognize the very few Things in which something eternal endures that one can love and something solitary that one can gently take part in.

I am still living in the city, on the Capitol, not far from the most beautiful equestrian statue that has come down to us from Roman art - the statue of Marcus Aurelius; but in a few weeks I will move into a quiet, simple room, an old summerhouse, which lies lost deep in a large park, hidden from the city, from its noises and incidents. There I will live all winter and enjoy the great silence, from which I expect the gift of happy, work-filled hours. . . .

A pride of lions

2007-04-25T12:41:00.000-04:00

from The Book of Kells

from the Lindisfarne Gospels

from the Book of Hours

On this feast day of St. Mark the Evangelist

2007-04-25T11:35:00.000-04:00

This Lions 'blog celebrates today's feast of St. Mark the Evangelist. Oh to be in Venice today.

Catechetical Lectures

2007-04-25T07:04:00.000-04:00

~from St. Cyril of Jerusalem's Catechetical Lectures

Disciples of the New Testament and partakers of the mysteries of Christ, as yet by calling only, but ere long by grace also, make you a new heart and a new spirit, that there may be gladness among the inhabitants of heaven: for if over one sinner that repents there is joy, according to the Gospel, how much more shall the salvation of so many souls move the inhabitants of heaven to gladness.

As you have entered upon a good and most glorious path, run with reverence the race of godliness. For the Only-begotten Son of God is present here most ready to redeem you, saying, Come unto Me all that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. You that are clothed with the rough garment of your offences, who are holden with the cords of your own sins, hear the voice of the Prophet saying, Wash you, make you clean, put away your iniquities from before My eyes: that the choir of Angels may chant over you, Blessed are they whose iniquities are forgiven, and whose sins are covered. You who have just lighted the torches of faith, guard them carefully in your hands unquenched; that He, who erewhile on this all-holy Golgotha opened Paradise to the robber on account of his faith, may grant to you to sing the bridal song.

Practice makes perfect

2007-04-22T00:05:00.000-04:00

I have a violin and piano recital next month a few days before we leave for Italy. I haven't performed much in the past year, concentrating mostly on sacred music in the parish setting. So I'm in a slight panic. There's nothing like the bareness of a stage save instruments and performers to strike fear in one's heart....especially if you're that performer. Even worse, if it's Mozart on the program. Worse still if you've not had much chance to really practice seriously.

So what am I doing to prepare? It may sound odd, but I've been playing Bach Toccatas and Fugues. There's nothing like the perfect architecture of a toccata to bring discipline to unruly fingers that have been playing typical church fare for the last six months. Marty Haugen isn't exactly conducive to maintaining fitness.

I remember years ago when I was working through a Mozart piano concerto, a girl came up to me and said rather snidely, "Oh, Mozart is easy. So's Bach. Give me Rachmaninoff any day." I was too chagrined to say anything clever as a rejoinder. It's one of those episodes that I keep replaying in my mind and wished that I had said, "Sure, yeah, Mozart's easy...to butcher that is." And I in that scenario would've flicked my hair at her and walked away. Alas, that was not so then, and here at present, I just hope that I don't butcher Mozart.

Practice makes perfect. Slow and easy. Which is what I tell my children when they try to practice cadenza passages in dizzying tempos and get tripped and snared in all the notes. Slow and easy. Something I have to heed for myself.

The neophytes in Mystagogia will start gathering for rosary prayer. Some have said that they're having difficulty remembering where all the prayers go, let alone keeping all the mysteries straight. I don't know if they expected that Easter Vigil would have turned on some proficiency switch, but I tell them not to be afraid of making mistakes and that it's perfectly alright to have a printed guide on their laps while they pray. We practiced saying the rosary in class throughout the past year, which must have been a bit like learning the parts of speech. Now they're learning to string those words together and trying to be grammatically correct at the same time. Someday, eloquence will come. Slow and easy, I say to them, with persistence. Soon they'll gain mastery and pray from the heart. For now, they tease, they'll pray awkwardly together.

I'm happy to see them learning the great devotional prayers and have their sponsors help them along the way. Some of the class members have started attending the rosary prayers at church. So much has happened to them this year, and maddeningly continue to happen to them. They'll need the prayers, especially the rosary, to get them through difficult days ahead.

Hail, Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee. Blessed art thou among women and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus. Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners, now, and at the hour of death.

Freedom to Choose

2007-04-21T09:45:00.000-04:00

One of the saddest things I've heard from people entering RCIA is, "My parents didn't raise me in any religion telling me that they wanted me to have the freedom to choose."

In the latest round of inquirers, there are a number of them with this story. There is deep sadness in them as they related the sense of being on the outside looking in. It may have sounded noble to their parents' ears to pass on the choice to them, but what pierces me is what one said, "I wonder if I had had God in my life if I would've avoided the stuff that I'd done."

I told him that, yes, indeed, God was and is present in every moment of his life. And the fact that he had walked through the doors to join RCIA, was in response to God's calling him. I quoted St. Augustine (an oft-quoted passage, I understand, but for those who've grown up without the company of the saints and angels, it's clear as clarion): You have made us for yourself and our heart is restless until it rests in you.

So we spoke about holy longing, touched a bit on God's grace, and discussed why they were particularly drawn to the Catholic Faith. They mentioned how counter-intuitive it was, especially here in the South where there's a Freewill Baptist Church round every corner, literally. And all of them said, "The Eucharist draws me."

For all the casual Catholics in my parish, I wish I could pair them up with one of these who earnestly seek communion with the Church so that their hearts may be stirred from a complacency about the most precious thing that they possess. During the Elevation of the Host, I want them to gaze in astonishment and say, "My Lord and my God."

Child Art

2007-04-20T07:06:00.000-04:00

My daughter at eight is a devotee of Fra Angelico. She scrutinizes his works and the fruit of her contemplation is readily seen in her sketches. She began drawing at the age of two, the simple primitive circle faces with stick arms and legs. The archetypal circle people soon gave way to more expressive faces, so that at the age of three, her sketches told whole stories. She was and continues to be prolific in her work, which I cannot bear to throw away, so I have dutifully kept her drawings in a trunk which is soon to be full. She has art journals scattered throughout the house, one that is strictly for meditating on the life of the Virgin Mary, another that is for the Passion of Christ, one for her girly-girl princesses and their adventures, one for the warrior princesses that battle dragons, and another for processing daily events in her life.

I, being a fan of Italian Renaissance art, have a huge collection of Madonna images that I've found via the internet. She loves to sit on my lap and look through each of them. We'll tell each other the stories that the pictures seem to be telling us. And later on, she'll share with me her latest interpretations of the Crowning as Queen of Heaven, or the Annunciation, or the Nativity, or an ordinary day in the life of a Blessed Mother with the baby Jesus in a backpack and Mary baking a cake.

Soon, I know that she'll need formal art lessons, and though I've given her some simple art lessons, I love her easy, unconscious natural style. I see my role as helping her see as an artist sees...the soul of story. I want her to continue learning how to see with her innocent child's eyes the different layers that a story presents. With formal art lessons, her focus would have to shift to the mechanics of drawing...and there, I would miss the rich pictures of Mary and her constant companions of angels, one holding up a cookbook while Mary stirs a pot, another angel holding open the door to the oven, and the orchestra of angels holding various instruments serenading Madonna and Child. I know these are fruits of the rich interior life that my daughter has, a love for Our Lady and the Babe given for our salvation. Her schoolwork has been turned into illuminated manuscripts. Her division problems are hidden in the body of dragons, while her solutions are borne upon crusading warrior princesses' broadswords.

I gave her this book, Saints and Angels by Claire Llewellyn for Christmas. It has become her most treasured possession which she carries with her everywhere she goes. Do yourself a favor and buy this book. Here's a site to preview its contents. Since receiving this book, my daughter has started expressing her own interpretation of the Litany of Saints.

Next month, we will be spending three weeks in Italy, and prominent in our itinerary is San Marco Convent in Florence where there is a treasure trove of Fra Angelico paintings. I cannot wait to see her face light up when she sees the paintings in real life.

Habemus papam--a call to conversion

2007-04-19T11:11:00.000-04:00

When Gerald posted my conversion story last year, The Anchoress said that technically, I came into full communion with the Church. While that may be true, there was a change of heart that necessarily had to take place--a letting go of the pride that kept me still rooted in the Episcopal Church. My coming into the fullness of the faith was a long process from the first impulse 10 years ago. So here's what I wrote last year ahead of the first anniversary of coming home to Rome.

It was the day of the words, "Habemus papam!" on April 19, 2005, that electrified me and led me to call the local Roman Catholic parish the next day. Before that, the weeks of John Paul's illness increased the longing to become Catholic, but still something held me back. Perhaps it was a reluctance to let go of Anglo-Catholic worship. But at John Paul's death and subsequent funeral, I felt as if I had missed something. Watching then-Cardinal Ratzinger during the Funeral Mass, I sensed with an overwhelming certainty that he would be the next Pope and that I would be standing at St. Peter's Square before the year was out.

The days leading up to the Conclave, I found myself scouring the internet looking for conversion story after conversion story. It is said that people convert for one of two reasons, the beauty of the Sacraments or the Truth in the Magisterium of the Church. What was drawing me? What was breaking down the walls of my own resistance? I pondered the meaning of Jesus Christ's Real
Presence in the Eucharist. As an Anglo-Catholic, I believed in the Real Presence, yet I was surrounded by people who didn't. Is it really just personal preference? If the consecrated bread and wine weren't truly Jesus' Body and Blood, what were we playing at every Sunday at the altar?

The turmoil within the Anglican Communion and the depressing dead-end political fights which shoved Truth to the side left me in despair over where I should go. Over and over I asked myself that if Jesus prayed that 'they would be one' as He and the Father are one, why, oh why were all these churches fracturing? And why was I considering going to yet another branch-of-a-branch-of-a-branch that had split off from the trunk? Lord, to whom shall I go? Going to another off-shoot must surely be offensive, must give lie to the prayer that Christ prayed for his disciples.

So, early in the morning of April 19th, I thought to myself that the Conclave would take some time, so I could unglue myself from the television. I met with a friend who was seeking guidance in his discernment to the priesthood in the Episcopal Church. I was explaining to him what the Eucharist and the sacrament of Holy Orders meant and he looked at me quizzically and said, "You better watch out or you'll end up becoming Catholic." To say that
I was floored was an understatement and I left that meeting feeling as though I had been exposed and all my longing was laid bare. When I returned home and switched on the TV, there was the white smoke. For an hour as we waited for the announcement, I prayed and wept, knowing that I stood on the edge of a precipice. Would I have the courage? What will happen on the "other side"?

"Habemus papam!" declared the Cardinal Deacon with joy. The crowds roared with gusto. I knew then that I must become Catholic. When the new Pope Benedict XVI appeared on the balcony, there he stood, the visible sign of God's enduring presence with His Church, keeping the promise that He would not allow the gates of hell to prevail. How could I stay where Truth was casually treated, and where adherence to the faith once delivered was scorned as being intolerant?
So, goodbye to private judgment, I said to myself, goodbye to being my own pope. Time to place myself under the Magisterium of the Church.

And as I took that "leap of faith", that affirmation of what had been a quickening revolution in my heart, it wasn't a hard landing after all. For there was Christ waiting for me all along. This past year has been full of unexpected graces and I am grateful to be where I am. What took me so long? I echo St. Augustine, "Late
have I loved Thee, O Lord." There are days that I feel giddy with happiness, and others, I am filled with sobriety in understanding the struggles within the Church. But I have found strength in the Catholic devotions, and discovered a deeper desire to know God, though I have followed Him all my life.

This letter at Pontifications by Al Kimel brought back so many of the memories of that April morning. I commend it to you, "A letter to an inquirer", as a response to someone inquiring entry into the Episcopal Church yet reluctant to leave behind the Catholic Church's sacraments. He touches on so many things that I wrestled with. If I do regret anything, it is not coming into the Church sooner. But I take comfort that my comings and goings are all in His hands. And yes, I did make it to St. Peter's Square before 2005 ended. In fact, while in Rome, I spent a few evenings strolling around the Piazza looking up to the Papal Apartments and saying, "Thank you, Papa. Sleep well, tonight, sweet Vicar of Christ."

Litany of Saints

2007-04-18T15:25:00.000-04:00

One particularly moving part of the Easter Vigil is the Litany of the Saints while the catechumens solemnly process to the baptismal font behind the Paschal candle. This year's class was large, so the procession lasted for a long time, the choir chant accompanying them all the way.

Holy Trinity, One God, pray for us.
All you Holy Angels and Archangels, pray for us.
All you Holy Patriarchs and Prophets, pray for us.
All you holy Apostles and Evangelists, pray for us.
All you holy Disciples of the Lord, pray for us.

Yes, all you holy men and women, pray for us, as Mother Church gives birth to these new children of the Light.

Our choir director likes to weave the names of catechumens' patron saints. The class had a long year to choose their saint. Choosing the right patron saint was a transformative experience for several of the class members who came from evangelical backgrounds deeply suspicious of the Catholic doctrine of the communion of saints. Truthfully, I had expected that some of them would eschew a patron saint.

But they all threw themselves wholeheartedly to the task with the guidance of their sponsors. My fears were dispelled when I caught snippets of conversations among themselves on the process of choosing. Thank you, saints in heaven, for your myriad prayers.

So, yes, St. Gabriel, pray for this mother and her children as they must live in a violent home. And, too, for this young unwed mother in a dangerous pregnancy.

St. Clement, we invoke you for this young man desiring to be a priest, and St. Elizabeth Ann Seton for this young woman who will soon be a teacher.

Lord, be merciful, save your people.
From the snares of the devil, save your people.
From anger, hatred, and all ill-will, save your people.
From everlasting death, save your people.

For here again, we hear news of deaths of loved ones for class members. And sorrow continues to haunt us.

By your Cross and Passion, save your people.
By your Death and Burial, save your people.
By your holy Resurrection, save your people.

And news of cancer burdens some of these your infants in the Faith .

Strengthen and preserve us in your holy service, hear our prayer.
Raise our minds to desire the things of heaven, hear our prayer.

And soon, some must leave us for other places, be with them, Lord.

Lord, have mercy on them.

I shall know why

2007-04-17T22:08:00.000-04:00

I shall know why, when time is over,
And I have ceased to wonder why;
Christ will explain each separate anguish
In the fair schoolroom of the sky.

He will tell me what Peter promised,
And I, for wonder at his woe,
I shall forget the drop of anguish
That scalds me now, that scalds me now.

~Emily Dickinson

Lectio Divina

2007-04-16T12:45:00.000-04:00

~We were discussing lectio divina a couple of weeks ago. There's nothing more humbling than having blank faces stare back at you. Deflated me arrived home needing some comfort, so rooted round my library and found this from Rainer Maria Rilke's Letters to a Young Poet.

Now Niels Lyhne will open to you, a book of splendors and depths; the more often one reads it, the more everything seems to be contained within it, from life's most imperceptible fragrances to the full, enormous taste of its heaviest fruits. In it there is nothing that does not seem to have been understood, held lived, and known in memory's wavering echo; no experience has been too unimportant, and the smallest event unfolds like a fate, and fate itself is like a wonderful, wide fabric in which every thread is guided by an infinitely tender hand and laid alongside another thread and is held and supported by a hundred others. You will experience the great happiness of reading this book for the first time, and will move through its numberless surprises as if you were in a new dream. But I can tell you that even later on one moves through these books, again and again, with the same astonishment and that they lose none of their wonderful power and relinquish none of the overwhelming enchantment that they had the first time one read them.

One just comes to enjoy them more and more, becomes more and more grateful, and somehow better and simpler in one's vision, deeper in one's faith in life, happier and greater in the way one lives. - From a letter dated April 23, 1093, Pisa, Italy

In Gratitude

2007-04-16T00:45:00.000-04:00

They were unexpected...the cards and flowers left on my desk.

"Thank you for all that you did to help me come into the Church," one card said.

Here was a box of chocolates and there a vase of lavender tulips. And here was a bottle of hand lotion--a most practical gift. Through the winter months, my wearing of tipless gloves while teaching Catechumenate became a running joke. Catechumenate class fell in between Masses for which I had to play the organ. Thus, the gloves to keep my hands from getting cold and stiff.

Another wrote: "Your humble service was a testament to your love for God."

I felt a stab of guilt and embarrassment, knowing that I hardly deserved this kind of esteem. What did I do, really, but merely to share what I'd been given. And isn't that what we're all to do in fidelity to our baptismal vows?

Everyday, in the dimness of the church for early morning Mass, I receive the most incredible gift of all in the Body and Blood, Soul and Divinity of Christ. Was there really a time when I wasn't Catholic? How did I manage? Yes, there was a time when I wasn't Catholic and it was very much like being on the outside peering into a window, wanting to be in that room next to the fire. But stubbornness had me returning to the familiar cold room where aching longing was a constant companion.

When my whole family and I were finally received into the Church, my priest gently patted my cheek and said softly, "Welcome home." How could I think about going into the pew to sit and not give that homecoming joy away.

So, no, the sacrifice wasn't really much of one. I received far more than I gave. It was a privilege to be there at the door welcoming the stranger in. And in return, I was drawn into intimate parlors where family pictures were shared, and life stories were exchanged. And what higher tribute is there than to be asked to have a picture taken with them, realizing that that snapshot will have its place in the family album.

This week, another round of inquiry classes begins, bringing a whole new set of people. I can't wait to hear their questions.

Driving Lessons

2007-04-15T16:04:00.000-04:00

Our second son has reached an important rite of passage...learning to drive. He had been reluctant to take on this responsibility. I suspect that the reticence stems from watching his older brother be given the onerous task of being assistant family chauffeur, his life inevitably put on hold for the good of others. It's a lesson we all have to learn, and for mothers, it's the story of our calling...our life is not our own.

So, this past week during Easter holiday, we enrolled Son-Number-Two in driving school, telling him he couldn't put off the inevitable. His reluctance surprised me because this is the child who fearlessly skis down black diamond slopes, who took to sailing solo as naturally as breathing, who rock-climbs as well as he walks on flat ground, who plays a mean game of street hockey. I think he's dealing with what driving symbolizes--moving into grown-up territory. And that can sometimes be unnerving even to the most fearless of us.

Today on Quasimodo Sunday, especially for RCIA, I think of our neophytes who are learning to grow into the Catholic Faith...like driving lessons, must take things at a reasonable pace. Learning to live out the sacramental life takes time. One was lamenting how in the world he could ever learn all the responses. I told him that we'll all be disoriented right along with him when the new Mass translations come out.

This morning, in spite of the Easter holiday and the torrential rain, some came to mystagogia. Their bright faces revealing an eagerness to share their Easter Vigil stories. There was solemn remembrance mixed in with laughter. The heartaches continue for this class as we received more bad news for several members. This has been the way with this class--a piling on of real life's dark valleys. But now, now, they have the Body and Blood of Christ. No longer will they have to step aside to let others pass. May the Body and Blood of Christ sustain them and strengthen them in their hours of testing.

A Long-awaited Homecoming

2007-04-14T15:33:00.000-04:00

They were an unlikely pair--Merric, built like a football linebacker tested in the rough neighborhoods of Philadelphia, and Grayson, sickly, gaunt with pained halting steps. Yet, Merric, for all his swagger chose the fragile Grayson for his sponsor. I watched the two of them huddled together at the RCIA retreat...Grayson reclining in his special chair with eyes closed and Merric in intense concentration speaking in low tones. Merric glanced up at me, sensing that I was looking at him. Whatever expression that he read on my face triggered a deep ho-ho laugh from him. I turned away to give them back their privacy to complete the task that I had given all the retreatants.

Later, Merric came up behind me and gave me a bone-crushing hug as he lifted me off the ground. "I'm so happy," he said into my hair. I swiveled around after he put me back down and peered into his face.

"Took you long enough," I teased. Again he answered in the Santa laugh that I'd come to love, eyes alight with bliss. Outside may have been cold and grey, but here standing before this giant of a man, I was dazzled by his smile.

It was a decade-long conversion with so much reluctance and unwillingness to overcome preconceived notions. But he faithfully came with his Catholic wife and children, self-consciously stepping aside for others to pass to receive Communion, Sunday after Sunday, year after year. I said a silent prayer of thanksgiving for all the saints' and angels' prayers offered on his behalf. And in a few short hours would be his homecoming.

A few weeks earlier, at the Rite of Election, I spoke to his wife and squeezed her hand telling her how happy I was that Merric was finally coming into the Church. She burst into tears and said, "You have no idea."

Then at the Easter Vigil, just a few minutes before midnight, he finally received the Body and Blood of Our Lord. He crossed himself and looked up at the crucifix. There were tears in his eyes.

At the reception afterwards, I could hear his booming laughter above all the din. I wondered how long before he returned to his normal intimidating persona. A couple of days ago, we drove past each other in the street. When he recognized me, he gave me that transfigured smile and I knew that he'd not yet climbed down from the mountain.

Welcome home, Merric. Enjoy the feast!

What She Has

2007-04-13T11:15:00.000-04:00

Her hands were clutching a prayerbook that was crisp and new, the gilded letters glowing in the eastern morning light which bathed the church. She sat hunched over in prayer as we daily communicants filed past her to receive the Body of Christ.

Here was a new face at daily Mass and instinctively, I knew that she must have been my early morning appointment.

"To whom it may concern," began the e-mail. "I would like to become a Catholic. Please tell me how." We made arrangements to meet this morning after Mass.

As I moved past her pew, I realized, here was not a casual seeker. If one can sense desire, hers was there in spades.

After Mass, I approached her and her companion who turned out to be her mother. I shook her mother's hands and noticed that she was struggling to maintain her equilibrium. No, this was not a casual decision on her daughter's part. I was intrigued.

"May I see the confessionals?" the daughter asked. What an unusual place to start a church tour. As we neared the confessional booths, mother and daughter walked slowly with a hushed reverence.

Did lightning strike? Because I certainly felt a powerful jolt at the moment...that I was witnessing something holy and powerful happening with these two people. I stopped in my tracks, feeling a bit of a voyeur.

At the end of the tour, I asked the daughter what drew her to the Catholic Church.

She looked at her mother with all the tender love and said, "She just became a Catholic this past weekend. And she's so happy. I want what she has."

I have been a practicing Christian all my life and I don't ever remember a time when I wasn't aware of walking before God. But at that moment, I fell in love all over again. And it was because of a young woman's desire to know God and become part of this mystical body. I hope I never grow weary of sharing this Faith.

April Showers

2007-04-12T13:08:00.000-04:00

They fell from the sky...huge white fluffy flakes of snow. At first I thought they were dogwood petals blowing in the wind, the sky grey, forbidding on this silent Holy Saturday. But word spread among the RCIA retreatants that yes, indeed, it's snow.

Out they ran, flicking out their cellphones to call home.

"This is Mama, get out of bed. It's snowing."

"Robbie, it's Daddy, guess what, it's snowing!"

And I, incredulous at the unlikely April showers that turned into snow, looked up into the sky, miniature meteorological missiles hurtling down landing softly on my eyelashes, my nose tickled by the cold sharpness of each. How right was this snow, just a few hours before the catechumens will be dressed in white garments...will be washed in the clean holy waters of Baptism.

I look around and relish the sound of laughter, joy and happiness for a cosmic event about to happen to them. Laughter, which for this class was buried under the storm of sorrow at deaths suffered, life-threatening illnesses discovered, even domestic violence experienced that befell this RCIA class in a few short months together.

"It's not always like this, I promise," said my pastor helping calm the anger I felt at the injustice of crisis upon crisis. Why this class, I asked? Why would the testing be so agonizing this first year? All I said yes to was to teach the Catechism. Having my heart pierced was not part of my plan.

Then here, under the falling snow, I recall St. Paul's words, "Rejoice with those who rejoice, and weep with those who weep." (Romans 12:15). This wasn't a sterile classroom experience, it was learning to love as Christ loves...each of these Elect whom God called and is calling to himself. How can I remain distant from their intensely personal stories?

A few hours later, the church is dark save for the Paschal candle. "Christ our Light, " intones our pastor. "Thanks be to God" we respond. Yes, thanks be to God for the immeasurable Love that untiringly calls people back into his fold. Thanks be to God for the Light that pierces our darkened imagination flooding us with the knowledge that God is Love.

April showered us with God's grace.

The Land of the Unlikely

2007-04-12T12:07:00.000-04:00

He is the Way.
Follow Him through the Land of Unlikeness;
You will see rare beasts, and have unique adventures.

He is the Truth.
Seek Him in the Kingdom of Anxiety;
You will come to a great city that has expected your return for years.

He is the Life.
Love Him in the World of the Flesh;
And at your marriage all its occasions shall dance for joy.
~W.H. Auden

Old Maps

2007-04-11T22:25:00.000-04:00

I love old maps. "Here be dragons" would denote dangerous and unexplored lands. In many ways, it's like being a catechist, a title which I wear most uncomfortably...this mantle thrust on my shoulders hastily. It is dangerous to say, "Yes". Dangerous to step into the shoes of a beloved predecessor. Dangerous to give away the Faith which I so recently embraced. Dangerous to open my heart to new people whom I might come to love.

When I was little, my family and I lived in the Tropics. There was an old mango tree in the front yard that I loved to climb. The higher the branches, the happier I was because I could see far away and from my vantage point, I could dream dreams. One day, inevitably, I fell out of that tree, but my guardian angel prevented anything serious from happening to me. I have the scars to remind me of my carelessness. But the fall wasn't enough to keep me from climbing again. Oh, what kingdoms I inhabited in that tree.

Perhaps it is safer to stay in my fluffy bathrobe and sit in my armchair sipping coffee, tut-tutting the cars speeding by my window. But that unexplored country would remain unexplored, the sites unseen, the people unmet. How poorer I would be.