More Resources: Where is Your God?

Jesuit novice Matthew Spotts' reflections on his experiences with the homeless in Washington DC are thought provoking. I learned the story of the monks of Tibhirine from a poem by Marilyn Nelson, The Contemplative Life, published in Image (61, p. 15).

Abba Jacob wiped his eyes.
Interval of birdsong from the veranda.

He's seeing not an abstract God,
but a God who has assumed a face,
a God who shows him this face
in every one of those Muslim brothers and sisters,
including the one who kills him.

My tears became my bread day and night, as they said to me all the day long, “Where is your God?” — Ps. 42:3

We have the same conversation each time we meet. Most often he happens upon me sitting in the pews of the city church where my spiritual director lives, though once we met on the street outside.

“What is your parish?” he wants to know.

“Our Mother of Good Counsel.”

“In Bryn Mawr?”

“Yes.” I am terse as he.

“Why are you here?”

“To pray.”

“What are you praying for?” And here is where I inevitably falter, faced with a question I’m unwilling to answer, even to myself.

At first my reaction was irritation. I’m there to gather my thoughts before I see my director, to slow down, to be still before God. This felt like an intrusion. “Why are you here?” I would think. Until the day it occurred to me that I was walking out of this recurring, slightly exasperating conversation into a recurring one with my director that sounded the very same themes: “How is your prayer?” he asks.

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More Resources: Stretched Between Heaven and Earth

You can read the text of Ancrene Wisse in both its original Old English and a modern translation.

The full column appeared on 4 June 2009 in the Catholic Standard and Times.














Let your thoughts be on things above, not on the things are on the earth, because you have died and now the life you have is hidden with Christ in God. — Col. 3:2-3

“If a mad lion was running through the streets, would not a sensible woman shut herself in?” So asks the author of the Ancrene Wisse, a 13^th century guide to life for anchoresses — women who elected to spend their lives in prayer, sealed into anchorholds within the walls of churches and monasteries.

There were waiting lists for some anchorholds. Frankly, at the moment, I’m not surprised. At quarter past eight, dinner cleared up, I went up to my study, leaving teens busy with homework and husband off to his night class. I imagined I might write this column. But…by 8:27, “Mom, can you help me?” At 8:49 settle squabble over computer; 9:19 locate clean socks; 9:31 bedtime; 9:42 phone rings.

Never mind the mad lion, this is enough to drive me to barricade myself in my room, if not seek an anchorhold within the walls of my parish church.

Anchoress derives not from anchor but from the Greek “anachorein,” to withdraw. Yet in some ways, the lives of these medieval women were no more or less withdrawn from the world than mine. Their cells had two windows, one looked into the church, the other out into the world....read the rest of the column here.

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More Resources: Praying the Everyday

The photo of my mother - crowning Mary after her First Communion.

....My theological library owes its start to my mother, who read the documents of Vatican II as avidly as she did the latest science fiction novel. Yet there was always a rosary to be found in her purse, and she never failed of saying grace at a meal, even when it was just the two of us in her hospital room. Faith was not just an academic stance for my mother; it was her whole way of being.

Jesuit Father Karl Rahner, one of the most eminent theologians of the 20th century, made Deuteronomy’s injunction manifest in his own preaching and life. He once cautioned a student, “Beware the person of no devotions and the person who does not pray.”....read the rest of the column.

Karl Rahner SJ's book: The Need and the Blessing of Prayer is a collection of homilies preached shortly after the end of World War II.

The text of Sacrosanctum Concilium from the Vatican's web site.

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More Resources: The Face of God

I will freely admit it was not the depth of my piety, but the depth of my aversion for the 5:30 a.m. train that drew me to the contemplation of this psalm a few weeks back. To avoid a before- dawn walk to the train station, I went down to Washington the afternoon before my conference began. So I had a bit of time to spare to see the exhibit on illuminated manuscripts at the National Gallery.

Hanging on the dark blue walls, the gold letters and brilliant colors lit up the space, as they must have in the dim churches 500 years in the past. Aptly enough, it was a cluster of three manuscript pages in an alcove that caught my eye. Each featured a slightly different representation of the Trinity. God the Father was drawn as the bearded patriarch seated on a throne, and the Spirit, a dove.

I was fascinated with the three depictions of Christ: first, as a full grown man, but the size of a child relative to the Father, held in the Father’s lap; second, on the cross between the viewer and the Father; and third, to me the most poignant of the three, kneeling next to the Father, bent over His cross, the Father’s hand on His shoulder. The faces of the Christ figures were expressive, in turns serene, impassioned and distraught. Behold, the face of God.

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See a slide show of some of the pieces in the exhibit.

Cardinal Schoenborn's book: God's Human Face.

Paul Pearson's book on icon painting, A Brush with God, which encourages you to imagine the face of God through your own artistic endeavors, opens with two reflections on the spirituality of images, one from Andrew Ciferni, O. Praem. - a Norbertine from Daylesford Abbey.

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More Resources: Does God have a sense of humor?

There are days when I’d rather be taking on “Whether a multiplicity of angels can co-exist in the same place?” against St. Thomas Aquinas, than tackling the questions being disputed at my dinner table. “Does God have a sense of humor?” queries the younger. “He created you, didn’t he?” responds his older brother, mindful of the rules of the game, which require supporting evidence. “Mom…” Chris’ pleas drag me into the fray.

Prayers to St. Thomas arising, I pointed to this passage in Luke’s Gospel. Surely Jesus’ sense of humor was at play here? He let Cleopas and his companion go on at length about the happenings in Jerusalem before revealing the punch line — He is the person everyone has been talking about — and vanishing before their eyes.

The Word made flesh in Scripture isn’t averse to humor either in the form of puns and double meanings. The Old Testament is replete with plays on words, all but lost to us in the layers of translation...

Read the rest of the column at the Standard & Times.

Robert Alter's translation of the Psalms tries to give a flavor of the ancient Hebrew. The footnotes, far from leaving a dry and academic taste behind, offer some insight into the dilemmas of the translator when the words are so ancient no one grasps their meaning any longer, except as part of the poetic whole.

Marilyn Nelson is the former poet laureate of Connecticut - Abba Jacob and the Theologian is from her collection Magnificat, which is now out of print. It is also in this more recent anthology of her poetry.

St. Thomas Aquinas (who looks rather grumpy in this photo) had firm ideas about the worth of humor: "It is requisite for the relaxation of the mind that we make use, from time to time, of playful deeds and jokes." (from his Summa)

Recently, James Martin, S.J. reflection on God's sense of humor and our own in this piece on NPR.

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More Resources: Slowing down to make room for God

Leisure in the monastic sense is not time to do nothing, or to do what you like, but a time to slow down, to be still, to make room in your life to look toward God.

“Be still and know that I am God.” A translation of this verse from Psalm 46 that hews more closely to the original Hebrew is “Let go, and know that I am God.” The sense is that of unclenching your fist, even of releasing an enemy from your grasp. In my life, time often seems like the enemy, or at least my lack of it squeezes the life out of me. I hold tight to watch and calendar, hoarding time.....

If we were Carthusian monks, silence would be in the very air, and contemplation might be as easy as breathing. There would be no ringing phones, kitchen timers or teenagers chasing the cat, herself in hot pursuit of a mouse, through my study. Finding the necessary breathing room for my soul is a bit more of a challenge under these conditions.

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A fuller set of Father Lombardi's comments is here. He is the director of the Vatican press office.

For a short daily time of prayer at your computer, Loyola press offers a three minute daily "retreat":



Ways to help kids (and adults!) learn to be still in prayer.

A news story about the Anglican bishop and the eggtimers is here.

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More Resources: Passio

The column in which I referred to this piece is "Entering totally into the Crucifixion" -- reflecting on the Passion in the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius.

Avro Pärt is a contemporary Estonian composer. He calls his approach to composition tintinnabulation – and it sounds very much like bells ringing. Though clearly modern, Pärt’s deep and longstanding engagement with medieval polyphony and plainchant infuses his music. If you have not heard Pärt before – listen to a snatch (see the link below), or even the whole thing. The third and fourth movements are marvelous.

Passio by Arvo Part


The voices on this setting are so clear, you can take out a copy of St. John's Passion, in Latin and follow along. If you lack a copy at home - here's the text! (Christ is the bass; Peter and Pilate the tenors.)
(The icon is 13th century from Saint Catherine's Monastery, Sinai, Egypt)

1. First Movement: Jesus is betrayed.
Hæc cum dixisset Jesus, egressus est cum discipulis suis trans torrentem Cedron, ubi erat hortus, in quem introivit ipse, et discipuli ejus.
Sciebat autem et Judas, qui tradebat eum, locum : quia frequenter Jesus convenerat illuc cum discipulis suis.
Judas ergo cum accepisset cohortem, et a pontificibus et pharisæis ministros, venit illuc cum laternis, et facibus, et armis.
Jesus itaque sciens omnia quæ ventura erant super eum, processit, et dixit eis : Quem quæritis ?
Responderunt ei : Jesum Nazarenum. Dicit eis Jesus : Ego sum. Stabat autem et Judas, qui tradebat eum, cum ipsis.
Ut ergo dixit eis : Ego sum : abierunt retrorsum, et ceciderunt in terram.
Iterum ergo interrogavit eos : Quem quæritis ? Illi autem dixerunt : Jesum Nazarenum.
Respondit Jesus : Dixi vobis, quia ego sum : si ergo me quæritis, sinite hos abire.
Ut impleretur sermo, quem dixit : Quia quos dedisti mihi, non perdidi ex eis quemquam.
Simon ergo Petrus habens gladium eduxit eum : et percussit pontificis servum, et abscidit auriculam ejus dexteram. Erat autem nomen servo Malchus.
Dixit ergo Jesus Petro : Mitte gladium tuum in vaginam. Calicem, quem dedit mihi Pater, non bibam illum ?
Cohors ergo, et tribunus, et ministri Judæorum comprehenderunt Jesum, et ligaverunt eum.

2. Second Movement: Jesus before the High Priest.
Et adduxerunt eum ad Annam primum : erat enim socer Caiphæ, qui erat pontifex anni illius.
Erat autem Caiphas, qui consilium dederat Judæis : Quia expedit unum hominem mori pro populo.
Sequebatur autem Jesum Simon Petrus, et alius discipulus. Discipulus autem ille erat notus pontifici, et introivit cum Jesu in atrium pontificis.
Petrus autem stabat ad ostium foris. Exivit ergo discipulus alius, qui erat notus pontifici, et dixit ostiariæ : et introduxit Petrum.
Dicit ergo Petro ancilla ostiaria : Numquid et tu ex discipulis es hominis istius ? Dicit ille : Non sum.
Stabant autem servi et ministri ad prunas, quia frigus erat, et calefaciebant se : erat autem cum eis et Petrus stans, et calefaciens se.
Pontifex ergo interrogavit Jesum de discipulis suis, et de doctrina ejus.
Respondit ei Jesus : Ego palam locutus sum mundo : ego semper docui in synagoga, et in templo, quo omnes Judæi conveniunt, et in occulto locutus sum nihil.
Quid me interrogas ? interroga eos qui audierunt quid locutus sim ipsis : ecce hi sciunt quæ dixerim ego.
Hæc autem cum dixisset, unus assistens ministrorum dedit alapam Jesu, dicens : Sic respondes pontifici ?
Respondit ei Jesus : Si male locutus sum, testimonium perhibe de malo : si autem bene, quid me cædis ?
Et misit eum Annas ligatum ad Caipham pontificem.
Erat autem Simon Petrus stans, et calefaciens se. Dixerunt ergo ei : Numquid et tu ex discipulis ejus es ? Negavit ille, et dixit : Non sum.
Dicit ei unus ex servis pontificis, cognatus ejus, cujus abscidit Petrus auriculam : Nonne ego te vidi in horto cum illo ?
Iterum ergo negavit Petrus : et statim gallus cantavit.
3. Third Movement: Jesus before Pilate.
Adducunt ergo Jesum a Caipha in prætorium. Erat autem mane : et ipsi non introierunt in prætorium, ut non contaminarentur, sed ut manducarent Pascha.
Exivit ergo Pilatus ad eos foras, et dixit : Quam accusationem affertis adversus hominem hunc ?
Responderunt, et dixerunt ei : Si non esset hic malefactor, non tibi tradidissemus eum.
Dixit ergo eis Pilatus : Accipite eum vos, et secundum legem vestram judicate eum. Dixerunt ergo ei Judæi : Nobis non licet interficere quemquam.
Ut sermo Jesu impleretur, quem dixit, significans qua morte esset moriturus.
Introivit ergo iterum in prætorium Pilatus : et vocavit Jesum, et dixit ei : Tu es rex Judæorum ?
Respondit Jesus : A temetipso hoc dicis, an alii dixerunt tibi de me ?
Respondit Pilatus : Numquid ego Judæus sum ? gens tua et pontifices tradiderunt te mihi : quid fecisti ?
Respondit Jesus : Regnum meum non est de hoc mundo. Si ex hoc mundo esset regnum meum, ministri mei utique decertarent ut non traderer Judæis : nunc autem regnum meum non est hinc.
Dixit itaque ei Pilatus : Ergo rex es tu ? Respondit Jesus : Tu dicis quia rex sum ego. Ego in hoc natus sum, et ad hoc veni in mundum, ut testimonium perhibeam veritati : omnis qui est ex veritate, audit vocem meam.
Dicit ei Pilatus : Quid est veritas ? Et cum hoc dixisset, iterum exivit ad Judæos, et dicit eis : Ego nullam invenio in eo causam.
Est autem consuetudo vobis ut unum dimittam vobis in Pascha : vultis ergo dimittam vobis regem Judæorum ?
Clamaverunt ergo rursum omnes, dicentes : Non hunc, sed Barabbam. Erat autem Barabbas latro.

Tunc ergo apprehendit Pilatus Jesum, et flagellavit.
Et milites plectentes coronam de spinis, imposuerunt capiti ejus : et veste purpurea circumdederunt eum.
Et veniebant ad eum, et dicebant : Ave, rex Judæorum : et dabant ei alapas.
Exivit ergo iterum Pilatus foras, et dicit eis : Ecce adduco vobis eum foras, ut cognoscatis quia nullam invenio in eo causam.
(Exivit ergo Jesus portans coronam spineam, et purpureum vestimentum.) Et dicit eis : Ecce homo.
Cum ergo vidissent eum pontifices et ministri, clamabant, dicentes : Crucifige, crucifige eum. Dicit eis Pilatus : Accipite eum vos, et crucifigite : ego enim non invenio in eo causam.
Responderunt ei Judæi : Nos legem habemus, et secundum legem debet mori, quia Filium Dei se fecit.
Cum ergo audisset Pilatus hunc sermonem, magis timuit.
Et ingressus est prætorium iterum : et dixit ad Jesum : Unde es tu ? Jesus autem responsum non dedit ei.
Dicit ergo ei Pilatus : Mihi non loqueris ? nescis quia potestatem habeo crucifigere te, et potestatem habeo dimittere te ?
Respondit Jesus : Non haberes potestatem adversum me ullam, nisi tibi datum esset desuper. Propterea qui me tradidit tibi, majus peccatum habet.
Et exinde quærebat Pilatus dimittere eum. Judæi autem clamabant dicentes : Si hunc dimittis, non es amicus Cæsaris. Omnis enim qui se regem facit, contradicit Cæsari.
Pilatus autem cum audisset hos sermones, adduxit foras Jesum : et sedit pro tribunali, in loco qui dicitur Lithostrotos, hebraice autem Gabbatha.
Erat enim parasceve Paschæ, hora quasi sexta, et dicit Judæis : Ecce rex vester.
Illi autem clamabant : Tolle, tolle, crucifige eum. Dicit eis Pilatus : Regem vestrum crucifigam ? Responderunt pontifices : Non habemus regem, nisi Cæsarem.

4. Fourth Movement: Jesus is crucified.
Tunc ergo tradidit eis illum ut crucifigeretur. Susceperunt autem Jesum, et eduxerunt.
Et bajulans sibi crucem exivit in eum, qui dicitur Calvariæ locum, hebraice autem Golgotha :
ubi crucifixerunt eum, et cum eo alios duos hinc et hinc, medium autem Jesum.
Scripsit autem et titulum Pilatus, et posuit super crucem. Erat autem scriptum : Jesus Nazarenus, Rex Judæorum.
Hunc ergo titulum multi Judæorum legerunt : quia prope civitatem erat locus, ubi crucifixus est Jesus, et erat scriptum hebraice, græce, et latine.
Dicebant ergo Pilato pontifices Judæorum : Noli scribere : Rex Judæorum : sed quia ipse dixit : Rex sum Judæorum.
Respondit Pilatus : Quod scripsi, scripsi.
Milites ergo cum crucifixissent eum, acceperunt vestimenta ejus (et fecerunt quatuor partes, unicuique militi partem) et tunicam. Erat autem tunica inconsutilis, desuper contexta per totum.
Dixerunt ergo ad invicem : Non scindamus eam, sed sortiamur de illa cujus sit. Ut Scriptura impleretur, dicens : Partiti sunt vestimenta mea sibi : et in vestem meam miserunt sortem. Et milites quidem hæc fecerunt.
Stabant autem juxta crucem Jesu mater ejus, et soror matris ejus, Maria Cleophæ, et Maria Magdalene.
Cum vidisset ergo Jesus matrem, et discipulum stantem, quem diligebat, dicit matri suæ : Mulier, ecce filius tuus.
Deinde dicit discipulo : Ecce mater tua. Et ex illa hora accepit eam discipulus in sua.
Postea sciens Jesus quia omnia consummata sunt, ut consummaretur Scriptura, dixit : Sitio.
Vas ergo erat positum aceto plenum. Illi autem spongiam plenam aceto, hyssopo circumponentes, obtulerunt ori ejus.
Cum ergo accepisset Jesus acetum, dixit : Consummatum est. Et inclinato capite tradidit spiritum.

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