feminine-genius

An icon of the healing dimension of Holy Mother Church

 

Such a lovely witness: a beautiful combination of professionalism, motherly tenderness and faith. Furthermore, there is her evident humility, in that this only surfaces years after her ministry to the Holy Father was completed.

Bookmark

Just this last weekend, I spoke to some lovely women in Maine, the wives of members of the Knights of Columbus who had their annual state convention at Sunday River (Newry). Beautiful -- it even snowed! Subsequently, a woman wrote to me to ask if there are recorded talks anywhere, but other than the talks given to the women in the TASTE program in Baltimore and some recent talks to the "Women of the Blessed Sacrament" in Los Angeles, I don't know of any recordings.

But, this Bookmark audiofile should give a good sense of my message, if you're looking for a good summer read or a speaker for Fall/2012. By then, my new book on forgiveness will be out, and a day-long retreat would be a wonderful way to renew your faith. Also, remember that the book about which Doug and I spoke has a free study guide, if you want to go through it with a book club or prayer group.

Mother as bridge

K-Lo has found the most extraordinary video of a child, who speaks with the thoughtfulness and wisdom of a grown man--indeed like a man quite advanced in age. He had to think deeply because of a congenital illness that threatened to cut his life short. Do watch the clip here.

And then, please take some time to reflect on the mother's tremendous influence, by which she took a frightened, suffering child and helped him to make sense of his world. He died young, but with great anticipation of his reunion with God and those he loved. His words are inspiring, teaching us all how to live--and how to die.

Part of the feminine genius is to be an icon of the Church, mater et magistra, the bridge with the One True God. To be specific, the Church offers viaticum to those who are gravely ill, which strengthens them for the journey--either the path to recovery or the path to Eternity. This child reveals a mother who understood her vocation and carefully catechised her dear one amidst the tears. Thus with the help of God she took what could have been a tragedy and turned it into a miracle of grace.

Let's not miss the opportunities we have for being that bridge between the natural and the supernatural, between man and God, between sacrifice and grace. Truly this child must have been a powerful intercessor since his untimely death, and he is one to remember with confidence. Saint Garvan, pray for us!

Generous, fervent, and humble

The Mexican people rejoiced at the Basilica of Guadalupe, where Mother Maria Inés Teresa of the Most Blessed Sacrament was beatified. The fifth of eight children, she was born in 1904, discerned a call to religious life in 1924, and made her final profession in 1933 at the Ave Maria Monastery. Shortly thereafter, the entire convent had to move to California during the Cristero persecutions. Later she was called to found a new two new groups, the Clarissan Missionaries of the Most Holy Sacrament (1924) and the Missionaries of Christ for the Universal Church (1979).

From the Vatican website:

The Servant of God, Maria Inés Teresa Arias, was born on Ixtlan del Rio (Mexico). She entered religious life in 1929 and lived for a while in California and then in Mexico. In the community she was appointed counseler, secretary and novice mistress. In 1945, the convent she founded in Cuernavaca, Mexico, was approved by the Holy See. The Congregation became missionary by the Pontifical Decree of 1951. Different foundations followed: Cuernavaca, Puebla, Chiapas, Guadalajara, Monterrey, Japan, United States (Texas, California), Costa Rica, Sierra Leone, Indonesia, Italy (Rome), Spain (Pamplona, Madrid), Ireland (Dublin), Nigeria. She died in Rome on July 22, 1981, leaving behind a missionary family of sisters, priests and lay persons, spread through the five continents. She left us a testimony of generous dedication and service to the Church. Her missionary travels took her to visit the convents she founded. She kept in touch with each one of them by correspondence. This correspondence has provided us with an abundant missionary legacy of great spiritual richness as are: letters, advices and reflections, studies and meditations, spiritual exercises.

More information can be found here at their site. A hearty congratulations to her community at this joyful time!

New book on the horizon

As a follow-up to The Authentic Catholic Woman, Servant will publish Set Free: The Authentic Catholic Woman's Guide to Forgiveness (due out October 23rd). Now would be a good time to set up a presentation on this important topic. I'd love to address your prayer group, book club, study circle or larger women's organizations. The topic works wonderfully as an all-day retreat (here is some feedback). Talks are appropriate for women from all walks of life, but the new book material is specifically geared for women who are suffering from the ravages of the sexual revolution. After speaking on the topic for 15 years, I've discovered that forgiveness -- which is foundational to our faith -- is often terribly misunderstood. This book is well-grounded, entirely Catholic and very, very practical. Let's share the healing message! 

Feminine genius in action

CatholicMom offers this lovely testament to the Maryknoll Sisters, written by Dr. Carolyn Woo, who was taught by them when she was a child in China.

The most valuable gift I received from the sisters, though, was faith. We had catechism lessons, but, more importantly, we saw faith in action. Somewhere along the line, I concluded that God must be very real for the sisters. Otherwise, why would they leave home, family and security to go to some foreign land to live in hardship, speak a new language, adjust to a new culture, face such risks? Why would they choose to serve us girls when they did not even know us? How did they know they would succeed? They not only did this, but they exuded so much joy and humor, grace and adventure.

“Can’t be done” was not part of their vocabulary. By their examples, I learned to fight and to love—two sides of the same coin when it comes to serving poor and marginalized people. I learned to trust God because they did.

Do read it all. While many of us will not travel to distant lands as missionaries, remember the impact your steady, joyful faith can have even here in your own community, your own family. Stability and hope are very much needed at present, and women can easily build their lives around them -- and don't think they won't be noticed by a world careening towards darkness. Believe, love, smile!

"One in a million"

Dolores Hart was reminded that she was "one in a million," as family members tried to talk her out of leaving a successful acting career to enter the convent, but perhaps that's the very reason that she felt called to the cloister. It was a singular calling, and and at its heart, she knew it provided the stability that her broken family and Hollywood career did not. Those two things had provided her with great heartache--both being the source of constant good-bye's and disjointed relationships, which were shredding her.

She is in the news once again because of her upcoming visit to the Oscars, during which a short film about her vocation will be nominated for an award. This recent 20/20 interview probes her decision to enter the Regina Laudis Benedictine community in Connecticut.

It also brings back my own fond memories of a visit there. While I thought I'd have a quiet relaxing retreat, I worked harder than I'd ever done in my life, as I happened to visit at the time when they were removing an ingrown fence on one of their pastures, which meant uprooting the surrounding trees, hauling the stumps and clearing out years of brush. I was exhausted, but priviledged to work side by side with extraordinary women from all walks of life. My souvenirs were an opportunity for profound spiritual direction and a very sore back. The former, praise God, outlasted the latter!

 

Looking for a Lenten project?

I have a review at Catholic Lane of an excellent study for women -- it would be perfect to do alone, with friends in your living room or even in a more formal parish setting. With larger events swirling about us and making us wonder about how we'll be able to live our faith (with integrity) in the coming years, we would do well to remind ourselves of those who did the same over the centuries in the most trying of times. These books will be a practical and well-grounded help for all of us!

Remarkable Anniversary

I have taken the liberty of translating this piece in order to honour my patron saint:

On January 3, 2012, we mark the 1500th anniversary of the death of Saint Geneviève, the patron saint of Paris. For all Parisians, the name of the saint is associated with the mountain where she was buried and which remained throughout the centuries the radiant center of French intelligence. King Louis XV erected on the summit a beautiful basilica dedicated to Saint Geneviève (designed by Jacques-Germain Soufflot) although the Revolution of 1789 desecrated the building, creating the Panthéon in which to house the "big men" ... But never mind.

This saint was Gallo-Roman, born of a Gallic mother and Frankish father in Nanterre between 420 and 423. As a child, around 429, she was noticed for her "piety and heavenly beauty" by Saint Germain, bishop of Auxerre, who was passing through, accompanied by Saint Loup, bishop of Troyes, on their way to fight the Pelagian heresy in Brittany. The prelate then hung around her neck a coin marked with a cross, a sign of her promise of virginal consecration. Shortly afterwards, the death of her parents forced her to move to Nanterre, first to live with her godmother in Lutèce,and subsequently to head a community there. Distributing as alms the money inherited from the vast estates of her parents, she subsisted on beans and barley loaves, performing extraordinary miracles, including healing many who were blind or lame. This attracted not only praise from the population, but led them to understand that they should place all their hope in God alone, for the pagans were too materialistic and the Christians too discouraged by the situation of their city which was prey to Visigothic invasions.

The fate of Lutèce was indeed precarious, being the last Roman enclave under the protection of the patrician Ætius, head of the Roman militia. And then it came to pass in 451 that the terrible Attila the Hun, known as the "scourge of God," appeared in Gaul at the head of 500 000 fierce warriors. On April 7th, he had put the people of Metz to the sword. At Lutèce, men spoke fleeing, and only Genevieve, aged twenty-eight, encouraged them to resist. She managed to convince a group of women to pray, fast and refuse their husbands as cowards if they did not resist. What women want ...

The fact remained that Attila, having failed to take Troyes which was strongly defended by its bishop, Saint Loup, rushed but not on to Lutèce, but to Orléans, where he met with the resistance of Saint Aignan, another intrepid prelate. One must remember that Ætius had been raised as a hostage of honor among the Huns and was therefore thoroughly familiar with the practices of the children of the steppes; and Attila, for his part, believed himself destined to seize the Roman Empire was fully aware of the Greco-Roman education. The confrontation in that sense took on a symbolic value.

The battle took place two weeks later, near Troyes in the Catalonian fields, where Attila was defeated but not crushed. Geneviève had contributed to the victory by helping the Gauls not to panic. Peace, though, was still quite uncertain. From 476, the puppet emperor Romulus Augustus was disposed towards Odoacer, the king of the Heruli who was allied with the Huns, and who would later entrust his imperial insignia to Zeno, the Eastern Roman Emperor. A barbarian entering Rome! A whole world was collapsing!

Geneviève did not lose hope: Rome was revived under the sign of the Cross! But the bishops of Gaul, who could no longer count on Roman order to save civilization, instead began to place their hopes in the Frankish kings, descendants of Merovingia. Although they were still somewhat pagan and cruel, at least they were less so than the other invaders, the Visigoths and Burgundians, whose religion was Arianism. If Childeric, a great admirer of Roman civilization, or his son Clovis born in 466, succeeded, since they had the stature to reunite Gaul -- providing the greatest potential for unity since Saint Martin -- this could provide the bulwark to advance a Christian kingdom that covered the Western Roman Empire! Geneviève would participate in the realization of this grand design.

She held Childeric in high esteem, and upon his death in 481 she turned her affections towards the young Clovis, then aged fifteen, and who was soon to slay Syagrius, distant successor of Ætius, who was merely an embarrassing shadow. Clovis was preparing to enter Lutèce, which he envisioned as his capital, but Geneviève tried to forbid him, insisting that he should be baptized. And yet we know that her wish had to wait until Queen Clotilde became her friend and Remi, bishop of Reims, could convince the young king to be baptized at Rheims at Christmas 496.

Despite her advanced age - she was to live to be over ninety - Geneviève remained the confidante of the royal couple, and the most revered person in Lutèce, which subsequently began to be called Paris. Clovis had begun construction on the Mount of the Basilica of the Holy Apostles, where he himself was buried in November 511. Geneviève joined him on January 3rd, 512. Queen Clotilde was to join them much later, in 544. But Geneviève, patron saint of Paris, continues from her mountain to protect the capital against all the modern "scourges of God" can not be invoked too often.

The parallels with our own time could not be more obvious, and I encourage women everywhere to take even more seriously their ability to instill courage by means of prayer, fasting and living the feminine genius. Bonne fête!

Fancy that!

I just found out that I'm on Kindle. Sort of a cheap thrill, actually. For those looking for a present for the Catholic woman on your list, there's always the Dead Tree version -- appropriate for all ages (single, married, widowed, and consecrated). And if you like it, I'll visit your parish and do the Warm Body version in either conference or retreat style. Now that's fancy!