Piety vs Weirdness

Many Catholics now-a-days seem to confuse piety with weirdness. It is common for people new to the faith, or for young people, to have problems with scruples and the like. I am thinking of those who have been Catholics their entire lives and should know better. They seem to think that being "holy" dispenses them from basic kindness and courtesy. They are so holy they can violate the rubrics prescribed by the Church for the worship of God. They do not need Church documents because they are so "holy." They can indulge in lies and calumny but because they go to Mass everyday, it's alright.

Yes, we all have our sins, faults, and eccentricities. Being devout, however, is not equivalent to being an unsocialized crank. Holy feelings do not make a saint; sanctity is won by taking up the Cross. We are commanded to love, and to show love even to those whom we despise or who despise us. We are commanded to forgive injuries. The saints give so many examples of this; the Savior, of course, is the greatest example of all.

Anglicans Return

A discussion on the latest amazing occurrences. More HERE.

Mother Magdalen Taylor and Tyborne

Here is an article from Roman Miscellany about Mother Magdalen Taylor, the author of Tyborne, a novel about the English Catholic martyrs, and foundress of the Poor Servants of the Mother of God. I once stayed with those sisters in their house in Paris, while I was looking into a position of governess with a wealthy French family. The family lived on an elegant street near the Bois de Boulogne which the taxi driver could not find on the map. The apartment house had once been someone's palace, I think. At any rate, there were no numbers on the doors of any of the suites and it took me awhile to find the right one. They were a lovely family and the children had a nanny; they really just needed someone to speak English to their children all day. They had a house in Brittany as well. I decided not to take the job, however; there were reasons why I had to return home to America. However, it was an adventure.

There is also mention of the wonderful Mary Ward in the article.

Mary Ward

Mary Ward (1585-1645) founded one of the first teaching orders of nuns, experiencing persecution from within and without the Church. She was one of the brave English Catholics who persevered in the faith in spite of the penal laws. Here is an account of her life from the website of the order she founded, the Institute of the Blessed Virgin Mary:

Mary Ward: Pioneer for Women in the Church

Over 400 years ago, Mary Ward was born into a world not unlike ours in difficulties, except that now the world’s disasters come to us instantly via satellite communications. Mary spent her life following God’s guidance in seeking something new. How contemporary with us was her foresight in championing women’s role in spreading God’s compassion: how many today struggle as she did for the triumph of truth and justice. For us, and we hope for you, she continues to share her zealous vitality.

This is her story.

Born in 1585 into a devoted Catholic family in Yorkshire, from childhood Mary Ward knew religious persecution, not unlike trouble spots in today’s world: raids, imprisonment, torture, execution. Frequently separated from her family for her own protection, Mary was inspired by their steadfast heroism. At age fifteen, she felt called to become a religious. Since religious communities had been dispersed decades previously in England and on the continent, cloistered life was the only option for women at that time. She left England to become a Poor Clare. Through special graced insights, God showed her that she was to do something different and would manifest God’s glory. Leaving the Poor Clares, she worked in disguise to preserve the Catholic Faith in England before founding a community of active sisters in 1609 at St. Omer in present-day Belgium. Without cloister, she and her companions educated young women, helped persecuted and imprisoned Catholics, and spread the word of God in places priests could not go. The Sisters lived and worked openly on the continent, but secretly in England to nurture the faith.

At one time, she was imprisoned in England for her work with outlawed Catholics. Many who knew her, from bishops and monarchs to simple people, admired her courage and generosity. In days before Boeing 747’s or even Amtrak, she traveled Europe on foot, in dire poverty and frequently ill, founding schools in the Netherlands, Italy, Germany, Austria, and in today’s Czech Republic and Slovakia. Criticized and maligned for her efforts to expand the role of women in spreading the faith, she was imprisoned by Church officials who called her a dangerous heretic. Her work was destroyed, her community suppressed, and her sisters scattered. Never abandoning her trust in God’s guidance, she died in York, England, in 1645 during the Cromwellian Civil War. To the end, she trusted totally that what God had asked of her would be accomplished in the future.

Mary Ward taught by example and words. Act “without fear… in quiet confidence that God will do his will in the confusion.” Her unwavering fidelity to “that which God would” was nourished by deep contemplative prayer. To Mary, God was the “Friend of all friends.” She lived her fidelity with cheerfulness and a passion for truth. What may seem to us ordinary was startling in her time: she had no pattern to follow when she established her community for women, except the life and work followed by the Jesuit men. She sought to empower women to fulfill whatever part God called them to play, as did the women in the Acts of the Apostles, as women concerned for the poor. Mary and her companions established free schools, nursed the sick and visited prisoners. Even her Protestant neighbors attested to her love for the poor and her perseverance in helping them. Her concept of freedom for her community, externally from cloister, choir, habit, and rule by men, and internally in the ability to “refer all to God,” enabled her to live undeterred by adversity, never deviating from the way God called her. She invited her followers to “become lovers of truth and workers of justice.”

Not until 1909 did the Church finally recognize Mary Ward as founder of the IBVM. She was a pioneer for women’s role in Church ministry and a woman ahead of her time in shaping apostolic religious life as we know it today. Mary Ward expected much and believed with all her heart that, “Women in time to come will do much.”

St. Paul of the Cross

And the conversion of England. According to Scott Richert:

October 20 is the feast day of Saint Paul of the Cross (1694-1775), the founder of the Passionists. Though Saint Paul spent his life in Italy, the Catholic Encyclopedia notes that "For fifty years he prayed for the conversion of England, and left the devotion as a legacy to his [spiritual] sons." Almost 65 years after his death, the Passionists were first introduced into England, and the Catholic Encyclopedia declares that "They came in the spirit of Apostles without gold or silver, without scrip or staff or shoes or two coats," yet they "soon revived without commotion several Catholic customs and practices which had died out since the Reformation. They were the first to adopt strict community life, to wear their habit in public, to give missions and retreats to the people, and to hold public religious processions."

Father Pius Devine, in an 1882 manuscript cited by the Catholic Encyclopedia, remarks that the Passionist in England "gloried in the disgrace of the Cross, were laughed at by Protestants, warned by timid Catholics, but encouraged always by Cardinal Wiseman. Their courage became infectious, so that in a short time almost every order now in England followed their example."

All of this may simply be a coincidence. But considering Pope Benedict's sensitivity to the symbolism of dates, I don't think so. In any case, on this historic day, we can join Saint Paul of the Cross in praying for the conversion of England.

The Mystical Invasion

Fr. Mark has a spellbinding post on St. Margaret Mary, whose feast we just celebrated, and how the great mystics of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries changed the world. To quote:

Saint Teresa of Jesus died in 1582. Sixty-five years later, in 1647, Saint Margaret Mary was born. The spiritual climate in Europe, following the Council of Trent, was one of extraordinary effervescence. Henri Brémond in his monumental Histoire littéraire du sentiment religieux en France speaks of a "mystical invasion." Saint Teresa's Carmel had crossed the Pyrenees, introducing men and women of all states of life to the way of interior prayer. The Jesuits had launched their missions to North America or, as they called it, "New France." Men and women of God, too many to be counted, undertook great things for His glory. It was the golden age of great friendships in God. In 1610, the young widow, Jeanne-Françoise de Chantal, together with Francis de Sales, established at Annecy the Order of the Visitation of Holy Mary, declaring "that no great severity shall prevent the feeble and the weak from joining it."
The Choice of God
When Margaret Mary Alacoque entered the Visitation Monastery of Paray-le-Monial, it was assumed that she, like so many other women, would disappear into the cloister, leaving behind no more than the sweet lingering fragrance of another life given to Christ. But, as always, "God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise, God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong, God chose what is low and despised in the world, even things that are not, to bring to nothing things that are, so that no human being might boast in the presence of God" (1 Cor 1:27-29).
Contemplating the Pierced Side
The icy wind of Jansenism was blowing through the chinks in more than one cloister. It chilled the heart with the fear of a distant and vindictive God, eclipsing the mission of Jesus sent by the Father, in the power of the Holy Spirit, "to proclaim release to the captives . . . to set at liberty those who are oppressed" (Lk 4:18). While the hearts of many around her grew cold, Saint Margaret Mary fixed her gaze upon the wounds of Jesus Crucified. Like Saint John the Apostle, like Saints Bernard, Lutgarde, Gertrude, Mechthilde, and countless others before and after her, the humble Visitandine of Pary-le-Monial was compelled by the Holy Spirit to look upon Jesus' pierced Side. "They shall look on Him whom they have pierced" (Zech 12:10, Jn 19:37).

Forgiveness

It is the sign of being a Christian. Fr. Ray Blake has a moving story.

I am a survivor of the Tutsi genocide in Rwanda 1994.

A large part of my family was killed while in our parish church. The sight of this building used to fill me with horror and turned my stomach, just like the encounter with the prisoners filled me with disgust and rage.

It is in this mental state that something happened that would change my life and my relationships.