Tidings of Ty Mam Duw 2010 With Advent on the horizon once more and the beginning of a new Church year, it is time to take stock of the one now ending. Living as we do in the heart of the Church and praying for the whole world, we are always conscious of the need to take both its joys and sorrows to heart. And this year has certainly been a roller-coaster one in its heights and depths, as the Lord has continued to work His purpose out in love for the world His Son came to redeem.
Our Advent carol service was well attended and had a reflective contemplative dimension. It focussed mainly on the Gospel of the Annunciation, which was mimed during the singing of a carol on that theme, with Sr Elizabeth as the Angel Gabriel with large sweeping wings which were affixed by threads to the choir ceiling and Sr Amata as Our Lady.
The emphasis was on Lectio Divina, a way of reading the scriptures reflectively as prayer - one which we ourselves also expressed as Claritas Divina, “divine clarity” following a way formulated by St Clare in her letters to St Agnes of Prague. It may be summed up in three key words - Behold, hold, enfold - or as Clare expressed it - Gaze, consider, contemplate.
At the beginning of Advent Dear Mother gave us a reflection on being rooted in the word of God and following in the footsteps of the Lord. A ribbon path had been laid out on the refectory wall, to which we could attach footprints as we journeyed towards His coming at Christmas through acts of love and support for our Sisters. We were amused to discover on attaching footprints that they were all left feet, so presumably we were hopping our way to Bethlehem!
On the Feast of St Barbara, we were each given our “Barbara branches”, gathered from the garden. The aim is to coax them into leaf and maybe even flower by Christmas by giving them a bit of warm water each day. Dear Mother and Sr Elizabeth acted out an hilarious sketch of two women avidly reading the 4th century Nicomedia News and discussing its centre-page spread on the recent death of St Barbara, the young woman who had been reported to the authorities and ultimately executed by her own father for refusing to renounce her new-found Christian faith. (According to one version of the legend he was then struck down by lightning, which may be why she is traditionally invoked for protection against sudden death.)
One memorable and ingenious Advent sharing on the theme of preparation of the way of the Lord included a sketch acted out by Sr Elizabeth of someone hearing a knock at his front door, and though he hoped it was just the postman had a distinct idea that it might be God summoning him from this world. He felt less than ready for such an occasion, and wondered if perhaps he would get permission first to finish a job he had begun, or pack some reading to take with him in case there was any hold-up in his journey to his final destination!
With a long Advent of almost four weeks, we had plenty of time to erect our various cribs and put up lights and general decorations. One cloister crib, fashioned by Sr Beatrix and Sr Seraphina, featured a goodly number of colourful home-made angels. That in the refectory by Dear Mother, Sr Agatha and Becky, our postulant from New Zealand, was a pro-life one, stressing the need to welcome new life, especially children, into this wonderful world God has given us. Our beloved Mother Francesca and Sr Pia had constructed an ‘orchard’ in the cloister, as a place to gather to have coffee midmorning and share family and other news over the Christmas ‘coffee days’.
It was inspired by the lovely 20th century hymn, Jesus Christ, the apple tree, with very decorative collage trees laden with bright origami-style apples. One Christmastide evening we gathered there to share the sweetmeats hanging on it, while Mother Francesca explained how the forbidden tree of the knowledge of good and evil had become specifically associated with an apple tree - all because the word malum, which can mean both apple tree and evil was used in the Vulgate version of the Genesis account.
Sr Amata and Sr Ruth had made a crib featuring a large collage tree, symbolising the kingdom of God, with the Incarnate Christ as the seed from which it springs, and by way of fruit the text in 36 languages of the Our Father, the fundamental prayer of all who have come to call on God as their Father through the saving power of Christ in every time and place.
With snow falling heavily two days before Christmas, the world looked like a traditional English Christmas scene the next morning, much to our delight, though our hearts went out to all on the roads, and especially to the train passengers stranded overnight in the Chunnel - a nightmarish scenario. Hawarden seems to be about the most sheltered place in Britain, and in the past twenty-five years or so, we have rarely had more than a couple of inches - though the annals of the thirties and forties tell of really heavy falls and snow on the ground for weeks.
Our Christmas Vigil began at 10 pm with the singing of the Matins Invitatory psalm interspersed with carols and ended with Midnight Mass celebrated by Canon Quigley. After a short break for refreshments, we returned to the choir for the singing of the Te Deum in similar fashion and had Exposition for a couple of hours, united in spirit with the shepherds who came to adore the Christchild that first night, and bringing our own offerings of music, poetry and prayer to the manger.
On Holy Innocents we gathered in the novitiate, where Sr Yolanda and Sr Ancilla had arranged games for us - ranging from pinning the tail on a picture of Millie (our miniature dachshund, whose pride in her tail makes up for her diminutive size and gives her an advantage over Dollie, our schnauzer, who possesses no such decorative adornment).
Our memories were all taxed by the game: I went to the market and I bought .. with each person in turn adding an item to the list. The articles bought ranged from a box of matches to a lorry and a pet giraffe, and we had a list of over 40 items, without anyone dropping out, before calling a halt to the shopping!
One recreation was acted out in the parlour, so that our dear Marianne, who helps us in so many ways, from taking sisters to the doctor or dentist, to providing lovely flowers for the chapel to the glory of God, and treats of the edible variety for first-class occasions, could also be present at it. It comprised a story translated by our dear Mother Francesca and Sr Pia, about a business executive, whose heart was touched by his secretary’s musing about past Christmases. On encountering a nameless couple, two poor political refugees, out on the streets and heading for the hospital as the birth of their child was imminent, he paid for a taxi for them, and later took responsibility for the further care of the young family, so finding his own life transformed and his former priorities overturned.
We spent one day spiritually united with all who were to take part in the annual Pro-Life March in Washington DC on 21 January. The day began with our each signing of a “Pro-Life petition” in Washington (our chapter room) and receiving a pro-life badge depicting an unborn child. We then went on our own march round the cloister behind a pro-life banner and a tapestry of Our Lady of Guadelupe which had been given in most providentially a few days before. Our progress was interspersed with quiet periods of reflection with the recital of a decade of the rosary at different parts of the Cloister. Afterwards we gathered in the novitiate for coffee and Dear Mother and Sr Agatha spoke about the origin of the Washington March and its increasing support over the years since its small beginnings. Later we assembled at the ‘soup kitchen” in the “Orchard”, after Sr Agatha spoke to us of the picture of Our Lady of Guadeloupe, adopted as the emblem of the pro-life movement, and of the significance of the way Our Lady is depicted in terms which would have been understandable to the Aztec Indians of those days.
In the afternoon we each earned our ticket to the “Rose Gala Dinner” by producing a song, reading or poem in highlighting the human worth of the unborn child, and later joined in Vespers in the refectory. The theme of the crib was unfolded, from its first beginnings as one inspired by the motto of an organisation in Colombia, Let the Children Live, which helps street children, and later extended to the equally important pro-life cause, working for the rights of unborn children and helping pregnant women in need. At the end of the crib sharing we were each presented with a home-made pottery figure of an unborn child at the age of 12 weeks from conception, and later enjoyed a video on St John Bosco and his work with the street children of his day.
Our annual celebratory Mass in honour of Saint Colette, took place in February, and was attended by mothers, babies and friends who had come to be blessed with her relic. We also gave thanks to God for all the “Colette babies”, who had arrived safely in the course of the year through her intercession.
Among our Christmastide highlights was one stage-managed by Sr Seraphina and Sr Beatrix. They had made an impressive computer printout of the facade of the Rosary Basilica in Lourdes and took us there on pilgrimage, as a group of small Poor Clare figures mounted on a cardboard base which was pulled along with strings. We sang the Lourdes hymn and others popular among pilgrims there and, as “we” approached, the church’s facade (mounted on a wooden cheese board) revolved to reveal the Lourdes Grotto, made of Fimo, with figures of Our Lady and Bernadette and a cluster of burning candles as on the large candlestick at the actual shrine. We also took part in spirit in the traditional torchlight procession, represented by a group of about fifty more home-made figures carrying banners and with votive lights burning beside them.
One especially fascinating recreation on 7 January was based by Sr Juliana and Sr Elizabeth on the life of Galileo. To their delight the date coincided with the 400th anniversary of the groundbreaking discovery, by means of the telescope he had invented, of the moons of Jupiter. The principle of a swinging pendulum, and the demonstration of the fact that light objects fall at the same rate as heavier ones, were duly demonstrated - the latter not by dropping cannonballs from the leaning Tower of Pisa, but by the dropping of a cabbage and a dried pea from the top of a stepladder.
In the afternoon we continued with Galileo’s story and his encounters with friends and enemies, until at the close of his life. When Galileo reached the end of his life, an angel, complete with cherubic wings, appeared to take him to heaven with a special detour via the planets, a treat permitted by the Almighty just to give him pleasure. In the evening we saw a video, Galileo’s Daughter, on the life of his much beloved Virginia (Sr Marie Céleste). She was a Poor Clare, and his greatest comfort and support throughout his controversial life, even taking upon herself the daily recitation of the penitential psalms, which he had been given as his penance by the Church court for his supposedly mistaken views!
February brought Dear Mother’s feastday for which we staged Water, Wind and Light, a meditation on Lourdes and Saint Bernadette, with the images of fire, light and water as the basic themes. It included several simple motets, with much of the script being read in dramatic form or as lines recited by a chorus, while some very lovely home-made collage-type slides were projected on the sanctuary wall in choir.
Several wooden mallets and a pile of bricks furnished the required sound effects when it came to recalling the Gospel episode of the paralysed man, whose friends broke through the roof of the house where Jesus was staying to lower him on his pallet at Christ’s feet.
The reflections ended with Bernadette’s death, with seven “last words” recalling those of Christ. The final slide, as we softly sang the Hail Mary, was of the incorrupt body of St Bernadette lying as if asleep in a glass casket in the convent chapel at Nevers, where she had spent the last decades of her life.
The following week our dear Sr Ancilla, who comes from the Philippines, took her first vows. As she is noted for her thorough cobwebbing of the cloister at regular intervals, the countdown calendar we made for the great day took the form of colourful smiling cardboard spiders suspended from the ceiling for her to bring down with her brush, each yielding up an appropriate quote by St Bonaventure on the religious life! The profession ceremony was as always a very lovely and moving occasion. Fr Gareth celebrated the semi-private Mass and preached on the first reading from the Song of Songs (8:6-8), speaking of Christ impressing His seal on the soul and conforming its image to himself. The next day we saw a video on the life of St Clare, and later a delightful finger-puppet dramatisation of the life of Saint Colette, written by Sr Elizabeth, as amusing as it was inspirational. Sr Yolanda and Becky had made the puppets, about thirty in all from colourful felt, with characters ranging from Colette and Fr Henri, to the townsfolk of Corbie, and the Cardinals affected with spotty pinkitis after opposing her reform! At one point the puppeteers had all their fingers occupied by the crowd of characters ‘on-stage’.
The weather continued bitterly cold, and the pond in the cloister garden was frozen over most days till mid-March. One amusing sight as the ice was thinning was a large ungainly pigeon gingerly testing its weight on the surface! A few days later it was there in the water obviously relishing its much longed-for springtime bath! And the small magnolia tree outside the infirmary became a mass of shining white glory to lift the heart even on grey days.
We had a first-class flu-type cold doing the rounds for much of Lent. Our main chantresses lost their voices almost completely, so we were praising the Lord sotto voce, and for a week or so were reduced to reciting the Office rather than singing it. During the Lenten months as our response to the tragic unfolding of the extent of abuse cases and the failure of many in authority to deal with the pain this has brought to individuals and to the Church as a whole, we had extra Exposition regularly to enable us to hold the sorry situation in our hearts before the Lord, praying for His mercy and healing.
This year the backdrop for the Holy Week/Easter tableau in our choir was a representation of St Peter’s Basilica, with dark clouds looming over it, and featured a newly carved figure of Papa Bene in the role of St Peter. After the Good Friday service a shrouded figure of the dead Christ was placed in a bricked-in catacomb under the basilica. On Easter Day He was depicted in shining garments appearing to the holy women who had come to the tomb to anoint His body. The windows of the Basilica had been transformed to stained glass, their colours also suggesting the reflection of the bright dawn of the new day ushered in by the abiding hope and promise of the Resurrection. St Francis was there too, rebuilding the Church as Christ told him to, by recalling it to the gospel values he himself lived out so wholeheartedly - and Saints Clare and Colette had their place at ground level, supporting the scaffolding he was standing on!
A Sister who had worked in the Vatican was on retreat here in Eastertide. She was so struck by the figure of the Risen Christ holding out his arms to a figure of Papa Bene (alias St Peter), that she sent some photos to a friend in Rome, telling him to be sure to pass them on to the Pope, with an assurance of our loving prayer support in these troubled times.
In Easter week we went on a treasure hunt, with successive clues provided by Bible references. For instance, 1 Kings 21:2 about Ahab coveting Naboth’s vineyard for a vegetable garden, led us to the statue of St Francis which presides over the vegetable garden, where we found the next clue was Jeremiah 18:2: “go down to the
potter's house”. This took us to the pottery shed and ultimately to a chocolate rabbit each by way of a prize!
During May we had a retreat given by Fr Peter Burrows, who radiated a deep love for holy Scripture, with a fascinating approach and interpretation of much therein that tends to be overlooked in a superficial reading. His sheer enthusiasm was like a gale of fresh air, blowing away any cobwebs from parts of the Bible that one thought one knew. He gave us three 90 minute talks a day without any notes, which was quite a feat, and promised to come back some other time for a conference on the book of Ruth.
The following week Brother Parker, who for several years had been a guide in the catacombs, came to to speak about the early Roman martyrs and the other saints mentioned in the Roman canon of the Mass, which was made universal by Charlemagne in the 7th century and is still an option in use today. He used a computer to project illustrations of his talks on a screen, and also gave each of us an illustrated printout summary.
May is by tradition Our Lady’s month, so we ourselves had a novena celebration in her honour, masterminded by Sr Seraphina and based on a very lovely live one in the Philippines with processions of children, some dressed as angels and others in colourful long dresses, singing hymns in her honour. Sr Seraphina had made us a number of very lovely figures, about 8 inches high, of angels and other participants, which she moved back and forth in formation to give us a vivid impression of the celebration as a whole.
Several of them made a solemn entrance carrying letters forming the words AVE MARIA, recalling the Angel Gabriel’s greeting to Our Lady at the Annunciation, entrusting to her care our prayers for specific needs of God’s children throughout the world. Each evening of the Novena we honoured Our Lady under a different title, and we looked forward to her entrance near the end of the celebration dressed in the robes associated with the image of that name. Our celebration included hymns, a psalm, and scripture readings, and ended with us each bringing a flower to Our Lady, which we placed before her in a basket. Afterwards we ourselves took the collected posies in procession, while singing Ecce Ancilla Domini, laying some before each of the small shrines in her honour in the cloister and main rooms of our monastery.
In June Fr Gareth came to preside at our triennial community elections at which Mother Damian was returned for a second term. While he was here he went all over the house and garden blessing everything (including the crops and our dogs!) with holy water. As to our vegetables, it never pays to count your beans before you pick them!
This year their growth was slowed by rain and cold weather and many were irreparably attacked, early on, by the Bean Weevil,
and had to be replaced by some peas we still had in hand. But the remaining ones rallied and the peas also did well enough. It certainly was a good year for the soft fruit which suffered much less from the changeable weather. Sr Agatha’s blueberry bushes fruited, to her great delight, with lovely luscious berries, almost as big as grapes. . Our American e-mail friends tend to rhapsodise about their blueberry pies, and now we’ve actually tasted some of our own, we can better appreciate their enthusiasm!
Spells of wet and windy weather with sunshine episodes produced rainbows to lift the spirits, and also encouraged a bumper crop of mushrooms in various parts of the garden! We identified the two most impressive ones as giant puffballs (Langermannia gigantea) an edible variety, unlike the smaller kinds which are poisonous. They were both the size of a football, with firm pure-white flesh which could be sliced like meat, each furnishing a tasty meal for the whole community.
Our hearts were gladdened this year by a pair of robins and of swallows nesting under the eaves outside the kitchen and successfully raising their respective youngsters there. At one point two rabbits were spotted frolicking in the garden, but as far as we know simply strayed in from a nearby field and did not decide to settle for good. We also had a number of small squirrels of an enquiring disposition, including one which developed a taste for objects made of PVC, gnawing holes in the lids of a dustbin and hopper, as well as demolishing a rubber flap designed to prevent our low-lying dogs from straying under the enclosure gate. Now at the time of writing in late autumn, the moles are hard at it, raising several miniature mountains a day, presumably digging for all they are worth before the ground freezes solid!
August brought the lovely Feast of the Portiuncula, at which Fr Gareth preached on the theme of ‘indulgence’, as the overflowing mercy and love of God, also evident in the abundance of life and vitality in creation. He spoke of the Portiuncula indulgence as a ‘dynamic way of changing direction in life’, opening the heart through sacramental confession to the overwhelming love and mercy of God. In this we are supported too by Our Lady’s motherly love and care for all her children, and by the life and love of the whole Church down the ages, especially as manifest in the saints.
The Feast of our Holy Mother Saint Clare the following week began with a Holy Hour, during which we recalled her great love for Our Lord in the Blessed Sacrament, and her equally great love for the Church through thick and thin, despite all the storms of those tempestuous times.
It was also the 120th anniversary of the death of Cardinal Newman, who wrote in one of his well-known hymns, And I hold in veneration/ For the sake of [Christ] alone, / Holy Church, as his creation, / And her teachings as his own. So as we looked forward to the Holy Father’s visit to Britain we felt sure that both Saint Clare and Cardinal Newman would be be praying for its success.
On the Feast of the Assumption, several Sisters staged in tableau form in the cloister a meditation play based on readings from the New Testament, which highlighted Our Lady’s role in the life of her Divine Son. The way in which the different episodes of her life, such as the Marriage Feast at Cana and her standing under the Cross of her Son, were related to each other through the interweaving of the appropriate passages was very moving and thought-provoking. The account of the Annunciation was acted out in the original Greek version of St Luke’s Gospel.
For Dear Mother’s profession anniversary later that month we enjoyed a delightful (and instructive) recreation, written by Sr Elizabeth, with colourful felt finger-puppets made by Becky and Sr Yolanda, and manipulated by three puppeteers.
It comprised a potted history of Britain from 2600 BC till the Norman Conquest in 1066, introducing us to the first known settlers in the form of Neolithic man, the Britons, the Romans, the Picts, Angles, Vikings etc. Each new conquest was symbolised by two appropriately clad puppets advancing singing, We are the Britons (Romans / Picts / Angles, etc), Ho, Ho, Ho; We’re here to stay and not to go - until of course the next wave of arrivals came on the scene! Along the way we were also introduced to old friends from our childhood history lessons
- King Arthur, Alfred the Great, Saint Augustine of Canterbury, Edward the Confessor etc - and the play ended with the arrival of William of Normandy. (We have been promised a further episode in another 15 years or so!).
Our beloved Mother Francesca, has given us talks on a wide variety of subjects this year, from ones on the Reformation, giving the background issues which were likely to colour the Papal visit, to input on the various Orthodox Churches, as well as the Eastern and Uniate Catholic Churches. The Papal visit was of course a time of tremendous joy and inspiration for us, and for the millions who watched it world-wide, confounding the strident hostility expressed by some individuals and widely reported in the secular press in the weeks beforehand. We were glued to the TV for a good deal of the 4 days he was here, had armed ourselves with copies of the liturgy obtainable off the internet, and so were able to join in all the events with full voice as well as in spirit! The TV coverage of his speech in Westminster Hall, with all its historical and religious associations, was especially memorable, as was the ecumenical Vespers at Westminster Abbey. It was altogether an historic occasion for the country as a whole, and we hope and pray that it will inspire many to heed his urgent call to respect faith groups and ethical and moral values, if our society is not to become a spiritual wasteland.
For most of us, the most moving and impressive moment of the visit was the Vigil in Hyde Park and the complete silence and deep prayer for almost ten minutes of the 90,000 people present when the Blessed Sacrament was exposed for adoration.
It was all the more moving as the event was within a stone’s throw or so from the site of the former Tyburn Gallows, where four to five hundred years ago so many Catholics, both priests and laity, gave their life for their loyalty to the Pope as the head of the Church, and for their love of the Mass and the Blessed Sacrament.
At Michaelmas we had a special celebration in the cloister in honour of the holy archangels. Sr Seraphina had designed and made colourful angel costumes complete with wings for the five Sisters who took part in it. The liturgy included mimed readings from the Old Testament and the Book of Revelation on the Archangels, whose office is to praise Him eternally and defend and intercede for His people. There followed a medley of Marian hymns, played by the group on tin whistles, which they had mastered in the preceding weeks, together with a very lovely Magnificat, composed by Sr Seraphina.
After it was sung, intercessions we had written on slips of paper and ceremonially burnt, rising up in smoke and mingling with the prayers of the angels in the presence of the Lord.
Several groups of Secular Franciscans were present for the celebration of the Transitus of Our Holy Father St Francis on the Eve of his Feast. It comprised the text of 13th century accounts of his passing from this world to eternity, with several of us reading the narration and the spoken parts, combining this with simple symbolic actions - such as the laying of a habit and cord before the altar to represent the dying Saint Francis, and then scattering it with rose petals when he entered into the glory of heaven. We had made small heart-shaped marzipan biscuits which we distributed to those present, and were glad there were enough over for us as well!
October also brought the universal joy at the safe rescue of the Chilean miners, and at the faith and courage which had sustained them in their darkest days.
The middle of the month also saw the Synod for the Churches of the Middle East, which took place in Rome. Sr Juliana treated us to a fascinating talk on the very different liturgical rites of the sundry Catholic Churches in those parts, and of the very difficult situations and problems they have to face, often ones of suspicion, hostility or outright persecution and violence. She illustrated her presentation with epidiascope pictures, and had also made us a loaf such as is used in the Eastern liturgy for holy Mass, marked with liturgical symbols including representations of the nine choirs of angels - this we later shared at collation.
The same week our Dear Mother and Sr Yolanda had ventured as far north as Scotland to attend a meeting at Perth of the Association of British Contemplatives on our behalf. On their way home they passed through Edinburgh, the city where the Pope had first touched down on British soil, but even more important for us as the childhood home of Venerable Margaret Sinclair (Sr Mary Francis of the Five Wounds). She had become an extern Sister in our motherhouse of Notting Hill in 1924, dying of TB the following year, nine months after taking her first vows.
Sr Pacifica, one the extern Sisters who had come on the foundation to Wales, had been in the novitiate with her. Her own clothing ceremony was combined with the one at which Sr Mary Francis was professed, and she occasionally shared memories of her with us.
After the excitement of the Papal Visit, we had come more or less down to earth again and had spent the next four weeks preparing for our Autumn Fair, baking, making jam, pickles, pottery, soft toys, arts and crafts of all sorts. Despite cold weather and even a short hailstorm, which meant less people venturing out than last year, it went very happily and a good time was had by all. We would like to thank all those who helped towards it, by sending us materials to make items to sell, contributing bric-a-brac and miscellaneous items for the jumble department, or by manning the various stalls.
We also deeply appreciated being able to share your joys and sorrows and hold them before the Lord, as a result of your letters, whether E-mail or “snail-mail”. The ongoing support given to our community in so many ways, spiritual as well as material, and especially the generosity of local schools and churches who brought us produce from their Harvest Festivals has warmed our hearts and encouraged us in our vocation.
You can be sure that we will be encircling you with our prayers this Christmas and as the New Year unfolds, asking Our Lord to guide and protect you, that the words of the following lovely 6th century prayer from Spain may be fulfilled in your life and in all those whom you hold in your hearts:
O Lord Christ, who art both Alpha and Omega,
the beginning and the end,
and whose years shall not fail;
grant us so to pass through the coming year with faithful hearts,
that in all things we may please thee and glorify thy name.
Mozarabic LiturgyWith loving prayers for you,
one and all,
from
your little Sisters at Ty Mam Duw
Poor Clare Colettine Community
Upper Aston Hall Lane, Hawarden, Deeside CH5 3EN North Wales G.B.
Tel [++44] [0]1244 531029
E-mail community@poorclarestmd.org
Website http://www.poorclarestmd.org
