Silence

The Father uttered 

only one Word

Which was His Son

This Word speaks always 

in eternal silence

And in silence is to be heard 

by the soul.

St. John of the Cross

Today, the feast of St. John of the Cross, was our monthly Day of Adoration at the little chapel near Emmanuel Hermitage.  


We start the Day with an early celebration of the Eucharist which is followed and prolonged by 12 hours of silent prayer before a Host consecrated during mass. People come in and kneel or sit for a few minutes in the silence; most remain for one hour, some for two hours, or even more.  

This prayer time in shared silence is powerful. 

Jesus shows and hides himself to us in the silence of the Host, in a presence so humble and simple that only faith can see Him. 

Each person present in prayerful silence is a witness to their faith, a witness to the Mystery that hosts us in that sacred space, and also a witness to the mystery that we each one are. 

Shared silence is as powerful as it is fragile; it is born when and where there is not only a silent atmosphere but also when everyone present embraces it by giving and receiving simultaneously the gift of prayerful silence in a form of shared intimacy. 

It would take only one person to break the silence of all others present as we see it often happen in our parishes. This is how fragile it is.

Silence has many dimensions and levels, so many that in a way the whole spiritual journey can be considered a journey into deeper and deeper silence.

The first and most obvious level of silence, and the easiest to reach even though not easy, is external silence, which is the absence of words, of music, and of every sound and noise that can be avoided. 

External silence is an avenue that can put us directly in touch with our inner world, which has its own noises and conversations. To bring those inner voices to quiet is the work of a further and much more challenging level of silence that is, actually, as challenging as rewarding because this takes us to the realm of contemplation. 

In the silence of plans, insights, expectations,  concerns, reflections, judgments, guilts, anxieties  ...  we can let go of everything and dwell in Faith, in a wordless, obscure, and paradoxical knowledge that, when we remove the layers that make up our lives, we come face to Face with Mystery in us and around us. And there we know that we don't know, and it's OK.

This encounter with Silence in the sanctuary of our inner silence may seem useless, a waste of life and time (here is again 'judgment' destroying silence) but in Faith we know that it is the most productive idleness if we allow it to be, if we allow Mystery, the Source of everything, to be and pray in us.

We don't create the Silence that dwells in us, but we can create the doorway to it with our inner silence, by letting go of our personal noise. This is the role of some forms of prayer like centering prayer, which is an exercise on befriending silence and quiet in ourselves by not responding to the noises knocking at the door of our inner sanctuary. Centering prayer is not contemplation, but it is a doorway to contemplation. 

Consecrate yourself to the silence of 

Pure Love.

                                    M. Maria Celeste - Dialog IX      

Rule of Life as a Hermit

Fall season at Emmanuel Hermitage

Another "stand alone page" has been created under the title Rule of Life.

It can be accessed directly in the menu below the heading of this blog.


The post includes the complete text of the initial personal Rule of Life that served this Diocesan Hermit to step into the path of a contemplative solitary, and live it out for five years until first profession of canonical eremitical vows for the Diocese.

There are some comments on specific aspects of the Rule, and the page also touches on the identity as a Redemptoristine Hermitess.

St. Francis, M. Maria Celeste, and the Inspiration for the Congregations of the Redemptorists

        Mother Maria Celeste received the Inspiration for the foundation of the Order of the Most Holy Savior (a name changed later to the Most Holy Redeemer) on 1729 but she had to wait until 1731 to see it come to life on Pentecost Day, May 13 on that year, when the Sisters started living out the new Rule. On August 6 of the same year 1731, the Feast of the Transfiguration they changed the habit of the Visitation they had been wearing for the new red tunic and blue mantle as revealed to M. Maria Celeste for the new Institute.

         That same eventful year of 1731, M. Maria Celeste received the Inspiration for the foundation of the male branch of the same Institute, that is the Congregation of the Most Holy Redeemer better known as the Redemptorists. This happened on the Feast of Saint Francis of Assisi and under his patronage and example as it was recorded by M. Maria Celeste in her Autobiography:

One day, the vigil of the Feast of St. Francis of Assisi, the 3rd of October in the year 1731, this Religious who had received the new Rule being in the refectory, her mind was in one moment lifted up to the Lord. Then Jesus showed Himself to her surrounded by the light of glory, accompanied by the seraphic Father Saint Francis and Father Don Alphonso de Liguori. Then the Lord said the her: "This soul [Alphonsus Liguori] is chosen as the head of My Institute. It is he who will be the first superior of the Congregation of men."


The Religious [M.M. Celeste] saw in God this work as if it were already established, and her soul was so filled with joy that she could not take any food. She saw herself surrounded with an interior light, and remained close to the holy Patriarch [St. Francis], who seemed to be transformed into Our Lord Jesus Christ. This lasted all the time of the meal.


       It is worth noticing that M. Maria Celeste pointed out that in her vision Saint Francis "seemed transformed into Our Lord Jesus Christ", which is the specific Grace or charism of the new Institute of the Most Holy Savior/Redeemer she was being called to bring to life. This transformation of herself into Christ was a frequent happening that she repeatedly recorded in her writings, and happened on many occasions but always after receiving Holy Communion, the Sacrament of our Transformation into Jesus Christ.

       But let us continue listening to M. M. Celeste and her connection with St. Francis on his Feast Day involving also (the then future St.) Alphonsus Liguori:

For the moment nothing else was revealed to her, and so this Religious made no accoumt of it, and told no one anything about it.
The next day, the Feast of the holy Patriarch to whom she had a great devotion, she went to Communion much absorbed concerning what had happened to her overnight. Suddenly her soul was illumined by a light of the Lord and she understood that she was to write as the motto of the Institute these words of the Gospel, 

Go and preach to all creatures that the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand. 

(cfr. Mc 10.16 & Mt 10,7)

Based on these words she should write out the text that the Lord dictated to her in His Name:
The daily and spiritual exercises were the same as those already written in the new Rule [for the Nuns]. Also the habit was to be like that prescribed. 
All the Religious were to live in apostolic poverty like His well-beloved servant whose feast they were keeping that day -who had so closely imitated Him. For this reason, all their worldly goods were to be placed at the feet of the Superior, who would make a common fund of them, called that of the poor, which they would use on missions, and would give alms from it to widows and orphans according to the directions of the Superior.

      It is clear how significant "apostolic poverty" is to the new Institute, both of men -the Missionaries, Brothers and Priests- and women -the Redemptoristine Nuns. This is no surprise given that the Institute is to be rooted in the admirable humiliations of the Word Made Man, with charity and humility as the capstone. A deep spiritual poverty is called forth as well as the visible Franciscan poverty.

      M. Maria Celeste continues explaining this first Inspiration of the Congregation of the Redemptorists:

In their journeys they will go two and two to places not too distant from their dwellings, and they will preach penance.


      And here comes from M M. Celeste's pen something especially close to the heart of this Redemptoristine Diocesan Hermit attesting to how much the call to transforming prayer in solitude is at the heart of our charism for both the Redemptorists and the Redemptoristines:

As to those who are called to the contemplative or eremitical life, they are not to be reproached, for those souls who apply themselves to prayer in solitude convert many more souls than those who are destined to preach.


They will be at least thirteen in each house and they are not to go on mission by their own choice, but by the will and choice of the Superior.


This was the first sketch concerning the Congregation of men that this Religious received from the Lord. She wrote down all that had been said to her and added it to the Rule of the nuns, as it was to form only one with theirs, as will be written in the proper time.
This Religious made a detailed statement to her spiritual father [Don Tomaso Falcoia] of all that had been communicated to her about the new Congregation of men, and of all the other things that had been revealed to her. 


      May the holy Patriarch Saint Francis show his patronage over M. M. Celeste's Double Institute of Women and Men dedicated to bringing the Good News to the poor through the combination of their personal contemplative transformation into Christ as well as through the preaching of the Gospel message to every creature. 


      Saint Francis of Assisi, Pray for us!

The Exaltation of the Holy Cross - M. Maria Celeste Feast Day

The Cross is the altar of the sacrifice of Christ who is always present also in our crosses. Through faith we can transcend the negative aspect of the suffering we meet in our way and allow God to make it an avenue of Grace not only for ourselves but for the Church and the world.

        The Cross is the superabundance of God's Love poured out upon this world and the great sign of Christ's saving presence. Love of the Cross is essentially love and imitation of Jesus Christ.  (Rule of Life #30 - Constitutions OSsR, 57)

On this liturgical feast day of the Triumph or Exaltation of the Holy Cross, the Redemptoristine daughters of Mother Maria Celeste -including this hermitess- celebrate also her triumph and passing into Glory as Jesus himself promised her:

Know, My daughter, that in this world, you will not be separated from My Passion, but will have an abundance of troubles and infirmities, because you cannot acquire love without sufferings. Thus, whatever I dispose and ordain for you, it is all love! Therefore, you must have patience and I promise you, on My word, that the moment your soul leaves your body, I will lead it into heaven where it will enjoy Me for all eternity.  Dialogue IX

Mother Maria Celeste, the Holy Prioress of the Monastery of the Most Holy Savior in Foggia, Italy, was nearing her 59th birthday when on September 14, 1755, the Feast of the Exaltation of the Cross:

.  She had taken communion that morning in the community Mass and the day began as one more day in conventual life.  But, feeling very ill, she had the confessor called, Father Nicholas Lombardi, who administered the viaticum to her and holy unction.  Then, she requested him to read her the Passion according to St. John, and when the confessor arrived at the words “Consummatum est” (‘everything is completed’, Jn. 19:30) Mother Maria Celeste quietly died.  It was at 3 o’clock in the afternoon. (Autobiography, Apendix) 

As we praise and thank God for the great gift of the life and death of M. Maria Celeste, we pray through her intercession for her glorification, and for the future of her legacy, the Order and the Congregation of the Most Holy Redeemer. We also pray for the new forms in which her spirituality is lived out in various ways around the world, particularly the Redemptoristine eremitic life. Most especially we pray that her very rich doctrine on the transformation of the human person into Christ, which she herself lived and experienced, may be made accessible through publications in different languages, and that many daughters and sons of her spirit be called to live the Christian vocation to the depth of intimacy with God that she was called to mediate.

Receive, My daughter, the spirit of your Institute so that you may instil it into every soul willing to receive it, and through you, be united to Me in love. (Dialogue IX)

Venerable Mother Maria Celeste, pray for us!

Novena to Ven. M. Maria Celeste of the Most Holy Savior

O God, 

who bestowed on Mother Maria Celeste 

the grace of a most intimate communion

in the mystery of your beloved Son's 

death and resurrection, 

we beg you

to glorify your handmaid,

to grant us the request we make to you 

through her intercession,

and to teach us to cooperate, as she did,

in the fulfillment of 

your admirable Plan of Redemption.

Grant this

Through Christ our Lord.

Amen.

"Glory be to the Father ..." (three times)

"Hail Mary" (once)

Alternate prayer:

O Most Holy Trinity,

I adore You from the depth of my nothingness

and I thank you 

for the gifts and privileges

bestowed on your servant Mother Maria Celeste.

I pray you

to will her glorification even here on earth

and for this, I beg you to grant me,

through her intercession,

that grace which I humbly desire

from your paternal mercy.

Grant this through Christ our Lord.

Amen

"Glory be to the Father ..." (three times)

"Hail Mary" (once)

United to all Redemptoristines throughout the world during these days of preparation for her feast on September 14th, let us pray through the intercession of our Mother Maria Celeste that we may receive a double portion of her spirit in order to become, like her, living portraits of Jesus Christ, our Savior and Redeemer in today's world.

Solemnity of the Most Holy Redeemer

Redemptoristine Nuns and Redemptorist Missionaries throughout the world as well as this Hermit of the same spirituality celebrate on the third Sunday in July the solemnity of the Most Holy Redeemer.

Come, let us worship Christ the Lord, 

Redeemer of the world.

The feast of the Title of the Order and the Congregation of the Most Holy Redeemer "stresses those aspects of Redemption which lie outside the scope of history, namely the love of the Father who gave us his Son, and the love of the Son, giving himself up in our place." (Divine Office - Proper CSsR)


Mother Maria Celeste initially founded the Order of Nuns under the title of The Most Holy Savior. This was also the initial title of the group of Missionaries led by St. Alphonsus following the inspiration of M. M. Celeste when years later during the process of approval by Rome the title was changed from Most Holy Savior to Most Holy Redeemer because the former was already in use by other religious institute.

This picture of Our Savior was originally venerated by M. Maria Celeste of the Most Holy Savior and is cherished by her daughters to this day. It depicts the Savior, God Incarnate, Homo Viator, Jesus the Wayfarer dressed in the traditional colors in which artists have depicted the garments of Jesus and Mary: a red tunic and blue mantle. These are also the colors of the habit of the nuns, called to become living portraits of Jesus, resembling Christ in every aspect, including his garments.

Saint Alphonsus took the Rule originally written by Mother Maria Celeste under divine inspiration for the Nuns and adapted it for his group of Missionaries. But he didn't retain the colors for the habit of the men as intended by M. Maria Celeste. This is no surprise given that the red tunic is used in the Church by Cardinals, that is by the men who are the closest collaborators with the Pope.

Eternal Father, 

To conquer death and bring us back to life

You made your only Son Redeemer of humanity.

May we ever remember your kindness,

Cling to you with unfailing love, 

And so enjoy the benefits of your Redemption.

Grant this through Christ our Lord. AMEN

May our Most Holy Redeemer bless our religious family with abundant fruits of holiness, and grant us many and holy vocations in fire with the mystical love of Venerable M. M. Celeste and the apostolic zeal of St. Alphonsus.