Carla Mae's Blog

… ’Tis the best of times, and the worst of times… The glow of the Christmas season is celebrated one more time on Candlemas Day…a short taste of Ordinary Time, and before we know it, we are summoned into the Lenten desert. Lent means springtime. As the people who are God’s own, this season of the soul invites us to till the soil of our personal soul-garden, so that the wonder of what has been planted in us in baptism can grow. I’m going to suggest this “tilling” is like a spring tune-up of our consciousness. There are four steps. ·         First, notice things. Be very present to what is going on with you at this moment. Be attentive to people, and to situations. This is a real discipline! ·         Second, question everything…with compassion. That means your doctor, your mayor, and yes, your politicians and your newscasts. Find out if they are a good reliable source of truth. ·    ...

The Dominicans and the Jubilee of Mercy It’s Anniversary time. We’re 800 years old! It’s a time for looking back at what has been, and looking forward for what can be. It’s also a time for reclaiming who we are and what we are all about. For Dominicans that means being something first, then doing something. We are the Holy Preaching. We don’t just imitate the Word of God. We identify with it. We are first of all a word of hope, then of joy, then of peace. We are worded women and men, and in this celebration year we are also called to be a word of mercy. How so? Dominicans walk a tightrope. (This image comes from Edward Schillebeeckx, OP.) We walk through history with a balance pole. On each end is a pail. One pail holds the Gospels, the Documents of the Church, and the Creeds. In the other we carry the New York Times, the Economist, the Science News, and the New Internationalist. If we let either go, we fall off the tightrope. Because we identify with the Incarnate Word, ...

"...Mater Misericordiae..." "Mother of Mercy..." How often these words have crossed our lips when reciting the "Hail, Holy Queen." In this Year of Jubilee of Mercy perhaps it is time to ask what we mean by this title that we give to the Mother of God. Miseri: the poor ones; Cordiae: of the heart. She is heartsick for the poor miserable ones. How and why is Mary the Mother of Mercy? Pope Francis tells us in his letter on Mercy (Misericordiae Vultus, The Face of Mercy) that Jesus is the face of mercy. So Jesus is heartsick too. It would be a challenging reflection to ponder that dear face being formed in the womb of Mary, his mother. In fact, he delighted in spending nine months confined in that small space, no larger than a man's fist...he, the God of the cosmos. He delights being intimately united with small things, so I guess you and I have a chance. Mary is the former and shaper of the human face of God's own mercy shown to us so we can see it,...

“My Soul Longs for you… … like a dry and weary land without water.” (Ps. 63) We live always in Advent. We marvel at him who has come in history and who will come finally in majesty. Most of all we marvel at him who is always coming to meet us in the mystery of our common human encounters. History, Mystery, and Majesty. The deep desire of this holy season of the Church Year is a heart-hunger springing from our woundedness, our sense of powerlessness, our craving for genuine peace. We might do well to ponder the image given us for this season of our longing. It is the image of a helpless child. Indeed. Is this an appropriate image for the God of the universe to offer us as we open this Jubilee Year of Mercy, this 800 th Anniversary Year of the Dominican Order dedicated to the proclamation of the Word of God? Couldn’t God have managed something more spectacular ? You want spectacular? Bear with me. We are given a God who thinks small . God begins there because we are small. We are...

Mercy, Mercy, Mercy… We are women and men of the Word. We do not just imitate Jesus, the Incarnate Word in our flesh. No, we identify with the Incarnate Word. So how are we to enter this Jubilee Year of Mercy? We find a clue in Francis’ letter opening the Jubilee year, a celebration which is corresponding with the 800 th Anniversary Celebration of the Dominican Order. In Misericordiae Vultus (The Face of Mercy), Francis opens his letter with “Jesus is the face of Mercy.” This means more than meets the eye. Mercy is compassion when it goes out to one who in no way deserves it. So, if Jesus is the face of mercy, this means he is the most accurate revelation of the true nature of God. Jesus is the revelation of the Father. Now each of us has our own images of God from childhood. The God keeping black marks…the judging God… But then we look at Jesus and we see a God bouncing children on his lap, a God hanging on a tree with arms outstretched to welcome us home when we have put h...

Ancient Cosmological Period:  Dawn of Human Consciousness; animist nature worship: the sacred identified with nature. First Axiel Shift  (750 BCE to approx. 250 BCE, peaking about 500 BCE across cultures with Confucius, Zoroaster, Socrates, the Jewish Prophets, etc. and the emergence of primitive science.)      - The shift from animist nature worship (fire, air, water, earth characterized by ritualistic magic)  to ethical                awareness, character and ethical norms manifest in organized religion and religious law.      - The shift to primitive science and the resulting distinction of  nature from the divine.      - The momentum toward idolatry of human reason ( Enlightenment:  approx.1750 through the modernist                     movement of the early 20th century) through World War I and II, and the mili...

Art as Sacramental Art is a sensate window into mystery...both human and divine. As such a window, it plays a  sacramental  role, opening us up to mystery as it plays in our human struggle and as it points to something beyond time/space. The Incarnation is our model. The Christ looks at us through human eyes, and veils the Divine Word. He teaches us to take seriously our own humanness, and shows us how our human struggle can be a window revealing to us the Divine at work in our very concrete human lives. The human Jesus was an inclusive welcomer. He was a nurturer, an encourager, a healer, a forgiver, a wild lover, a shepherd-leader. He is not dead. In his risen life, by power of His Spirit he continues to be all these things. Now he invites us into the act. Baptism makes us inclusive welcomers. To be a bigot goes against our baptism. He invites us to nourish one another, so he becomes our Eucharistic food to make this possible. He continues to strengthen and enco...