With One Accord Mother Church Volume Two, Issue 4 Autumn 2022 CONTENTSEDITORIAL Lucinda M. Vardey WHAT IS MATERNAL? Rome Round Table HOLY MOTHER AND HOLY MOTHER CHURCH Francesca Baldini SAINT TERESA OF KOLKATA: A brief biography The Magdala Interview: Emily VanBerkum with Jeanette Petrie SERVICE: THE HEART OF THE CHRISTIAN MESSAGE Giulia Galeotti FEMININE MODELS FOR ORGANIZING CHURCH Lucinda M. Vardey MEETING MOTHERHOOD AS A MAN John Dalla Costa A SOUL’S SWEET EMBRACE Roberta Vannini BOOKS OF INTEREST Lucinda M. Vardey www.magdalacolloquy.org 1
While preparing this issue I contacted my colleague in Rome, Church historian Sr. Caterina Ciriello, and asked her how and when the term “Mother Church” was first applied. As far back as the early Fathers, she responded, particularly St. Augustine who stated that “the Church is truly the mother of Christians” (De moribus Ecclesiae, 30.62-3:PL32,1336)
2
Francesca Baldini and Giulia Galeotti contribute on the subjects of peace-building and service. John Dalla Costa shares the challenges of relating to motherhood as a man, and Roberta Vannini remembers her own mother. Alternative organizational models for Church in keeping with the maternal are offered, along with a review of Kathleen MacInnis Kichline’s latest book Why These Women?
Editorial
. The Second Vatican Council’s Lumen Gentium refers to the Church as Mother but with a focus on her as the Spouse of Christ, “whom Christ united himself by an unbreakable covenant” and “whom He unceasingly nourishes and cherishes” (LG:6) . The spousal concept was already in the culture of 12 th century Christianity, as Hildegard of Bingen’s O Virgin Church (O Virgo Ecclesia) illustrates, and could have influenced the title of Mary as the Mother of the Church established by Pope Paul VI in 1964. Yet the word, Ecclesia in Greek means assembly or congregation, such as understood in Antioch and Jerusalem in the early days.
Lucinda M. Vardey Editor
The most well-known of the Church’s mothers of our time is undoubtedly Mother Teresa. With September marking the 25 th anniversary of her passing, the Magdala interview explores Jan Petrie’s long relationship working with Mother Teresa, and recording her life and service to the world’s poor on film.
“The Church as mother has a vocation to seek the good of persons in a maternal way”
Catherine Ruth Pakaluk (With Motherly Care in Promise and Challenge) www.magdalacolloquy.org
In this issue we will focus more on the aspects of the maternal as they relate to the Church, and how these can be applied in response to Pope Francis’ emphasis that the Church’s identity needs to have the face of a mother.
Contributions by members of the Rome Round Table on the Feminine Dimension Christianity is a religion that exemplifies the maternal. Much of Jesus’ teachings reflect the actions and attitude of a mother: healing, feeding, welcoming, and forgiving, inviting the children of God’s family around a table while imparting wisdom to those present. “The holy is always maternal,” expressed Marta Rodriguez, “the maternal reaches out to heal and give life. Maternal wisdom is the way of the heart.”
In her writings on women, Edith Stein (St. Teresa Benedicta of the Cross) described a woman’s supernatural calling as “to embody in her highest and purest development the essence of the Church—to be its symbol.”
www.magdalacolloquy.org 3
What is Maternal?
The maternal, then, can be identified has having two elements, that of being life-giving in all its aspects, and that of being wise. Life-giving is not only a physical experience of being a woman, although women are given this gift by conceiving children, but it carries a spiritual component. In many cases, mothers are both—life-givers to children, and life-givers to the soul. Spiritual mothers invariably exist among singles and religious who, stripped of their own desires, practice a “spirituality of renunciation,” open to God, to walk with and protect the vulnerable, and be constant in the generosity and reliability of a mother’s love and acceptance.1 “Just as Mary,” claimed Sr. Caterina Ciriello, “who turns her eyes to the suffering of others.”
2 So how do we recognize what is the essence of the Church, not so much as a structure but an invitation on how to be a member?“Weare called to contain God,” shared Maria Rita Cerimele, “to have the capacity in ourselves to reflect God in some way to those around us.” We return again to the source—how Jesus was and what he taught, the primary being, as Sr. Margaret Gonsalves wrote, Jesus at home in peace.3 To summarize this fundamental of the Son of Man who had no place to lay his head, was that he, containing God, was at home everywhere. He was also particularly at home with not only his earthly parents but his heavenly Father. He was at home with women, children and the marginalized, he was at home in community with his disciples; he was at home with nature, using so many parts of the natural world to “The Holy is Maternal”always
Marta Rodriguez suggested that we need the “mind of a mother to overcome obstacles,” a mind that is not separated from the heart. The obstacles that the Church faces in being a Mother are numerous, particularly as the leadership is mostly made up of men. Marta Rodriquez believes that one of the changes most needed to aid the conversion of the Church to a mind of a mother, is to shift roles, assigning governance to women and the ministry of care to men. It is clearly not a black and white issue, but one in which ways of thinking about being Church are re-focused and reformed. Could we consider the essence of the maternal as composed of three features: embrace, encounter and engage? If we begin by embracing, as a good mother would, those who enter through her doors, then we’d be containing what Jesus exemplified and what Pope Francis calls “accompaniment.” By encountering, we are in relationship; we listen, we speak, we pray, we act, we help heal whoever comes our way, just as Jesus did walking through the towns and countryside. And by engaging, we feed, forgive, and welcome all into community.
MOTHERHOOD IS AN ATTITUDE OF MIND5
www.magdalacolloquy.org
Works cited 1 Archbishop of Assisi, Domenico Sorrentino,’s Pastoral Letter 25 December 2016.
4 make his points and speak his parables; he was at home with suffering and non-violence; he was at home in peace,4 the peace he gave after the Resurrection, “not as the world gives do I give” (John 14.27).
2 The Collected Works of Edith Stein, Vol Two, ed. L. Gelber & Romaeus Leaven (Washington, ICS Publications 1987) p. 9.
3 Margaret Gonsalves CCV “Practicing Shalom: Homecoming of the Feminine” published in “Practicing Peace: Feminist Theology of Liberation, Asian Perspectives ed. Gallares/Lobo-Gajiwala (Quezon City Philippines, Claretian Publications 2011) pp. 214-218.
4 ibid 5 Metti Amirtham SC “Retrieving Motherhood as an Agent of Peace” in “Practicing Peace” as above p. 223.
www.magdalacolloquy.org 5
Francesca Baldini
Women’s requests change lives, their recognition, their ability to listen and subsequently proclaim. Women remained to the last at the foot of the cross, carried Jesus’ injured body and helped place it in the tomb. Above all, they were the ones who first announced the unexpected—the empty tomb, the cloth bindings—yet their words were not believed. “After he rose early on the first day of the week, Jesus appeared to Mary Magdalene, from whom he had cast out seven demons. She went and told those who had been with him, while they were mourning and weeping. But when they heard he was alive and had been seen by her, they would not believe it” (Mark 16: 9-11).
There are many women protagonists in the Bible from different backgrounds and race. They are often charismatic figures in the Old Testament, but in the New Testament we find many women disciples of Jesus, first among them being Mary Magdalene. Jesus encountered numerous women especially in his preaching years. Perhaps the most powerful of encounters was with the Samaritan woman at the well. Her request for thirst to be satiated still fascinates us: “Sir, give me this water, so that I may never be thirsty and have to keep coming here to draw water” (John 4:15).
Women have been present since the Church’s inception. Their desire to proclaim the beauty of the Resurrection has traversed the entire history of the Church over the centuries. A history studded with many strong and courageous female figures, whose voices were often repressed by the ecclesiastical leadership, but who were also a source of stimulus and renewal. Women’s hearts still beat within the Catholic Church, hearts that are eager, listening and open to welcoming, as well as being open to renewal and proclamation, qualities that often recur in the female gender.
Welcoming and listening, just as a mother would do with her children, are among the missions of the Church itself. But listening pre-supposes silence, stillness and entering a Francesca Baldini graduated in Literature from the University of Bologna, she began her career as a journalist with the private broadcaster Rete8Vga. She worked for a short time in Australia for the network Special Broadcasting Services covering the 2008 World Youth Day for the press agency of the Italian Bishops’ Conference and Vatican Radio. Back in Italy, she became a press officer for communication campaigns in the non-profit sector, and continues as a freelance journalist, web editor, and press officer especially in the social field. She was one of the founding partners of the Roman web radio Radiopiu (www.radiopiu.eu) and managed the Roman branch of the Centro Culturale San Paolo onlus. From 2014 she became national coordinator of the ‘Women of Faith in Dialogue’ group of Religions for Peace Italia, promoting projects for training and knowledge of religions from a female perspective.
Holy Mother and Holy Mother Church
www.magdalacolloquy.org6
www.magdalacolloquy.org 7 different rhythm of time than that of usual daily life, grasped as it is in a rhythm of frenzy. It is only in a slower pace can we confront and understand, mend the flaws of a globalized and distracted world, by forging new paths and building Bridge-buildingbridges.speaks
strongly to me:
Let us not forget that, as the Holy Father emphasizes in the Apostolic Exhortation Amoris Laetitia , “from our awareness of the weight of mitigating circumstances—psychological, historical and even biological—it follows that without diminishing the value of the evangelical
ACCOMPANIMENT Today, I just want to continue working with this intention via the feminine that connects all religions, to stimulate peace and mutual dialogue with people of different faiths. I try to do this, in my own small way, by keeping in mind the effect we can have on future generations, remembering how women have always been central in spreading the Gospel message. Women were the first to take up the challenge of that proclamation, and even when Christ was alive, they supported him materially and followed him constantly, without question. Therefore, women who know how to listen, how to welcome, and who sometimes protest and yet are able to question themselves, can seek and affect ways of generating a better future through accompaniment, helping to heal what is fragile in our world.
building connections between generations, genders and religions, between men and women and their spiritual needs. By this I am guided to follow the example of Mary, the “first” bridge between the human and divine, she, who at the foot of the cross received Jesus’ mandate of universal motherhood.
In his encyclical, Fratelli Tutti, Pope Francis reminds us how: “In the power of the risen Lord, she wants to give birth to a new world, where all of us are brothers and sisters, where there is room for all those whom our societies discard, where justice and peace are resplendent” (#278). The pontiff adds his hopes that the Church must follow the example of Mary, who allowed herself to be overwhelmed by the unexpected and supported her special son to the very end. The Church, he writes, must be: “a home with open doors, because she is a mother”[#269]. And in imitation of Mary “we want to be a Church that serves, that leaves home, and goes forth from its places of worship, goes froth from its sacristies, to accompany life, to sustain hope, to be a sign of unity [...] to build bridges, to break down walls, to sow reconciliation”[270].PopeFrancis’words are a comfort to me on my journey as a woman, a mother and a believer, who seeks to listen and work in and for the Catholic Church, while contemplating my own desires. From such searching I began meeting believers from different faiths, particularly from the Jewish faith. I followed what I felt in my heart was the natural way and was lucky enough to meet people with whom I deepened that path. People, women specifically, who became friends, because bridges can be built where there is a common desire to improve the world together.
I try to follow this edict by being present to the frailties of others, with the patience and care I offer towards every living being. Holiness is, in the end, nothing other than knowing how to set out in response to a greater will, measuring one’s strengths against everyday challenges. By following the example of women like Mary, is nothing other than becoming God’s co-operators in a plan of goodness that knows how to welcome the joys and sorrows one experiences and encounters. My wish, then, is precisely this: to know how to listen to ourselves and our communities in order to be fruitful women in this Catholic Church, so human, so fragile, but also so resilient and holy. Saint Teresa of Kolkata (1910-1997)
Agnes Gonxha Bojaxhiu was born 1910 in Skppje, Albania. The youngest of three, her mother was very devout and her father, successful in business, died young leaving their family with sparse means. Agnes desired to be a missionary in India, so she joined the Loreto order at the age of eighteen and learned English in Ireland. She spent her novitiate in Darjeeling, learned Hindi and Bengali, and taught geography at the Loreto school in Calcutta, becoming its principal in 1944. India, at that time, was undergoing political turmoil after gaining independence from British rule as well as suffering the effects of Gandhi’s assassination. Sent to Darjeeling in September l946 to recover from tuberculosis, Mother Teresa, on the train ride heard Jesus asking her to serve him in “the poorest of the poor.” It took a few years for her to gain permission to leave Loreto, and donning a blue and white sari, she began serving those who were alone, sick and dying on the streets. Many of her students followed her and the Missionaries of Charity was born as a recognized congregation in 1950. Their first home (for the dying) was founded in 1952 and the community’s Mother House in 1953. By 1960 twenty-five homes had been opened throughout India. l965 saw the Missionaries of Charity become a Society of Pontifical Right aiding their expansion outside of India, first to Venezuela and later Rome, Tanzania, New York and gradually to all continents wherever they were called to serve the greatest need. Other groups were formed by Mother Teresa over the following two decades; co-workers of Mother Teresa www.magdalacolloquy.org8 ideal, there is a need to accompany with mercy and patience the eventual stages of personal growth as these progressively appear making room for the Lord’s mercy which spurs us on to do our best”[308].
A BRIEF BIOGRAPHY
www.magdalacolloquy.org 9
Emmy award winning filmmaker Jeanette (Jan) Petrie, together with her sister Ann Petrie, produced and directed two major documentaries on Mother Teresa. The first entitled “Mother Teresa,” was filmed on 4 continents, 10 countries and 24 locations throughout the world over 5 years. After winning the Soviet Peace committee prize, and assisting Mother Teresa with opening a home in Moscow, at Mother Teresa’s behest, Jan continued working with her over the next 10 years opening homes in many of the former communist countries. After Mother Teresa passed away, Jan and her sister Ann joined together again to produce and direct the film “Mother Teresa: the Legacy.” Currently, Jan is overseeing the restoration and re-release of the film “Mother Teresa.” Petrie productions’ website will be updated in September 2022 with more information and where the films can be purchased: www.petrieproductions.com.
and the Sick and Suffering co-workers, the Lay Missionaries of Charity and a contemplative branch of the Missionaries of Charity sisters whose prayer was offered for the active sisters. The Missionaries of Charity Brothers was founded in 1966 and the Missionaries of Charity Fathers in 1984. Mother Teresa received many peace prizes, among them Pope John XXIII’s Peace Prize and the Nobel Peace Prize. The 1980s saw homes opened for drug addicts, alcoholics, prostitutes and battered women plus orphanages and schools for poor children. The Missionaries of Charity established the first hospice for people with AIDS in New York and later other hospices were opened in Rome and San Francisco. A few years before her death Mother Teresa returned, for the first time, to her native Albania and opened a home in Tirana. She died in the Mother House in Calcutta on 5 September 1997 at the age of 87 leaving a legacy of over 600 missions and schools in 120 countries. Beatified in 2003, she was canonized by Pope Francis on 4 September 2016.
Emily VanBerkum is the Dean of Student Residence of Loretto College, affiliated with the University of St. Michael’s College in the University of Toronto. She holds a B.A. (Hons) with a specialist in Christianity and Culture and an M.Div degree from the St. Michael’s College Faculty of Theology in the Toronto School of Theology. She has volunteered widely in campus ministry settings and as a student intern in Ecumenical Chaplaincy. Her scholastic interests include the historical development of the liturgy, theology of ministry, Catholic social teaching, as well as inter-religious dialogue and practice. A past Director of pastoral ministries at St. Basil’s Parish, she is a founding member of the Magdala Conciliary. and Associate Editor of With One Accord. She also collaborated with her husband, Dr. John Paul Farahat, organist and choirmaster, to compose and perform the introductory theme to the Magdala interviews.
“Servants of God” have been historically defined as men whose mission concerned the chosen people—for example, Moses being mediator of the covenant; David, Messianic king, the patriarchs Abraham, Isaac, Jacob and then Joshua who led the people into the Promised Land. “Servants of God” were how the prophets defined their mission to preserve the covenant, as well as the priests, who celebrated divine worship in the name of the chosen people. But Israel—indocile to God’s commands—became unfaithful to this vocation from the start, so in order to carry out God’s plan, God sends Jesus, his Beloved Son. As a true servant, a gentle and humble teacher, Jesus proclaims salvation.
Giulia10 Galeotti is both an historian and journalist and from 2014 head of the cultural section of the Vatican’s newspaper L’Osservatore Romano. Her most recent book is “We Are a Revolution: the Life of Dorothy Day” (Jaca Book 2022). Her other published works include “The Veil” (Edb 2016, translated into Spanish); A Church of Women in “Visions and Vocations” (Paulist Press 2018); “Pope Francis and Women” co-authored with Lucetta Scaraffia (Il Sole 24Ore 2014); “From One Body to Another: The Story of Life-giving Transplants (Vita e Pensiero 2012); “In Search of the Father: Stories of Paternal Identity in the Contemporary Age (Laterza 2009); “Gender” (Viverein 2009); “A History of Women’s Suffrage in Italy” (Biblink 2006); “A History of Abortion” (Il Mulino 2003, translated into Spanish and Portuguese). She has been awarded many prizes including the Minturnae and Capalbio, as well as the Amelia Rosselli Prize and Eduardo Nicolardi Prize.
Giulia Galeotti
www.magdalacolloquy.org
Service: the Heart of the Christian Message
In addressing members of the International Union of Superiors General, (May 12 2016) Pope Francis upheld the dignity of a consecrated woman’s vocation in serving the Church in whatever way she is called: “But her services are not to be servitude.”
This address was an opportunity to uproot the mistaken millennial attitude that the Catholic Church has taken towards women’s service to the Church. Over the last few decades the word “service” in relation to women held unfavourable connotations. However, “service” still remains, in itself, the heart of the Christian message. “The Son of Man did not come to be served but to serve” (Mark 10:45).
In the New Testament servants of God become servants of Christ. Just as Jesus took as his mother the one who called herself God’s servant (Luke 1:38-42) he makes his servants his friends (John 15:15). Therein the Messiah constitutes a community of service to God and to God’s people. This service not only creates but sustains the community, and that is the Church. “Here then,” wrote Enzo Bianchi, “is the true ‘constitution’ given to the Church, a community of brothers and sisters who serve one another, and among whom those who have authority are servants of all servants.”
THE CHURCH OF THE APRON
The “constitution” of Church as community is established in a slow, rhythmic gesture at the Last Supper. Jesus gets up, lays down his robe, wraps himself in a towel, pours water into a bowl and starts washing his disciple’s feet. Nothing in this sequence reveals a willingness to humiliate—Jesus does not lower himself, but rather teaches by this symbolic act a truth that they would understand only in light of subsequent events. Putting oneself at service to the extreme is inspired by love. Love itself redeems Jesus’ subsequent humiliations. The Christian way is guided by this subversive logic that leads to the cross but at the same time leads to glory. In one of his earlier writings prelate Tonino Bello (1935-1993) defined the Church that proclaims the Gospel as “The Church of the Apron.” The Gospel prescribed for Holy Thursday doesn’t mention chasubles, nor stoles or copes. It speaks, instead, of a coarse cloth that the Master wrapped around his hips with “an exquisitely priestly gesture.” Washing feet, caring for others, not living with each other but for each other, should not this be the Church of today? Religious women are the ones who practice this the most, caring for the vulnerable with open hands. And they come not as one but as many. Emphasizing the network of female communities Sr. Patricia Murray, Executive Secretary of the International Union of Superiors General said, “Where there is one of us, there we all are.” It is only by rediscovering the presence and gifts of women will the Church be able to rediscover the value and authentic meaning of service. Pope Francis never ceases to denounce the fact that a worldly Church run on the structures of world logic (i.e. power, misogyny, utilitarianism, vanity) becomes a Church that is to be served, not one that serves.
The revolutionary message of Jesus, a great feminist, has been in relation to women, largely ignored. That many in the Church consider the quiet and industrious presence of women as a commodity (and frequently as so-called “slaves” where a person disappears behind the facade of service) cannot be refuted. But instead of denouncing such attitudes and behaviours as human deficiency within the Church, I’d prefer to emphasize the characteristics of the service that Jesus taught. Let us restore “service” to its primary place in the Church by remembering that it is service to be there for another, that is what creates and sustains the Church, and it does so around that apron, the only vestment in the Gospel. Christian service, which distinguishes it from worldly service, simultaneously serves God and neighbour.
www.magdalacolloquy.org 11
Feminine Models for Organizing Church
Participating in the organizing of an international conference event in 2001 called Anima: The Soul of the Feminine (with 60 speakers and over 200 participants) the committee decided to adopt a tree as the metaphoric model for getting things done. This, naturally, included the raising of funds. The usual vertical line describing the goal to be reached, used by hospitals and other institutions—including the word “target” echoing sports and the military—felt inappropriate to the theme of the conference and the manner in which we wished to organize it. We engaged, instead, on a nonstatic platform, one more like a living moving
www.magdalacolloquy.org12
But, if by chance there should sometimes be bad people in the Church? We have our mother. If mother is sick, if my mother by chance should become lame, I love her even more. It is the same in the Church. If there are, and there are, defects and shortcomings, our affection for the Church must never fail.”
Pope John Paul I (General Audience 13 Sept 1978)
Let us redeem the term “service” by remembering, Gospel in hand, that even the most humble service is not one of humiliation. And may we never forget that Christianity’s logic is, and always will be, subversive.
Lucinda M. Vardey is the editor of With One Accord. For more on her background please visit our website. The institutional Church, as well as most parishes, religious orders and lay communities, are run on an imperialistic model that has, over the centuries, utilized military concepts. There’s a superior in command, generals who carry out orders and the rest (commonly referred to in traditional hymns) are “soldiers of Christ.” Even though this type of organizing model continues in most parishes, more popular now is the adoption of a business-like structure with the priest as boss, parish councils like boards of directors, and staff working in “teams.”
“The Church is also a mother. If she continues to represent Christ, and Christ is good, the Church too must be good; good to everyone.
system with ongoing dialogue as equals, certain tasks and responsibilities shared, expressed and recorded around the rings of the inner trunk of trees. This was especially effective in monitoring the funds, which were substantial. A circular mode of thinking was used right through the two preparatory years to its final accomplishment. It introduced a spiritual, prayerful, receptivity to grace in action and was very successful, as was the way we learned to relate by relying on the gifts, strengths and intuitive wisdom of each of the 15 organizers.
13
The Cardinal realized there was no other model that could combine and embrace with equality the staff of one and the other.
www.magdalacolloquy.org
A flower is another excellent organizational form. It was adopted by a lay community of Catholic women, formed over a decade ago. The soil in which the flower stands is composed of the shared qualities of the core behaviour of each individual as well as the collective whole. The stem of the flower forms the purpose, or the intent, of the community. Using the daisy as their model, the yellow of the flower symbolizing Jesus as the centre, the guardians of the community (usually 3 or 4) are defined as sepals that compose the calyx that holds the flower in place from below, like hands cupping a chalice. The calyx guides and supports the health, strength and blossoming of the membership represented by the petals. Petals are also adopted to define the different activities and specialties of the community, and each petal was overseen by one person referred to as “Tender.” The flower organizational model has been recently used at the Vatican after two dicasteries were merged.
For initiating new and innovating projects and ministries, the words of Margaret Brennan IHM carry a valuable directive: “It takes nine months to form life.” Therefore a feminine process that is experienced in work, creativity, prayer and change can be said to unfold in the following way:Conception, gestation, labour, birth, cherishing and nurturing.
Whatever is being done, or change undergone, or new incentives embraced, require a collective sense for the rhythm of the maternality of God’s time. The initiating, the waiting, the protecting, the transforming, the growing, the suffering, the joys and the care in the undertaking, require not just ideas, plans, goals, aims or strategies, but a trust in the ways of the Holy Spirit. It also requires a receptiveness to how the process is unfolding and when it is best to act.
www.magdalacolloquy.org14
John Dalla Costa is an ethicist, theologian and author of five books. For more on his background please visit our website. Mother Church is an all-encompassing designation that Catholics accept as part of tradition’s legacy, which, despite being the vernacular for identity, remains opaque, and ill-defined. The obvious association is that the Church carries and incarnates Christ in history the way that Mary, as Jesus’ birth mother, bore pregnancy, and laboured in birthing him. Through its sacraments, most specifically the Eucharist, the Church does indeed imitate Mary as theotokos. But is this already precious sacramentality all we mean (or can mean) in calling Church “mother?”
These alternative models all function just as well as the traditional ones, in fact I’d venture to say better, because they enable everyone to feel a part of the whole, connected as one tangible body in Christ. Using models from natural life allow each person to equally participate, to be essential in expressing the creative and to, in the freedom of Spirit, allow for more space for grace. Therein something beautiful is always being born, and its fruits are those that last.
Or are there other dimensions to identify, develop and cherish? As a man, the very concept of mother is simultaneously comforting and distancing. My own experience as a son draws me into an appreciation for a mother’s embrace, and all the love birthing and growing a child entails. No mother is perfect. But every human, for being born, appreciates the gift— and, even if not fully realized—gifts imparted by motherhood. The distancing factor is biological, and also more than that. Being a man precludes me from the bodily process of conception, gestation, and labour. In its most fundamental sense, my body, with its bone structure, cells, nerves and muscles, has no capacity for motherhood. My enfleshment with a Y as well as X chromosome sets me on a physical trajectory that is not motherly. Yes, I can imagine the qualities and concerns mothers have. I can imitate (or strive to imitate) a mother’s generativity. Yet a boundary remains. My imagination can only go so far, as I am limited to the analogy rather than the reality. Does this matter? God created us in our beautiful diversity, so we each bear an integrity for becoming whole and holy in our own way. Still, to belong to a faith community that self-identifies as mother challenges me to imagine incarnating Christ in dimensions that I can’t easily fathom. Mystics often use the language of intimacy with Christ that harkens a nuptial sensitivity, a symbiotic flourishing of pregnancy, or situates suffering and sacrifice within the arc of tissue and blood as the ecstatic-agony of birth. I understand these intimacies intellectually, and crave for such union spiritually, all the while removed from the embodied fervour I read in the saints and spiritual directors. It may well be that my inability to grasp the full motherhood of Mother Church stems from my own biases. Inspired by fiercely independent Dominican nuns at university, I became—for a man—an ardent feminist. Not only did this become my hermeneutical lens for evaluating society, culture, and Church; I
Meeting Motherhood as a Man
When Pope Francis in 2013 summoned for the Church to discover at depth its feminine dimension, my heart leaped. Something I believed in, which I also desperately craved, had been validated. Something I felt I needed for my own integrity had been seen.
www.magdalacolloquy.org 15 also carried this mode of interpretation to my relationships, work in business, and, later, to my studies in theology. My feminism has had its rough edges worn away, sometimes from time and experience, and also by that friction from resistance that recognizes the dangers when any “ism” defaults to ideology.
The question remains (for me, at least): what does the Church’s motherhood mean for a man? Is this not Pope Francis’ question as well? In seeking the feminine dimension, is not the implication that the motherhood of the Church is somehow incomplete— somehow androgenized? A feminist orientation works to change attitudes that diminish or stereotype women, and challenges cultures to include the equality of women as a given. A feminine dimension effects a different liberation, unleashing capacities in men as well as women to live in the fullness that since St. Pope Paul VI the Church has called “integral.” Fusing not only faith with reason, being integral is to integrate the affective with the intellectual; the receiving with the doing; the cross with the resurrection. In that sense, motherhood begets integrality—one life bearing another in the generative intimacy of love.
Theologians often refer to Mary as the paradigm for Church. In our litany prayers, we call her ‘tabernacle’ for embodying what encases the Holiest of Holies. Swiss theologian, Han Urs von Balthasar, delves into this analogy in more detail. In his view, Mary is the prototype of contemplative prayer, because only silence can give due to the mystery of a woman carrying in her womb, and giving birth to her (and our) Creator. Her motherhood is the indispensable impossibility needed for God’s incarnation.
Getting motherhood, as a man, is neither possible nor the project. The motherhood that includes us all is from shedding categories of distinction and capability, so as to rest in the silence in which vocation and contribution can be discerned.
I’ve often been frustrated, even a little angry, that the authors of scripture almost always omitted women. What was the mother feeling, doing, thinking, during the escapades and return of the Prodigal Son? These are considerations worth exploring in prayer and study, yet it may be that the absence and silence of the feminine dimension is the point. Motherhood does not explain itself. Mothers make the space for love to grow, and for life to flourish. In New Seeds of Contemplation , Thomas Merton describes love as the humility that can exorcise fear. His words may well encapsulate our shared mission as Mother Church. Bear Jesus, and incarnate His presence, with the creativity and generosity of love, and with the stillness and gratitude of humility, to help dissolve fears and impart new beginnings.
IN PROGRESS
Even though my mother passed away 18 months ago, what she taught me remains very much alive in my life. She and I still converse, and I feel her closer than ever. This experience has made me understand that when you really hold someone in your heart, it doesn’t matter where you are, or what you are doing, you can always be in contact, directed on the path God has made for you. My mother’s embrace was constant, and when I rebelled, or didn’t like what she stood for, I realized, in hindsight, that her standpoint was what I most needed. Sometimes she held in her embrace, a look or glance that made me feel, through a deep and intense connection, compelled to face some aspect of my life or of myself that paradoxically made me suffer, due to my fragilities and fears. But she was there, and I was not alone.
My gratitude lives on for my mother. She gave me life, she directed me on the right path and she showed, by her example, how to best live my every day.
A Soul’s Sweet Embrace Roberta Vannini
www.magdalacolloquy.org16
I experience this same feeling when I listen to what God is telling me, or calling me towards. I think the same happens to any of us.
Being embraced by my mother was, as long as I can remember, not just a physical experience. Victoria was her baptismal name but everybody called her Lola. An elegant woman with good taste in furniture, flowers, plants and food, she enjoyed serving others with kindness and generosity and always without expectations. For families, home is the first church. My mother made sure that the doors to our “home” were always open, where you were always welcome to engage with each other in mutual respect and devotion, and to celebrate each day’s blessings. It was a place where you were also always forgiven for your errors and sins, after first discussing the importance of being responsible for one’s thoughts and actions. Victoria’s most simple and important rules were based on respect for each other. In the family you were expected to dress properly on every occasion. Participating in any form of profanity or egregious argument—plus the hurting of other members of the family—were considered serious offences, and laziness and inactivity were unacceptable.
To remember or recall (zakar—an important focus in the Hebrew texts) is something Kichline takes up herself in the writing of this book. We may “remember” these women’s names (Bathsheba less as she is only mentioned as wife of Uriah the Hittite) but Kichline brings them alive as real people, and portrays the decisions they made and their effects on the future of a people, ancestors to Jesus.
Books of Interest
Pope Francis directs us to go to the margins of society, our communities, and our Church to discover the gospel being taught there. Kathleen MacInnis Kichline has done just that with her new book Why These Women? Tamar, Rahab, Ruth, Bathsheba: Four Stories You Need to Read Before You Read the Story of Jesus about the non-Jewish women referred to in the opening genealogy sequence of Matthew’s gospel. These women are gentiles and combined with the fact they are female fall outside “the circle of power that is the nature of patriarchy.”
After referring to the scripture in question, Kichline masterfully paints a portrait of each woman’s character, life circumstances, repression, their faith, and their particular gifts and abilities to not only survive the “mess of others’ lives” but to recognize and trust the God that accompanies them. Here we see how Kichline accomplishes her claim that these women’s stories reveal elements of Jesus’ character and actions ,providing concrete proof of the feminine influence in Jesus’ persona. By pouring over “the fine details” in scripture in order to bring these women alive to us through her research—with an obvious authoritative comprehension of Hebrew and the times in which these women lived—she claimed that she “encountered a different Jesus from the one I thought I knew.”
www.magdalacolloquy.org 17
Lucinda M. Vardey
What can be claimed as particular to the feminine spirit, is the insight that justice is done by noticing the details and making sense of them in the larger scriptural context; asking the right questions—the ones that beg answering—and generously including the reader in the journey of discovery. From these insights we can recognize two important ingredients in the ministry of Jesus; the telling of past stories as the present story is being written, and the ability to notice everyone.
Available in paperback (on Amazon) 155 Pages Published Jan 24 2022 by sistersinscripture.com
www.magdalacolloquy.org18
These four women, pivotal to the history of Israel, all served by seeing, listening and knowing. Kichline weaves their stories into Mary’s, calling them her sisters as Mary herself saw, listened and knew. Why These Women? is a thoroughly enjoyable as well as insightful, informative read. Kathleen Kichline, from her experience as spiritual teacher and retreat guide, writes in a rarely found familiar style ,reflecting not only solidarity with her female subjects but also her reader. Along with her scholarship, sense of justice and love of God, this book is one to relish.
O God, our Creator, You, who made us in Your image, give us the grace of inclusion in the heart of Your Church.
R: With one accord, we pray. Jesus, our Saviour, You, who received the love of women and men, heal what divides us, and bless what unites us.
R: With one accord, we pray. Holy Spirit, our Comforter, You, who guides this work, provide for us as we hold in hope Your will for the good of all.
www.magdalacolloquy.org 19
With One Accord
R: With one accord, we pray. Mary, mother of God, pray for us. St. Joseph, stay close to us. Divine Wisdom, enlighten us.
R: With one accord, we pray. Amen.
With One Accord journal is published in English, Italian and French. To access the other language editions please visit our website.
Pages 12-13 “Tree rings” vectorstock.com; “Daisy” by Freya Ungava; “Rose calyx” by John Dalla Costa.
Page 3 “St. Peter’s Basilica, Rome” photo by John Dalla Costa.
Pages 8-9 “Mother Teresa” copyright Petrie Productions. Reproduced with permission.
www.magdalacolloquy.org20 We welcome your comments and reactions and will consider sharing them in future editions or on our website. Please send to editor@magdalacolloquy.org
If you haven’t already subscribed, you can do so at any time at no cost due to the generous support of the Basilian Fathers of the Congregation of St. Basil. Just visit our website www.magdalacolloquy.org where you can also read past issues of the journal and be informed of our ongoing activities and news items.
Page 15 Detail from “Madonna and Child,” Church of Sacra Cuore, Arezzo, Italy. Photo John Dalla Costa.
Page 5 “Pregnant Madonna” by Piero della Francesca (1412-1492).
With One Accord signature music for the Magdala interview composed by Dr. John Paul Farahat and performed by Emily VanBerkum and John Paul Farahat.
Page 11 “Christ Washing the Feet of His Disciples” by Jacopo Tintoretto (1518-1594).
Page 2 “The Crucifixion” by Hildegard of Bingen (Scivias II, 6).
Page 7 “The Visitation” by Jacopo Pontorno (1494-1557).
Images used in this edition: Cover: “Nursing Madonna” by Defendente Ferrari (1480-1540).
www.magdalacolloquy.org 21 PUBLISHER Morgan V. Rice, CSB EDITOR Lucinda M. Vardey ASSOCIATE EDITOR Emily VanBerkum CONTRIBUTING EDITOR Gregory Rupik PRODUCTION COORDINATOR Michael Pirri VIDEO EDITOR Eric Patrick Hong CONSULTANT John Dalla Costa TRANSLATORS Diana Isacchi (Italian) Patricia O’Grady (French) ADMINISTRATOR Margaret D’Elia This edition Copyright © 2022 Saint Basil’s Catholic Parish, Toronto, Canada For editorial enquiries, please contact editor@magdalacolloquy.org ISSN 2563-7924