8/27/2013 - Vita Evangelica

I have been reading Sandra Schneider's book, Buying the Field: Catholic Religious Life in Mission to the World, published this year. It is a bit long at 800 pages. I've read the last half of the book. I also have been reading a couple of articles by Joe Chinnici, OFM, from 1983 and 1987 (courtesy of Dorothy, OSF) on Vita Evangelica. The Schneider's book is part of  the required reading list for the Third Order Regular Franciscan Common Novitiate in St. Louis and focuses on poverty, chastity, and obedience in the third millennium for the Vita Apostolica, or apostolic life. So, as a friend pointed out to me in an email, it does not quite fit Franciscan evangelical life. A second friend thought that I might be happy in a Poor Clare order since I enjoy contemplation.  I have also had a third friend point out, very emphatically, that "we are not Poor Clares" in response to something I asked about contemplation. So, all of this is prelude to explain what I have further discerned about my needs.

I was educated by Mission San Jose Dominican Sisters and Franciscan Friars at St. Elizabeth High School in Oakland. From a friar, I learned about Teilhard. From a couple of the sisters, I learned about the active and passive life. The good sisters taught me, in good Dominican fashion, that the active and the passive are in a dynamic tension that needs to be kept in balance. The active is "doing stuff," or ministry  to the sisters. The passive is contemplative prayer or meditation. In this context, one should not do too much of either one. One needs to follow the golden rule of moderation in keeping them in harmony. Somehow, that never really worked for me.

I learned meditation of a sort, at least breathing exercises, from Judo classes at age eleven. For me, at eleven, the breathing calmed my heart and relaxed my muscles as a warm-up to (or cool-down from) movement. As I grew older and learned Ignatian exercises and other forms of contemplative prayer, I did not experience meditation as something opposed to action. If anything, meditation and contemplation energized movement. As I earned a black belt in Aikido in my early twenties, I found that movement (the active) was one facet of contemplation (passive). That is, one could be in a contemplative state while moving very quickly. I think athletes often describe the phenomenon as "being in the zone." For me, the active and the passive were not opposites held in a tension. In embodied movement as well as in silence, my experience was that the contemplative gave life to, enlivened, the activity -- the passive energized the active. Even now, after some amount of contemplation, I need to go DO something. For example, I get wiggly and need to go wash the dishes or engage my mind. So, here is what I discovered today in reading the articles by Joe, who is the president of the Franciscan School of Theology. I knew, at age eleven, what Francis of Assisi discovered about 800 years prior. Here's what Joe wrote in 1987 on "The Institutionalization of the Franciscan Charism:"

(1) Neither ministry nor formal prayer is the determining characteristic of the vita evangelica. In fact, the dichotomy which is implied between contemplation and action, a dichotomy which has entered into our self-understanding since the sixteenth century, was not present in the experience of Francis and Clare in the same way that it is today. Francis had available to him both the vita monastica and the vita apostolica. He focused his life neither on prayer, nor on ministry, but on the person, on the person of Jesus Christ. The issue is not how we pray nor what we do, but, in this context how we experience the presence of God through Christ .  .  . (3) In other words, the Franciscan life has neither a liturgical foundation nor a ministerial foundation as its starting point, but an anthropological one. In other words, neither withdrawal from the world nor action in it were adequate categories for the life. There were for the brothers times of contemplation (i.e. enjoyment of God alone) alone and times of contemplation in work. God was available everywhere. There was neither cloister nor world; in fact, as the Sacrum Commercium testifies, they were the same.  .  . (4) It was precisely his synthesis between itineracy and community which made for a unique form of religious life, dominated neither by the regularity of monasticism nor by the wandering nature of the apostolic life. Again, the synthesis was located on the level of the person.

My eleven year old self was intuitively Franciscan even before I knew the term. Joe writes in another location in the article: "(2) The primary locus of the life is the person and the sharing among persons of the experience of Christ .  .  . The reciprocity of people lies at the heart of experience. It is more important than either ministry or place." In the 1983 article, "A Franciscan Experience in the Life of the Spirit," Joe emphasizes obedience in terms of relationality: "This understanding of obedience is very important, for what binds the community together is not a commonly discerned work, unless that be the commitment to 'live according to the form of the holy gospel.' What binds the community together are personal ties, the bonds of brotherhood and sisterhood."

As the council members have told me, it's all about relationship. And as I have said publicly at the chapter meeting, I have fallen in love with the people of this province. About contemplation, active and passive are a both/and for Francis, and that's good enough for me. So, on my essential needs list so far are:

• a religious life in community
• as a Franciscan in relationship
• where contemplation energizes activity

8/25/2013 - SoulCollage: The Hermitess

Thanks to the hospitality of the Mission San Jose Domincans, through the efforts of my high school chum, Janice (an OP), I'm ensconced in the "Bishop's Suite" for a retreat week of discernment in Fremont. I met one of my high school teachers, Sister Claudine, in their motherhouse library today. We had a pleasant conversation. I spent some time praying in "God's Acre," their cemetery, thinking of my former teachers and of friends "gone to heaven" and to whom I am very indebted. I watched a half-dozen wild turkeys cross a service road, all in single-file and in stately procession. I looked at the big trees that Sister Pierre Eymard, the motherhouse resident artist and my high freshman religion teacher, used to spray with water on hot summer days -- the swing from which she used to watch the turkeys is gone now. I thought of Sister Mary Hyacinthe, who at age 100 still sent me to buy lotto tickets for her in hopes of "hitting the big one for the sisters." They too made the stately procession to God's Acre years ago. So, here I am. Somehow, in spite of their influence, I am Franciscan at heart.

I gazed at another SoulCollage card I made in early 2009. It is named "The Hermitess." Through the creation of that collage, I knew that I was not meant to be a hermitess. I was not meant to be in or on a mountain by myself.  I knew I was not meant to journey toward the light, toward the Holy One, by myself. Through that card, I recognized that I needed a community.

                                                                     The Hermitess

So, trying to identify the essentials of what I need, and trying to separate out the non-essentials that I might describe as ego boosters (like having initials behind my name or being called by a special appellation), I have come up with this: In the journey toward God, I need to be a member of a  religious community with whom I may travel, members of which make decisions together in an egalitarian manner and support each other in the ups and downs of that communal journey toward the Holy One. In a nutshell, I think and feel that's it. It is also consonant with my personal values of transparency (being the same on the inside as outside; saying what one does and doing what one says; walking the talk), honoring diversity (solidarity; walking in another's shoes), and consensus (not simply" majority rules" or the powerful rule).

One of  the assigned books for the St. Louis Franciscan novitiate is Buying the Field: Catholic Religious Life in Mission to the World by Sandra Schneiders, IHM. I've been reading it. One of the quotes from her book describes this kind community of which I would like to be a member: "Religious life, if it is to be true to itself, must be a communitarian lifeform that is fundamentally egalitarian and interdependent rather than hierarchical and individualistic. It is not egalitarian in the political sense of one-person-one-vote but in the Trinitarian sense of interpersonal mutuality. Power, in such a lifeform, is a resource to be shared within the community and with others, through ministry. It is not the possession of some, unavailable to others. Dialogue, the mutuality of authority and obedience exercised in and for freedom, is the mode in which power is exercised in such a community. All in the community speak with authority, that is, with the right to be heard and heeded; and all in the community are called to obey, that is, to respond appropriately to what the Spirit is saying through the community's discourse. By the vow of obedience one assumes one's place as an equal adult at the circular table of community discernment and dialogue and commits oneself to stay at the table, no matter what, as the community works out anew, from day to day, how to be together in community and in ministry." I would like to find such a community. Also, I realize that Schneiders is speaking of apostolic, and not Franciscan evangelical, congregations in her book.

8/20/2013 - Franklin Fong, OFM, on Franciscan decision-making

Fr. Franklin Fong, OFM, gave a talk at St. Francis Parish in Sacramento last night. What he had to say has a bearing on my discernment process. He talked about a cycle of Vision which leads to Action which leads to Confirmation (or not) which leads back to Vision (or perhaps revision). Franklin said that when Vision and Action are coupled together, we begin a process of changing our original vision, which is classically known as conversion, transformation, or metanoia. In doing this process over time, we deepen our faith. We change, and need not only to give ourselves permission to change, but also to actively engage and guide our change -- our conversion process. As we deepen in faith, we grow in our trust of the Holy One. As we continue to spiral through the process of Vision --> Action --> Confirmation, leading back to Vision again our faith deepens. In other words, as we change through this coupling of Vision and Action, our trust increases until we find the courage to act on our vision, what Franklin calls a Leap of Faith. In other words, one has the courage to do something that makes no rational sense, necessarily. One acts, then seeks confirmation by discerning the movement of the Holy Spirit. From what does the vision arise? Prayer. Franklin gave the example of Francis of Assisi. In prayer, Francis heard a voice telling him to "Rebuild my church," his Vision. Francis did rebuild the church, the Action. The Confirmation was the completion of the rebuilding as well as a perception in prayer that he, Francis, should rebuild another church -- and so the twist in the spiral began the process of Vision --> Action --> Confirmation again. In many ways, Franklin's explanation is John Duns Scotus' view on Franciscan decision-making in a nutshell, So, what does this have to do with my discernment process? It's back to this SoulCollage, Desert Sisters.

I believe that when I made this picture in 2009, I was officially inquiring with the Immaculate Heart of Mary (IHM) congregation. I had just returned from visiting St. Gertrude's, a Benedictine monastery near Lewiston, Idaho, and had decided that I did not belong there. I had yet to begin taking theology classes at the Franciscan School of Theology (FST)  in Berkeley. So, this collage (in its original form; it's been changed in Photoshop over the years) spoke to me of that which I was seeking.  Four years, and many theology courses later, I have been gazing at this picture to discern whether this Vision, if you will, is still valid for me. Does this picture still speak to me in the same way? Or, has the way it speaks to me changed? I think it still speaks to me, but perhaps in a slightly different way now. Prior to taking classes at FST, my main mode of decision-making was Ignatian. I did the 19th Annotation 30-day Ignatian retreat when I was 23 years old (with the Cenacle sisters in Carmichael, when they still had a retreat house there), and used that method for decades. What's different now is that I look at the picture through Franciscan eyes, through a Franciscan hermeneutic. And it does still speak to me. Using the SoulCollage exercise with the picture, which begins with I Am the One Who .  .  .

We Are the Ones Who: Seek the light. We travel together, in relationship, on the journey toward the Holy One. We take only ourselves on the journey, trusting the Holy One to guide and provide what we need. We walk off the edge of civilization into the wilderness, leaving behind certainty and safety, for the unknown that may guide us to our destination. There are no sign posts. There are no paved highways. We create the path as we go. We have the courage and company of one another in pursuit of guidance of the Spirit. We are comfort and goad and mother and sister to one another. We are the desert sisters who create anew.

Now, in the intervening years that I have heard Ilia Delio speak, the picture makes even more sense to me. Delio's talks to the Leadership Council of Women Religious (LCWR) last week were similar to the ones I heard her give at the American Franciscan Conference (AFC)  last month. The National Catholic Register (NCR) has excerpts from her keynote here: http://ncronline.org/news/sisters-stories/lcwr-keynote-sisters-must-evolve-consider-universe-story. From the NCR, in part, Delio says, "A dynamic universe provokes the idea and the understanding of a dynamic God .  .  .This is not a stay-at-home God." The NCR further notes:

Drawing from her description of an evolutionary universe, Delio said there were four lessons she wanted to highlight for the sisters:

• The universe is unfinished: “God is not finished creating … and therefore life is not behind us, it is ahead of us.”
• Death is integral to life: “We are trying to hold on and grip and the tighter we grip the more we snuff out any life that’s there.”
• People are not fixed essences but “dynamic becomings:” “What we become will depend on our participation.”
• Live in an “open system:” “A closed system will wear down and wear out.”

So, as I consider Delio and what I am seeking, I am wondering at the closed system aspects of religious life and am wondering where I might find the life that is "ahead of us." Utilizing Franklin's conceptualization of the process, it seems to me that my Vision is still valid. I am unsure as yet of the Action.

8/17/2013 - SoulCollage: Desert Sisters

I no longer own a car -- though the necessities I've been dragging around with me through the last three moves fit in the back seat and trunk of one. I have been making an effort to simplify. I no longer have a job, neither one that pays nor one that is volunteer -- which also adds to a sense of not being anchored. My checking account had a balance of $5.40 in it yesterday morning. And as I move through this discernment process, I hear Claire Graham's admonitions to me from last week: "Don't be moved by the fear. Fear is the devil." Or, as Frank Herbert wrote in Dune, "Fear is the mind-killer. Fear is the little-death that brings obliteration." I am trying to be mindful of that as I move around once again in liminal space, or as the Asian theologian, Peter Phan, put it, in the betwixt-and-between. Being neither here nor there, and trying to dodge the fear, takes a bit of effort and focus (breathe, Debbie, keep breathing deep deep breaths) to be simply in the present. Being in the present and aware -- there's a name for it in martial arts, zanshin. I am trying to maintain my zanshin as I move through the liminality of my interior space.

Putting aside the fear to consider the present is a balancing act. It is like walking on the edge of a sword or on a tightrope. Keep eyes focused on the goal. Don't look down. Breathe calmly. Keep putting one foot in front of the other, feeling for the contours of the void as you go. Don't ignore the dangers, but also don't let them catch your mind. Keep inching along smoothly without becoming frozen in one spot. Maintain the zanshin .  .  . and in the moments between the breaths when all is still, just discern.

Discern is an interesting word. It is from the Latin word, discernere, which means "to separate, divide, distinguish, discern”. It seems like a circular definition in a way, that at the root of the word discern is the word discern.  It is the equivalent of the Latin words "dis," which means not or not any, plus "cernere" which has several meanings. Taken from the Latin root cerno, the infinitive form, cernere, means to see, to decide, to examine, to sift, to separate, to distinguish, to resolve, and to determine. So, to discern means NOT to be  decided or resolved. It is being neither here nor there, betwixt and between. It is a state of examining and sifting and distinguishing. And so in the moments of stillness, I am trying to distinguish where I should go and what I should be.

I have a picture that is a window into what I am trying to discern. It is a Soulcollage, a collage that I made before starting this journey with the Franciscans -- a picture of what I was seeking, pasted together magazine pictures tweaked in Photoshop to express one of my deepest desires.  Its title is "Desert Sisters". In the tradition of Clare of Assisi, I have been gazing upon it as meditation. Since it predates the Franciscan journey, Desert Sisters is a source "to go back to." It is a picture of my liminality.

Desert Sisters

8/13/2013 - About Thomas Merton's "Letter to A Young Activist"

I have read, and re-read a dozen times at least in the last few days, Merton's letter to a young activist. Merton talks about letting go of results and letting go of personal satisfaction, letting go of generalized ideals in favor of the personal relationship. I too have grappled with that thought, and have come to believe that I may make a difference one person at a time -- that it is about process rather than outcome. Though, with the patients who are seen at the clinic, we have had two people die -- the process did not work for them. The "health care process" took one man off the kidney transplant list at UCD Med center because he did not have documents, and it was assumed that he would not be able to afford the anti-rejection drugs. He died of heart and kidney failure. I can still see has face, a Fiji  man. There is a saying that "It's business," meaning that it is not personal. Since the invention of that cliche, business has become more pseudo-personal after a fashion. Marketing targets one's cell phone and one's email -- some grabbing a GPS signal to find our location or intercepting our web browser choices  to offer us local deals. Process has become commercial, mistaking the statistic for the for the person -- but needs to become truly more personal.

Merton further says in the letter, "The big results are not in your hands or mine, but they suddenly happen .  .  ." Or perhaps, as St. Paul put it, "no one may boast." (Ephesians 2: 8-9). It is not our doing in the end, but God's. Or as Magdalen Damen put it, Deus providebit, God will provide. In the end it is about trust.

At the Clara's House Tea this afternoon, Claire Graham, SSS, talked about seeing God in the eyes of a young man years ago. He was sitting by the side of St. Francis Church in Sacramento crying, sort of tucked into a little niche along K Street. His chest was heaving with pain and tears. Claire says that she asked him if she could help, and when the young man looked up into her eyes, she saw in them the face of God. Claire is one of the most Franciscan of people I know. God is in relationship.

Merton continues with a statement about finding meaning in one's work: "The great thing after all is to live, not to pour out your life in the service of a myth; and we turn the best things into myths." And so here I am, trying to discern whether I am pursuing a myth or becoming aware of a reality, or maybe a little of both. I am certain of one thing, though. Like Claire, I too have looked into a patient's or a client's or a friend's eyes and have seen the face of God. In the end, the "work" is not the journey. The "work" is how well we travel along the way, how well we journey. Merton concludes: "The real hope, then, is not in something we think we can do, but in God who is making something good out of it in some way we cannot see.  If we can do His will, we will be helping in this process." I am trusting that whatever I am supposed to be, and to be doing, is what will happen .  .  . and so my process of discernment continues .  .  .

8/10/2013 - Discernment thoughts after 1 week

I have a friend who is 80 year old. She is a Loretto sister. The Loretto sisters have their motherhouse in Wheaton, Illinois. So, the Loretto sisters are spread across the United States, but they are committed to listening to each other prayerfully. As with many congregations in the U.S., their population is aging. For skilled nursing and other services, such as alzheimers, they have partnered with other congregations at Resurrection Life Center in Chicago.  For example, my spiritual director for 20 + years, a Cenacle sister, lived at the Resurrection Life Center with her alzheimers and died there last May. However, for assisted living services not offered at Resurrection Life Center, the Loretto sisters came together in conversation to decide on a facility. How they did this is a model of obedience, of listening, to me.

The Loretto sisters' council researched seven different options for assisted living. They eliminated two of the options as not within their search parameters. The council presented the remaining five options to the community and asked them to choose. The council asked community members to choose with one proviso -- that they choose a single place to which all would go. The community-at-large gathered, listened to each other, prayed with each other, and came up with their choice. They recorded their findings in a document which they blessed in prayer and then presented to their council for a final decision. For me, this is a model of  listening and collaborative action.

This is one story that I'm contemplating as I consider membership in our congregation, in this province. It is a story I consider in contrast. But, it is a kind of story that is familiar to the Franciscan family. This story is from a Franciscan web site:

"Clare was joined by other women including her sisters and mother, eager to live a life devoted to God. All were accepted and cared for, no matter their family background. Clare modeled right relationships in the way she called the sisters together in collegial decision making. She wanted to listen to the wisdom of each sister. Clare was the first woman to write and have approved a way of life. She wrote a way of life that honored the graces available in the ordinary actions of everyday life." (1)

These are some of my ponderings of late.

(1) Source: Sisters of St. Francis, Daughters of the Sacred Heart of Jesus and Mary, http://www.franciscansisters-fcjm.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=80%3Ast-clare-of-assisi&catid=10%3Afranciscan-heritage&Itemid=7&lang=en