A Soulful Summer
In the dog days of summer, it’s good to find an interval of serenity to calm the nerves and refresh the sagging spirit. The world is overheating with urgent issues, concerns, controversies, breaking news about disputes, rising prices, anxiety over Iraq. Angst seems to dominate the public scene.
Inane trivia make the headlines: celebrity opinions, body glamour, the hottest CD, iPod, PlayStation, or the latest box office buzz. Important issues fade too easily into the background: the homeless, the refugees, AIDS and hunger victims in Africa, the poor, the lonely, the depressed, the elderly. It’s a struggle to keep up, keep track, stay focused, let alone nurture our Christian values.
“The world is too much with us,” said the poet Wordsworth. So, this summer, the Mendonça family decided to make more time for reading, reflection, and prayer. Not just find time, make time. It has helped us balance things better and discover a meaningful perspective on the spinning galaxy. In the lingo of the young, we’re chilling the soul.
There’s no plan etched in stone. The goal is to create an oasis of reflection and prayer once or twice a day. It helps to turn off the TV and bring home some mind-expanding books. It also helps to plan a visit to the Art or Natural Science Museum downtown, or an art gallery like the Menil Collection. Create a space for inspiration and soaring visions. Gaze at the stars. Ponder. Dream.
When our four children were growing up in Florida, my wife Peggy devised a summer regimen for them along these lines: no friends allowed until 4 pm, after wholesome activities (music, reading, crafts) were completed. This simple rule kept summer madness at bay and promoted an enduring sense of priorities.
Our summer patron is St. Francis of Assisi. I bought a garden statue of the gentle saint for Peggy’s birthday, and somehow we sense an extra measure of serenity. Holding a dove, he stands amidst the shrubbery, keeping an eye on our comings and goings.
Francis knew quite a bit about stress and upheaval, and about the ugly side of reality. He engaged vigorously with the world, being bold enough to evangelize the Ottoman sultan in wartime, thus gaining valuable insights into the Muslim faith. He saw visions, built churches, founded 3 orders, and gave us unforgettable lessons in peace – all before he died at the age of 44. Through it all, he found a way to balance engagement with contemplation. That makes him a perfect model for our age of tension, dividedness and spiritual apathy.
St. Francis helps us get in touch with God through the beauty and abundance of nature. (He also helps Peggy’s oleanders, roses, and hibiscus stay in bloom.) Our daughter Julie visited Assisi in January and found it to be a place of inexpressible tranquility, an oasis. That image has become our summer horizon.
Our daughter Lesley, just back from a college semester in Europe, is spicing up our summer. I showed her Joyce Kilmer’s poem, “Trees,” and asked for an instant response.
I think that I shall never see
A poem lovely as a tree.
A tree whose hungry mouth is prest
Against the earth's sweet flowing breast;
A tree that looks at God all day,
And lifts her leafy arms to pray;
A tree that may in Summer wear
A nest of robins in her hair;
Upon whose bosom snow has lain;
Who intimately lives with rain.
Poems are made by fools like me,
But only God can make a tree.
She took a minute, then said, “Here's what I think. God is the original poet.”
I shared that response with the college literature classes I am teaching. You might say that it sparked a teachable moment.
This summer, I’ll probably still rush around here and there, strain my nerves over a commute, or agonize a bit over repairs for the car or the house. But each time I leave or enter the house, St Francis will flash a wink and a smile, and I will feel a bit lighter.
~ Stephen Mendonca ~
Monday, July 04, 2005
The Eyes of Faith
The Eyes of Faith
On a grassy slope in Lithuania, beside a majestic river, stands a motley collection of wooden crosses, statuettes, devotional images, and rosaries. This “Hill of Crosses” has been a pilgrimage site since the 14th century. Like the cathedral at Chartres, it rises amidst a stretch of countryside, a silent witness to the faith.
A modern Golgotha of sorts, it survived the onslaught of Soviet repression and continues to flourish in our times. On certain days, the wind blows across the hill, gently swaying the rosaries and medals, whispering a song of healing.
The mystery of that distant shrine was brought home to my family in May, while at an art exhibition in College Station. There we saw a mosaic image of the Hill of Crosses, one of many works by Lithuanian artist, Lucija Tijunelis. She looks at nature through the eyes of faith, a bit like the poet William Blake who wished to “see a world in a grain of sand and heaven in a wild flower.”
In fact, Lucija (now a great-grandma at 87) cannot bear to see flowers die and go to waste. For decades she has been collecting and pressing botanical materials that eventually form part of her floral collages and mosaics. You might say that she wants her flowers to live forever in her artwork, no less than her sweet memories of her native land.
Her themes are simple and nostalgic: innocence, wonder, awe, beauty, and gratitude for God’s bounty. As she painstakingly glues petals, shoots, or wood filaments into an image of a child, a waterfall, or a rustic scene, Lucija is recreating and preserving something pristine in her own past. Not a scrap of artificial material enters into her collages. Hers is truly a unique skill.
I see many parables hidden in Lucija’s work. For instance, I like to think of how
Divine Providence draws value out of everything we do, even those things in our past that are failed or somehow gone dead. Nobody’s life is wasted.
When I have gone to God with my disappointments or defeats, He never fails to turn them into new realizations or fresh opportunities. I take heart from seeing how Lucija’s faith has helped her remain a sweet and whole person, despite a harsh life behind the Iron Curtain and years of hard work as a post-war immigrant
Another lesson we learn from Lucija’s work is her perseverance and positive attitude. In an age of disposable products, glitzy media hype, and self-promotion, Lucija shows us the importance of contemplating God’s creation through imagination linked with faith. In her own special way, she saves and renews, and in this way teaches us to be re-enchanted by everyday things.
What brings all this even closer home is that Lucija is related to us by marriage. In 2003, our daughter Julia married Lucija’s youngest grandson, Bronius, and they are expecting their first child in early July.
Like them, our entire family feels blest by the shining example of faith and the spirit of renewal in Lucija’s life. (Visit: http://mmt.fingertrips.com)
Reflecting on the eyes of faith, the words of C. S. Lewis come to mind: “I believe in Christianity as I believe that the sun has risen: not only because I see it, but because by it I see everything else.”
Stephen Mendonca
On a grassy slope in Lithuania, beside a majestic river, stands a motley collection of wooden crosses, statuettes, devotional images, and rosaries. This “Hill of Crosses” has been a pilgrimage site since the 14th century. Like the cathedral at Chartres, it rises amidst a stretch of countryside, a silent witness to the faith.
A modern Golgotha of sorts, it survived the onslaught of Soviet repression and continues to flourish in our times. On certain days, the wind blows across the hill, gently swaying the rosaries and medals, whispering a song of healing.
The mystery of that distant shrine was brought home to my family in May, while at an art exhibition in College Station. There we saw a mosaic image of the Hill of Crosses, one of many works by Lithuanian artist, Lucija Tijunelis. She looks at nature through the eyes of faith, a bit like the poet William Blake who wished to “see a world in a grain of sand and heaven in a wild flower.”
In fact, Lucija (now a great-grandma at 87) cannot bear to see flowers die and go to waste. For decades she has been collecting and pressing botanical materials that eventually form part of her floral collages and mosaics. You might say that she wants her flowers to live forever in her artwork, no less than her sweet memories of her native land.
Her themes are simple and nostalgic: innocence, wonder, awe, beauty, and gratitude for God’s bounty. As she painstakingly glues petals, shoots, or wood filaments into an image of a child, a waterfall, or a rustic scene, Lucija is recreating and preserving something pristine in her own past. Not a scrap of artificial material enters into her collages. Hers is truly a unique skill.
I see many parables hidden in Lucija’s work. For instance, I like to think of how
Divine Providence draws value out of everything we do, even those things in our past that are failed or somehow gone dead. Nobody’s life is wasted.
When I have gone to God with my disappointments or defeats, He never fails to turn them into new realizations or fresh opportunities. I take heart from seeing how Lucija’s faith has helped her remain a sweet and whole person, despite a harsh life behind the Iron Curtain and years of hard work as a post-war immigrant
Another lesson we learn from Lucija’s work is her perseverance and positive attitude. In an age of disposable products, glitzy media hype, and self-promotion, Lucija shows us the importance of contemplating God’s creation through imagination linked with faith. In her own special way, she saves and renews, and in this way teaches us to be re-enchanted by everyday things.
What brings all this even closer home is that Lucija is related to us by marriage. In 2003, our daughter Julia married Lucija’s youngest grandson, Bronius, and they are expecting their first child in early July.
Like them, our entire family feels blest by the shining example of faith and the spirit of renewal in Lucija’s life. (Visit: http://mmt.fingertrips.com)
Reflecting on the eyes of faith, the words of C. S. Lewis come to mind: “I believe in Christianity as I believe that the sun has risen: not only because I see it, but because by it I see everything else.”
Stephen Mendonca
To Be of Use
The people I love the best
jump into work head first
without dallying in the shallows
and swim off with sure strokes almost out of sight.
They seem to become natives of that element,
the black sleek heads of seals
bouncing like half submerged balls.
I love people who harness themselves, an ox to a heavy cart,
who pull like water buffalo, with massive patience,
who strain in the mud and the muck to move things forward,
who do what has to be done, again and again.
I want to be with people who submerge
in the task, who go into the fields to harvest
and work in a row and pass the bags along,
who stand in the line and haul in their places,
who are not parlor generals and field deserters
but move in a common rhythm
when the food must come in or the fire be put out.
The work of the world is common as mud.
Botched, it smears the hands, crumbles to dust.
But the thing worth doing well done
has a shape that satisfies, clean and evident.
Greek amphoras for wine or oil,
Hopi vases that held corn, are put in museums
but you know they were made to be used.
The pitcher cries for water to carry
and a person for work that is real.
~ Marge Piercy ~
The people I love the best
jump into work head first
without dallying in the shallows
and swim off with sure strokes almost out of sight.
They seem to become natives of that element,
the black sleek heads of seals
bouncing like half submerged balls.
I love people who harness themselves, an ox to a heavy cart,
who pull like water buffalo, with massive patience,
who strain in the mud and the muck to move things forward,
who do what has to be done, again and again.
I want to be with people who submerge
in the task, who go into the fields to harvest
and work in a row and pass the bags along,
who stand in the line and haul in their places,
who are not parlor generals and field deserters
but move in a common rhythm
when the food must come in or the fire be put out.
The work of the world is common as mud.
Botched, it smears the hands, crumbles to dust.
But the thing worth doing well done
has a shape that satisfies, clean and evident.
Greek amphoras for wine or oil,
Hopi vases that held corn, are put in museums
but you know they were made to be used.
The pitcher cries for water to carry
and a person for work that is real.
~ Marge Piercy ~
For all those who deny the creativity of others, here's a tiny parable from Kipling:
"When the flush of a new-born sun fell first on Eden's green and gold,
Our father Adam sat under the Tree and scratched with a stick in the mould;
And the first rude sketch that the world had seen was joy to his mighty heart,
Till the Devil whispered behind the leaves, "It's pretty, but is it Art?"
Rudyard Kipling, The Conundrum of the Workshops
"When the flush of a new-born sun fell first on Eden's green and gold,
Our father Adam sat under the Tree and scratched with a stick in the mould;
And the first rude sketch that the world had seen was joy to his mighty heart,
Till the Devil whispered behind the leaves, "It's pretty, but is it Art?"
Rudyard Kipling, The Conundrum of the Workshops
Failing and Flying
Everyone forgets that Icarus also flew.
It's the same when love comes to an end,
or the marriage fails and people say
they knew it was a mistake, that everybody
said it would never work. That she was
old enough to know better. But anything
worth doing is worth doing badly.
Like being there by that summer ocean
on the other side of the island while
love was fading out of her, the stars
burning so extravagantly those nights that
anyone could tell you they would never last.
Every morning she was asleep in my bed
like a visitation, the gentleness in her
like antelope standing in the dawn mist.
Each afternoon I watched her coming back
through the hot stony field after swimming,
the sea light behind her and the huge sky
on the other side of that. Listened to her
while we ate lunch. How can they say
the marriage failed? Like the people who
came back from Provence (when it was Provence)
and said it was pretty but the food was greasy.
I believe Icarus was not failing as he fell,
but just coming to the end of his triumph.
Copyright © 2005 Jack Gilbert. From Refusing Heaven, 2005, Alfred A. Knopf. Reprinted with permission.
Everyone forgets that Icarus also flew.
It's the same when love comes to an end,
or the marriage fails and people say
they knew it was a mistake, that everybody
said it would never work. That she was
old enough to know better. But anything
worth doing is worth doing badly.
Like being there by that summer ocean
on the other side of the island while
love was fading out of her, the stars
burning so extravagantly those nights that
anyone could tell you they would never last.
Every morning she was asleep in my bed
like a visitation, the gentleness in her
like antelope standing in the dawn mist.
Each afternoon I watched her coming back
through the hot stony field after swimming,
the sea light behind her and the huge sky
on the other side of that. Listened to her
while we ate lunch. How can they say
the marriage failed? Like the people who
came back from Provence (when it was Provence)
and said it was pretty but the food was greasy.
I believe Icarus was not failing as he fell,
but just coming to the end of his triumph.
Copyright © 2005 Jack Gilbert. From Refusing Heaven, 2005, Alfred A. Knopf. Reprinted with permission.
Friday, June 24, 2005
Memorable poem: Song of Wandering Aengus
The Song of Wandering Aengus
by W. B. Yeats
I went out to the hazel wood,
Because a fire was in my head,
And cut and peeled a hazel wand,
And hooked a berry to a thread;
And when white moths were on the wing,
And moth-like stars were flickering out,
I dropped the berry in a stream
And caught a little silver trout.
When I had laid it on the floor
I went to blow the fire aflame,
But something rustled on the floor,
And some one called me by my name:
It had become a glimmering girl
With apple blossom in her hair
Who called me by my name and ran
And faded through the brightening air
Though I am old with wandering
Through hollow lands and hilly lands
I will find out where she has gone,
And kiss her lips and take her hands
And walk among long dappled grass,
And pluck till time and times are done
The silver apples of the moon,
The golden apples of the sun.
by W. B. Yeats
I went out to the hazel wood,
Because a fire was in my head,
And cut and peeled a hazel wand,
And hooked a berry to a thread;
And when white moths were on the wing,
And moth-like stars were flickering out,
I dropped the berry in a stream
And caught a little silver trout.
When I had laid it on the floor
I went to blow the fire aflame,
But something rustled on the floor,
And some one called me by my name:
It had become a glimmering girl
With apple blossom in her hair
Who called me by my name and ran
And faded through the brightening air
Though I am old with wandering
Through hollow lands and hilly lands
I will find out where she has gone,
And kiss her lips and take her hands
And walk among long dappled grass,
And pluck till time and times are done
The silver apples of the moon,
The golden apples of the sun.
Wednesday, June 22, 2005
Taking a bow
Okay, okay, I will yield to the pressure of my adoring fans and fizz-dizzlers!!
This is the Renfro Man - short for Renaissance with a Fro Man. Anyway. Whatever.
I'm speechless. I feel like my mind is suddenly spotless and in need of some eternal sunshine.
Julie, Bronie -- I love this idea. Not yet sure how to give it a significant resonance, but that will come after I have polished off the pistachios you gave me. All in good time.
Les, tanks for your greeting. And to everybody - thanks for the fantubulous Father's Day. It felt great. James Joyce speaks of the mysterious, hidden role of fathers - mirroring the primal mystery of the author of creation. Fathers create, mothers nurture. But perhaps the roles are interchangeable and share-able. They should be if we are to be whole persons.
One thing I know. I have miles to go before I sleep, And miles to go before I sleep.
Dad
This is the Renfro Man - short for Renaissance with a Fro Man. Anyway. Whatever.
I'm speechless. I feel like my mind is suddenly spotless and in need of some eternal sunshine.
Julie, Bronie -- I love this idea. Not yet sure how to give it a significant resonance, but that will come after I have polished off the pistachios you gave me. All in good time.
Les, tanks for your greeting. And to everybody - thanks for the fantubulous Father's Day. It felt great. James Joyce speaks of the mysterious, hidden role of fathers - mirroring the primal mystery of the author of creation. Fathers create, mothers nurture. But perhaps the roles are interchangeable and share-able. They should be if we are to be whole persons.
One thing I know. I have miles to go before I sleep, And miles to go before I sleep.
Dad
Thursday, June 16, 2005
A heart-felt welcome!
Hey Dad!!!
Wow, you're very own webpage! Nevermind that I created you one years ago and it still goes untouched NO IT'S QUITE ALRIGHT!!!
But really, I hope you use this. Once I go back to Austin I will want somewhere to go where I can always feel connected to you and KNOW what's going on in your mind, heart and soul. I love you Daddy, Happy Father's Day! :)
-Chuckles Chiz Biz Bop
Wow, you're very own webpage! Nevermind that I created you one years ago and it still goes untouched NO IT'S QUITE ALRIGHT!!!
But really, I hope you use this. Once I go back to Austin I will want somewhere to go where I can always feel connected to you and KNOW what's going on in your mind, heart and soul. I love you Daddy, Happy Father's Day! :)
-Chuckles Chiz Biz Bop
Thursday, June 09, 2005
Welcome to your blogspot!
Hi Dad!
We thought this would be a neat way for you to express your musings, poems, articles, prayers, written reflections and anything else you'd like to share with family, friends, and the world.
Happy writing!
Love,
Julie and Bronius
We thought this would be a neat way for you to express your musings, poems, articles, prayers, written reflections and anything else you'd like to share with family, friends, and the world.
Happy writing!
Love,
Julie and Bronius
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