Recently in Personal Musings Category

This lengthy entry is not entirely new, but it does contain some new autobiographical elements. I decided to share with you, dear readers, the development of my call to live under the Rule of Saint Benedict, in Eucharistic adoration, while offering spiritual support to my brother priests and deacons here in the Diocese of Tulsa.

A continuity with the earliest glimmers of my Benedictine vocation is evident to those who have learned to read events -- even when they are marked by suffering, twists, and uncertainties -- with the eyes of the heart. There is much here that I would have preferred to keep as "the secret of the King," but there are also details that may well redound to His glory and, at the same time, respond to the queries and (not always accurate) speculations of those who want to know the details of my mission as it unfolds.

The Beginning of a Friendship

How did I first come to know Marie-Adèle Garnier? (See the previous entry for details about her life.) I was introduced to her by Blessed Columba Marmion! In order to reconstruct the genesis of our “friendship” -- for one can have a friendship with the saints in heaven -- I must return to my first exposure to monastic life in 1969.

Young Men and the Books They Read

I discovered Abbot Columba Marmion’s writings when I was fifteen years old. I was visiting Saint Joseph’s Abbey in Spencer, Massachusetts. Father Marius Granato, O.C.S.O., charged at that time with helping young men -- even very young men -- seek God, put Christ, the Ideal of the Monk into my hands. He even let me take the precious green-covered volume home with me. With all the ardour of my fifteen years I devoured it. No book had ever spoken to my heart in quite the same way.

My Spiritual Father

I read and re-read Christ, the Ideal of the Monk. At fifteen one is profoundly marked by what one reads. The impressions made on a soul at that age determine the course of one’s life. As I pursued my desire to seek God, I relied on Dom Marmion. I chose him not only as my monastic patron, but also as my spiritual father, my intercessor, and my guide.

Dom Denis Huerre, O.S.B., in his biography of Père Muard, the founder of the Abbey of La-Pierre-Qui-Vire, discusses Père Muard's extraordinary spiritual kinship with Saint Margaret Mary Alacoque. (She is, in fact, the secondary patron of La-Pierre-Qui-Vire.) Dom Denis concludes that it is not we who choose the particular saints with whom we desire to cultivate a special friendship; it is, rather, these particular saints who choose us. This, I am convinced is part of God's plan for the holiness of each one.

Spiritual Affinities

I became an avid reader of everything written by or about Abbot Marmion. In one of these books I encountered Marie-Adèle Garnier, Mother Mary of St. Peter, the foundress of the Adorers of the Sacred Heart of Tyburn, O.S.B. The little bit I read about her was very compelling: her focus on the Sacred Heart of Jesus and on adoration of the Most Holy Eucharist, her love of the Mass and the Divine Office, and her profound attachment to the Church. We were, without any doubt, united by a certain spiritual affinity.

Dom Marmion's Letters

Blessed Marmion's Letters of Spiritual Direction, edited by Dom Raymond Thibaut under the title Union With God, contain several pages of the Abbot's correspondance with Mother Mary of St. Peter. Among other things, Dom Marmion wrote:

"The very real imperfections which you confess to me do not make me doubt the reality of the grace you receive. God is the Supreme Master, and He leaves you these weaknesses in order that you may see that these great graces do not come from you, and are not granted to you on account of your virtues, but on account of your misery. You are a member of Jesus Christ, and the Father truly gives to His Son what He gives to His weak and miserable member. Do not be astonished, do not be discouraged when you fall into a fault, but draw from the Heart of your Spouse -- for all His riches are yours -- the grace and virtue that are wanting to you."

Saint Luke Kirby and Mother St. Thomas More Wakerley

In 1972, during my frightfully precocious initial experience of traditional Benedictine life, I wrote to the Tyburn Benedictines for the first time. (In photos from that period I am a very thin bespectacled 20 year old, looking rather like a young Pius XII in a Benedictine habit!) My purpose in writing to Tyburn was to learn more about Mother Mary of St. Peter, and also to request information on Saint Luke Kirby, one of the Tyburn martyrs whose surname I bear. I received a lovely reply written in what appeared to be a frail and trembling hand: a letter from Mother M. St. Thomas More Wakerley. Mother St. Thomas More sent me the information I had requested on Saint Luke Kirby as well as the red-covered biography of Mother Mary of St. Peter by Dom Bede Camm, O.S.B. The book was re-edited in 2006 by Saint Michael's Abbey Press.

Friends of the Sacred Heart

I read and re-read the book, finding that Marie-Adèle Garnier and I moved, so to speak, within the same constellation of mysteries: the Heart of Jesus, the Eucharist, the Sacred Liturgy, the Priesthood, and the Church. Blessed Abbot Marmion’s writings continued to nourish me, as did those of Saint Gertrude the Great and other Benedictine and Cistercian friends of the Sacred Heart. Dom Ursmer de Berlière’s book (in the “Pax” Collection) on the Sacred Heart within the monastic tradition added kindling to the fire. At about the same time, I read the life of other Benedictine mystics of the Sacred Heart: among them were Père Jean-Baptiste Muard, founder of La-Pierre-Qui-Vire, Mère Jeanne Deleloë, and Blessed Giovanna Bonomo.

Stability in the Heart of Jesus

In 1975, having wisely taken time out from the cloister, I made a pilgrimage to the cradle of Benedictine life at Subiaco. There I met a wise old monk who had been Master of Novices at La-Pierre-Qui-Vire. When I asked him for counsel concerning my monastic journey, he said to me, “Frère, tu dois faire ta stabilité dans le Coeur de Jésus -- Brother, you must make your stability in the Heart of Jesus.” These words were to sustain me in the years ahead. I know that Marie-Adèle Garnier would have understood them perfectly.

The Open Heart of Jesus Crucified

On August 4, 1979, together with Father Jacob, now a Dominican, and another brother, now a Franciscan, I went on pilgrimage to Montmartre in Paris. There, in the crypt of the Basilica of the Sacred Heart, at the altar of the Compassion of the Blessed Virgin Mary, and trusting in her intercession, we consecrated ourselves to the Heart of Jesus and to His designs on our life. Within me the desire was growing for a simple Benedictine life, characterized by the worthy celebration of the Divine Office and by adoration of the Most Holy Eucharist. The wounded Side of Our Lord exercised a supernatural power of attraction over me. The text of our Act of Consecration was printed on a leaflet with a drawing depicting a monk being drawn to the open Heart of Jesus Crucified. The attraction to the pierced Heart of Jesus and to His Holy Face was constant and undeniable.

Life Together

For several years I lived with Father Jacob and others in a small monastic community where, every evening after Vespers, we had adoration of the Blessed Sacrament. In the end it was decided that we should be absorbed by the monastery that was sponsoring and guiding us: the Cistercian Abbey of Notre Dame de Nazareth in Rougemont, Québec. It was a painful detachment for all concerned. Again, Mother Mary of St. Peter would have understood.

A Certain Thursday in June

I received my First Holy Communion 50 years ago today, on June 4th, 1959, from the hands of the Right Reverend Monsignor Vincent J. McDonough in Saint Francis Church, New Haven, Connecticut. June 4th fell that year on the Thursday before the feast of the Sacred Heart. We second graders had prepared for the great day by singing a little gregorianish hymn (in Latin!) from our "music readers." I still remember it, and can still sing it lo all these years later:

Veni, Domine Jesu,
Veni, Domine, Jesu,
Veni, veni, veni,
Et noli tardare!

I remember the thrill and the fear of kneeling before the white marble neo-gothic high altar on a prie-dieu covered in white satin, and the glint of the large golden ciborium in Monsignor's hands. Returning from the altar one had to keep one's hands folded while walking straight on the white line inlaid in the church's tile floor. The Sisters of Mercy prepared us well for our First Holy Communion, and even instructed on how to make a suitable thanksgiving with our little faces hidden in our hands. Inevitably, there was the temptation to "peek" through one's fingers.

Adoration,Thanksgiving and Reparation

I am celebrating this 50th anniversary in adoration, thanksgiving, and reparation. This year June 4th falls on a Thursday just as it did in 1959. I was far from imagining then the place that every Thursday -- day of the Priesthood and of the Most Holy Eucharist -- would come to hold in my life.

A Eucharistic Saint

It was also the feast of Saint Francis Caracciolo, an ardent lover of the Most Holy Eucharist who died on the vigil of Corpus Christi, June 4th, 1608.

The Alleluia Verse of the saint's Mass was:

Blessed is the man on whom thy choice falls,
whom thou bringest near to thyself,
bidding him dwell in thy courts (Ps 64:5).

The Secret of the same Mass was addressed to the Lord Jesus, as are any number of orations composed in modern times:

Da nobis, clementissime Jesu:
ut praeclara beati Francisci merita recolentes,
eodem nos, ac ille, caritatis igne succensi,
digne in circuitu sacrae huius mensae tuae esse valeamus.

Most clement Jesus,
grant that we who are commemorating the shining merits of blessed Francis
may be consumed with the same fire of love
as burned in him,
and so may be enabled to take our place worthily
around this sacred table of thine.

Finally, there was this Communion Antiphon:

Quam magna multitudo dulcedinis tuae, Domine,
quam abscondisti timentibus te (Ps 30:20).

What a multitude of sweetnesses, O Lord,
hast thou hidden for those who fear Thee!

A wise and dear friend wrote me from her cloister for the feast of the Epiphany. By God's providence, our lives, with their changes and chances, have been intertwined for over twelve years. Reflecting on the mystery of my call to Tulsa, she says:

Do you you know the poem The Wise by Brother Antoninus, O.P.? It is a favorite of mine and I thought of you as I read it today. All that has gone before in your life was not so much a search, but a preparation. What you have been called to fits perfectly.

I thank my friend for her message. Here is the poem:

The Wise

Miles across the turbulent kingdoms

They came for it, but that was nothing,

That was the least. Drunk with vision,

Rain stringing in the ragged beards,

When a beast lamed, they caught up another

And goaded west.

For the time was on them.

Once, as it may, in the life of a man,

Once, as it was, in the life of mankind,

All is corrected. And their years of pursuit,

Raw-eyed reading the wrong texts,

Charting the doubtful calculations,

Those nights knotted with thought,

When dawn held off, and the rooster

Rattled the leaves with his blind assertion---

All that, they regarded, under the Sign,

No longer as search but as preparation.

For when the mark was made, they saw it.

Nor stopped to reckon the fallible years,

But rejoiced and followed,

And are called "wise", who learned that Truth,

When sought and at last seen,

Is never found. It is given.

And they brought their camels

Breakneck into that village,

And flung themselves down in the dung and dirt of that place,

And kissed that ground, and the tears

Ran on their faces, where the rain had.

Msgr Brankin Writes:

May I add to all the friends and readers of Vultus Christi just how terrible this accident was? Fr. Kirby's car spun out of control, crossing three lanes of the most heavily travelled expressway in the city, and continuing its slide, cross over an exit ramp (fully 6 lanes). Flying backwards, Father Kirby's car flew backward off the road into a ditch where it landed in a concrete drainage culvert, bounced out, and came to rest about 15 feet away.

When I arrived at the scene, I was astounded that Fr. Kirby was not killed, not even hurt, not so much as a scratch.

You must understand that this was certainly a miracle. There is no way that I could imagine a car tailspinning out of control through six lanes of traffic without hitting or being hit by another car. I do not believe that Father could have flown off the road into the culvert and not broken his legs and hips.

Let me say that Our Lady's hand was very much protecting Fr. Kirby against the snares and dangers laid by the Devil.

Msgr Patrick Brankin

And My Account

Last night, on the feast of the Immaculate Conception, at about 9:00, while driving home from Broken Arrow, Oklahoma, I had a spectacular automobile accident. It would seem that the surface of the highway was slippery due to a very light mist of rain. I completely lost control of the car. It careened across several lanes of oncoming traffic, went head on toward an exit sign, and then spun around to fly off an embankment into a ditch.

I was saying the rosary at the time of the accident. In my pocket was an image of the Servant of God Father Lukas Etlin, that Father Abbot Marcel Rooney had just given me. (Father Lukas, a monk of Conception Abbey, born in Switzerland in 1864, died on December 16, 1927 in Stanberry, Missouri, as a result of injuries sustained in an automobile accident.)

Immediately, upon "landing," I looked to make sure that I still had my beads! Then, calmly, I called Msgr. Brankin and informed him of what had happened. I turned off the motor of the car and walked to the top of the embankment. Msgr. Brankin and Bishop Slattery were there within a few minutes. Someone driving by apparently called the Tulsa police. A very kind officer arrived on the scene. He could not have been more professional or more solicitous. The car is a total wreck, but I emerged from the accident without so much as a bump or a scratch.

I am certain that I was protected by the the Most Holy Virgin Mother of God, conceived without sin, and by the intercession of Father Lukas Etlin, and I offer heartfelt and humble thanks.

Michael Dennis Kirby
March 20, 1959 -- November 25, 1998

Michael's Statue

When I was growing up, there was a statue of Saint Vincent de Paul in the bedroom of my younger brother Michael, and it was his statue.

Little Michael had shortened Saint Vincent de Paul's rather long name to “Saint-Vincenty.” He met “Saint Vincenty” when he was taken to the Hospital of Saint Raphael in New Haven, Connecticut for a surgical procedure on his arm. He couldn’t have been more than five years old at the time. Saint Raphael’s was staffed by the Sisters of Charity of Saint Elizabeth (Convent Station, NJ), spiritual daughters of Saint Vincent.

The Saint Who Loved Children

A lifesize statue of Saint Vincent de Paul figured prominently in the hospital. The statue depicted him with three poor children; one child was in his arms and the two others were huddled in the folds of his cloak. For some reason, little Michael was very taken with this saint who loved children, and wanted to have a statue of his own.

Mom and Dad found exactly the right statue at the Saint Thomas More Book Shop on Chapel Street in New Haven, and bought it for him. For many years “Saint Vincenty” watched over Michael from atop a chest of drawers, becoming chipped and battered, but no less loved.

How did a seventeenth century French priest become a comforting presence in the life of a little boy in New Haven, Connecticut? There were, of course, the obvious mediations: the Hospital of Saint Raphael and the impressive statue. But none of this would have happened had Saint Vincent de Paul not opened his heart to the Word of God, to the Charity of Jesus Christ, and to the voices of the little and the poor.

Images of the Saints

How important a Catholic work it is to make images of the saints available to little children. Holy Images -- what Adé Béthune, following Saint Leo the Great, called "sacred signs" -- can powerfully influence their lives, and stimulate their imaginations to pursue the good, the true, and the beautiful. Every little boy should have his favourite saint, and an image of him (or her) close at hand.

Twenty-nine years ago today, a few young men prayed this Act of Consecration together in the crypt of the Basilica of Montmartre in Paris. I was among them. Our Lord is faithful, faithful even in the face of all our weaknesses, and infidelities, and betrayals. In the end, if we persevere in believing in His fidelity, His merciful love will triumph in our lives, and He will do in us and for us all that we, of and by ourselves, were unable to do.

Lord Jesus, we come to this holy place, to this Mount of Martyrs,
as so many saints have done,
to adore Thee, to thank Thee for the wonders of Thy love,
to implore Thy mercy and, above all,
to offer ourselves to Thy Heart. . . .

Lord Jesus, we seek Thy Face;
we consecrate ourselves to Thy Sacred Heart,
praying Thee so to unite us to Thyself
that Thou wilt live, and suffer, and pray
in us and through us
for the glory of the Father and the salvation of the world.

Lord Jesus, unite us to Thy faithful and perfect "Yes" to the Father,
that was consummated upon the Cross.
Thus wilt Thou unite us to the Holy Sacrifice offered throughout the world,
and give us to discover anew the hidden fecundity of the Cross.

Lord Jesus, we are certain of being heard
because we come to Thy Sacred Heart through the Heart of Mary
whom Thou didst give us from the Cross to be our Mother.
Mary is the faithful Virgin, Our Lady of Compassion,
standing with Thy Beloved Disciple at the foot of the Cross.
Let us know how close to us she is, and how present in our life.

Relinquishing Control

What does it mean to pray for someone or something?
If I pray to obtain control over someone or something, I am wasting my time.
Prayer is the expression of my desire to relinquish all control over persons, things, and circumstances into the merciful and loving hands of God.

Adoration of the Divine Will

If I pray to have some power over persons, things, or the course of events, my prayer is futile; it is, in some way, an anti-prayer.
Prayer is the struggle to let go of every desire to have power over others, over things, and over the course of events.
Prayer is adoration of the Divine Will in all its manifestations.

The Lord's Doings

At Vespers this evening I chanted the utter perfection of all that God does: Magna opera Domini, exquirenda omnibus, qui cupiunt ea (Psalm 110:2). Knox translates: "Chant we the Lord's doings, delight and study of all who love Him." And then, in the following psalm, singing of the just man, I read, Ab auditione mala non timebit. Paratum cor eius, sperans in Domino (Psalm 111:7). "No fear shall he have of evil tidings; on the Lord his hope is fixed unchangeably." Both verses enchanted me . . . and instructed me.

How Do I Pray?

How often do I bring to prayer a problem to be resolved, a person I would like to see changed, a suffering that I want to forestall? I tell God how best to resolve the problem. I advise Him on how best to change the person who is the object of my intercession. I bargain with Him in order to avoid the suffering that I fear: a suffering that may well be imaginary and that, more often than not, is merely the projection of an anguish lurking somewhere in my subconscious.

In Manibus Tuis

It is right to bring persons, things, and events to prayer, but the purpose of prayer is not to wrest control from the hands of God in order to assure that I get my own way, but, rather, to surrender all control in an act of childlike trust in the mercy, wisdom, and power of the Father. I remember the exhilaration I once experienced while standing in the middle of the choir singing the Offertory Antiphon, In te speravi. It contains the line, Tu es Deus meus, in manibus tuis tempora mea, "Thou art my God, my destiny is in Thy hands" (Psalm 30:16). The liturgy is an infallible school of what is essential in prayer.

The Rosary

There is another form of prayer that is admirably suited to "letting go," and that prayer is the Holy Rosary of Our Blessed Lady. It is as if each Ave, recited with one's gaze fixed on the face of the Blessed Virgin, relaxes one's hold over things, be it real, or imagined, or even desired, in such a way as to make it easier to relinquish everything into the hands of God. I have been praying my Rosary before the icon of Our Mother of Perpetual Help during this her Novena. "Hold on to me just as the little Jesus holds on to my thumb," she seems to be saying, "and let go of all the rest."

Images

Today's feast of Saint Catherine brought to mind how she has moved about in my life at various times. Having grown up in a city graced with a magnificent Dominican church, I knew of Saint Catherine from having seen her in a stained glass window. As a little boy I was profoundly affected by pictures, especially "holy pictures." Images engraved themselves in my memory. I remember having seen Saint Catherine crowned with thorns, and clutching the cross. In my "Lives of the Saints for Children" there was a romantic picture of Christ the King of Glory appearing in the sky over a young Catherine's head. If I recall rightly, her little brother was with her.

The Fire of Love

I must have read about Saint Catherine in my Missal or in The Church's Year of Grace by Pius Parsch, one of my favourite books from about age ten on. Years passed. I entered the monastery. One day I began reading the autobiographical notes of Cardinal Charles Journet. He described his own encounter with Catherine. He related how she erupted into his life as a seminarian, irrigating the dessicated theology of the "manuals" then in use, with a river of fire and of blood. Seminarians at the time were not allowed to read the mystics. They were deemed distractions from "serious theology." The young Abbé Journet read Saint Catherine of Siena in secret. She saved him from the banalization of the Mystery and invited him to surrender not only his mind to the light of God, but also his heart to the Fire of Love.

In the Train to Lourdes

Several years later I was in a train going from Paris to Lourdes. Across from me in my compartment was an elderly Dominican Father engrossed in reading and in telling his beads. I had just finished saying part of the Office, when the Dominican smiled and offered me a "holy picture" from his own breviary. It depicted Saint Catherine of Siena reciting the breviary with Our Lord as they walked side by side. The elderly Dominican turned out to be Père Henri-Marie Manteau-Bonamy, the famous Mariologist.

Praying With Christ

There again, the image from Père Manteau-Bonamy's breviary affected me deeply. I don't know what has become of it. Someday perhaps I shall find it between the pages of a book. The truth it portrayed still challenges and comforts me. When I pray the Divine Office alone in my tiny domestic oratory, I softly sing my verse and then read the following one silently, allowing Our Lord to sing it. Thus do we form a single choir, a single body praising the Father together in the Holy Spirit. I never pray the Office alone. Christ is always present, singing His part, sustaining my weakness, and making my poor prayer all His. Had Père Manteau-Bonamy never given me that "holy picture" of Saint Catherine reciting the breviary with Our Lord, I would not, I think, be praying in quite the same way all these years later.

Was anyone else struck by the Holy Father's allusion, in today's Regina Caeli message, to the "Marian dimension" of Pope John Paul II's death on the First Saturday of the month? "Many notice," he said, "the singular coincidence, that brought together in itself the Marian dimension — the First Saturday of the month — and the dimension of Divine Mercy." This discreet allusion to Our Lady of Fatima and to her role in the life and in the piety of John Paul II is, to my mind, very significant.

I recall what Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger wrote in 2000:

I would like finally to mention another key expression of the “secret” which has become justly famous: “my Immaculate Heart will triumph”. What does this mean? The Heart open to God, purified by contemplation of God, is stronger than guns and weapons of every kind. The fiat of Mary, the word of her heart, has changed the history of the world, because it brought the Saviour into the world—because, thanks to her Yes, God could become man in our world and remains so for all time. The Evil One has power in this world, as we see and experience continually; he has power because our freedom continually lets itself be led away from God. But since God himself took a human heart and has thus steered human freedom towards what is good, the freedom to choose evil no longer has the last word. From that time forth, the word that prevails is this: “In the world you will have tribulation, but take heart; I have overcome the world” (Jn 16:33). The message of Fatima invites us to trust in this promise.

Wednesday, April 2nd, will be the anniversary of the death of the Servant of God Pope John Paul II in 2005. Friday, April 4th, will be the anniversary of the death of Blessed Francisco Marto in 1919, and of Saint Gaetano Catanoso, the Apostle of the Holy Face, in 1963. Saturday, April 5th, will be the First Saturday of the month. I'm looking forward to a very special week.

Saint Patrick's Day Secularized

I wanted to buy a few cards for Saint Patrick's Day to send to family and friends both in Ireland and in the U.S. The cards I saw in local shops were entirely secular, apart from a few sentimental "Irish Blessing" motifs. Many were in poor taste. Some were downright offensive. Even our local Celtica shop had precious little in the way of images of Saint Patrick. I irked the chirpy sales lady by saying that her so-called Saint Patrick's Day cards were . . . heathen!

Remembering Adé

My mentor of thirty-five years ago, Catholic artist Adé Béthune, found her vocation when Dorothy Day asked her to make some good images of the saints. Adé's saints appeared in the pages of the Catholic Worker. They were later printed as greeting cards and holy pictures. Conception Abbey's Printery House has some decent Saint Patrick's Day cards. There may be other sources too. Terry N. would know. For the most part what I saw today was . . . heathen!