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St. Paul's Corner will provide a monthly reflection in honor of the Year of St. Paul (June 2008-June 2009)

The reflections are written in honor of her Patron by our very own Sr. Marie St. Paul!

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November 29, 2008

Cor Pauli Cor Christi

“The heart of Paul is the Heart of Christ.” 

~ St. John Chrysostom

Tomorrow begins Advent and the anticipation of waiting for the “darling little Man” to arrive on Christmas Eve!  This is a favorite time of year among the band of phive, hearkening back to St. Francis’ own love for the God Incarnate and the first crèche in Greccio.  What would St. Paul say to us during this time of preparation, silence, and prayer?

God-willing, our Christmas newsletter is mailing out this week with the spotlight on Our Lady.   I always wondered if St. Paul ever headed to Ephesus to spend some time with Our Lady for a break from his missionary travels.  (It must have been hard to leave.)  Would it have been a time of unadulterated peace and prayer for him, to be in the presence of the Woman who bore the Son of God?  Would she, the Seat of Wisdom, have shared with him her ponderings about the Messiah and His coming?  Theirs must have been a really special relationship, not exactly the caliber of St. John’s, of course, but very dear and precious to St. Paul.

I remember listening to a talk on Our Lady by a Franciscan priest who stated that the “fullness of time” referred to by St. Paul in Galatians 4:4 was the Virgin Mother of God, the Immaculate Conception.  “But when the fullness of time had come, God sent his Son, born of a woman, born under the law, to ransom those under the law, so that we might receive adoption.”   She who is perfect in every way welcomed the “All-Powerful Word (Who) leaped from Heaven, from the Royal Throne, into the midst of the land that was doomed.  (Wisdom 18:15)”     Just think of the wee Babe nestled so warmly in her womb beneath the Immaculate Heart that beat solely for Him, waiting to be born.  I think St. Paul would have us join our hearts and love to Our Lady’s, to welcome the Little King in a world that has grown chill.  Let’s take his writings and ponder them with her.  She will enlighten our dull minds with the piercing Light of Her Beloved Son and enrich this holy time of Advent as only she can.  

“Have among yourselves the same attitude that is also yours in Christ Jesus, Who, though He was in the form of God, did not regard equality with God something to be grasped. Rather, He emptied Himself, taking the form of a slave, coming in human likeness; and found human in appearance, He humbled Himself, becoming obedient to death, even death on a

Cross. (Phil 2:5-8)”

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October 2008

Cor Pauli Cor Christi

“The heart of Paul is the Heart of Christ.” 

~ St. John Chrysostom

  I digressed from St. Paul a wee bit last month, only because I knew I was soon to be visiting the grave of Bishop Jimmy Walsh, M.M.  He’s buried at Maryknoll, New York, a very beautiful site for pilgrimage and prayer.  They say when you go, you’ll leave a piece of your heart there; it’s true! 

While we were back east, Sr. André and I met Bishop Manny Cruz.  We were discussing his great devotion to St. Bruno, the founder of the Carthusians.  Bishop Cruz clarified that St. Bruno did not only love Christ, but that he was in love with Christ, a rare distinction in the spiritual life.  Sr. André then proceeded to tell the Bishop about Fr. MacCarthy, which is funny, as I had been planning to mention him in this piece.  Fr. MacCarthy was a gruff old priest who was an utter crank and an absolute delight to be around.  He was the first living priest I encountered as a religious who manifested this spousal love for Christ.  You knew when he said Mass or heard your confession, that he shared an intimacy with the Lord that few others do.

One of the reasons I love St. Paul so much is that he too was in love with Christ.  It jumps out of every page of his letters.  I have to bow my head in humble submission when I meditate on what his prayer life was like.  Oh, to have been present for one hour when the little man was praying!  And the deeds and the transformation this love brought about, even unto the present age.  There’s nothing namby pamby about a spousal love for Christ, especially in men.  It truly tempers the soul and brings about a delicate wholeness that can only mirror Jesus Christ and His own Beauty.

Reflecting on St. Paul’s spousal love for Christ leads quite naturally to the foregone conclusion that Christ loved him first.  He is in love with each and every one of us!  Mother used to stress constantly to us (it must have been because we were in a household of women) that He loved each sister as if no one else existed.  Our Lord does not crush our personalities.  St. Paul was still St. Paul, fiery and argumentative and verbose; Fr. MacCarthy was still a prickly old Irish priest.  He knows us through and through, and calls each one of us to fall madly in love with Him. 

May St. Paul pray that we too may be given the “strength to comprehend with all the holy ones what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses all knowledge, so that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.”  (Eph 3, 18-19)

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SEPTEMBER 2008

Cor Pauli Cor Christi

“The heart of Paul is the Heart of Christ.” 

~ St. John Chrysostom

A couple of weeks ago, Sr. Esther Marie, Sr. Augustine Marie and I heard Dr. Peter Kreeft give an excellent talk on the culture war.  At the end of his talk, he suggested reading St. Paul’s writings and Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings to inspire us to enter the fray and do battle for Christ.  Well, didn’t that just thrill my heart, hearing the writings of St. Paul and Tolkien linked forevermore!  So I thought I would rummage around for some applications of St. Paul to Tolkien.  The most obvious reference, of course, is “God chose the lowly and despised of the world, those who count for nothing, to reduce to nothing those who are something, so that no human being might boast before God.” (1 Cor 1:27-29)  Compare this to Gandalf’s answer to Frodo’s cry as to why he was chosen to carry the burden of the ring, “You may be sure that it was not for any merit that others do not possess:  not for power or wisdom, at any rate.  But you have been chosen, and you must therefore use such strength and heart and wits as you have.”  Frodo accepts the call and marches on his way to the hellish Mordor with Samwise at his side.  The defeat of Sauron is brought about by no ordinary means.  The very weakness and humility shunned by the great and mighty crushes Sauron’s realm of darkness.  As St. Paul says, “For it is when I am weak, that I am strong.” (2 Cor 12: 10)

Is this not the lesson of the Cross, taught to all the followers of Christ?  (A lesson I struggle with daily.  Darn it!)  Our Lord died in abject failure on Calvary, stripped and broken and beaten, and so, won for us the victory of the Cross.    He has conquered, but we must do our part.  “In the fight for the world, victory will go to the strong.  That fight is going to be won by and through the Cross; for it is only the Cross that can make us strong – and not only the Cross but the Crucifixion.  We must bear and love the Cross as it blisters and burns and bites in order to pour into us Its divine strength, just as it blistered and burned and bit the shoulder of Christ in order to make His divine strength available to us.  Sacrifice is the must…sacrifice is needed to make us strong.  This is not a time for half measures.”  Coolly expressed by Bishop James E. Walsh, another great Maryknoll missioner and I admit, my favorite!  When Bishop Walsh was put under house arrest by the Chinese Communists (shortly before he was placed into solitary confinement for 12 years), they stripped his room of everything but the bare necessities.  They did leave him the picture of a baby he had on his desk.  This baby was his beloved friend, Bishop Francis Xavier Ford, who had been martyred but a short time before.  Bishop Walsh was no sentimental fool.  He definitely had a grasp of what the fight for Christ and souls truly entails, a love willing to make the ultimate sacrifice of one’s own life by the path chosen for one by the Lord.    

I must leave you with a wee homage to St. Thérèse, whose feast day is just around the corner.  (At least I think it’s her quote, but I’m not sure!)  And I know she would have been a huge fan of the Lord of the Rings.  She must be now, anyway.  Who was more hobbity than the Little T? 

I ask of You, Jesus, a heart that loves You, a heart that cannot be conquered, always ready for battle after each tempest, a heart that is free, never seduced, a heart that is straight and never walks on crooked paths.  Amen.

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AUGUST 2008

Cor Pauli Cor Christi

“The heart of Paul is the Heart of Christ.” 

~ St. John Chrysostom

I feel a little more akin to St. Paul now that I have traveled to the very ends of the earth!  The trip to Sydney gave me a new found respect for the missioners of old.  Whereas we can cross an ocean in a day’s time with relative comfort and ease, those men and women really gave their all in just attempting to travel to their mission territory.  And to top it all off, they pretty much accepted the fact that they might never see their families or homeland again –my heroes!  This is a good place to insert a favorite quote from Bishop Francis Xavier Ford, Maryknoller extraordinaire:

All hail to you Defenders of the Cross,

Who on this day bid fatherland farewell,

All praise to you! Who, mindful of the dross

Earth’s pleasures are, count everything as loss

Save souls’ salvation, far distant seas across.

Unknown to men, you sacrifice your all

For God; unheralded you go

In loving, eager answer to the call,

The precious seeds of Christ’s own Faith to sow,

Yet high above all bright your names shall glow,

As His dear friends who fought against the foe,

Like Paul.

(When I showed this poem to Sr. Marie André, she actually had the nerve to accuse me of adding the last line!  Usually I would do something like that, but in this case I didn’t have to since St. Paul is one of the main patrons of Maryknoll, missioner of missioners that he was!  And then she added St. Andrew to her copy…doesn’t rhyme.)

When the daily drudge looms over me, I think of St. Paul practically unstoppable in the face of so many unimaginable hardships and heartaches.  He seemed to thrive on all the trials and sufferings thrown his way.  There are days when I would just like to run far, far away and the stuff I have to tackle pales in comparison!  So, what’s his secret? 

Here’s a man who was the Pharisee of Pharisees, who hated the followers of Jesus with such virulence, and who does the Lord choose to carry His Word to the Gentiles but him!  After all the trouble and heck the Pharisees gave Jesus during His Public Life, it’s one of the greatest ironies that the one of their crowd ended up becoming a Prince and Pillar of the Holy Roman Catholic Church!  It’s wonderful what Our Lord can and will do for us in our blind and weak moments.  Not that it’s going to be easy.  He did tell Ananias that He would show Saul “how much he must suffer for the sake of My Name.” (Acts 9:16)  And Paul rose to the challenge, suffering so much for Christ, the souls entrusted to his care, and the Church.  So, what was it that changed this fuming Pharisee into one of the greatest saints ever?  (A little partiality never hurt anyone!)  Here’s his answer in all the splendor of his eloquence:

“Who shall separate us from the Love of Christ?  Shall tribulation or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? ... No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through Him Who loved us.  For I am sure that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the Love of God in Christ our Lord.”  (8 Romans 35, 37-39)

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JULY 2008

Cor Pauli Cor Christi

“The heart of Paul is the Heart of Christ.” 

~ St. John Chrysostom

Every postulant in our order longs for the day when she will receive the habit and her new name in religion.  I was thrilled when Mother Angelica gave me the name, Sr. Marie St. Paul of the Holy Spirit.  There was a time in my life when I was rather indifferent to St. Paul.  (What I was thinking?!)  I cannot profess to be a scholar of St. Paul; I’m afraid the only thing we have in common is our tempers and he eventually overcame his.  I do love him very much, and  I would like to share with you during this Jubilee Year of St. Paul various books, quotes and thoughts that I have gleaned from his loving patronage.

The first book I read that completely changed my view of St. Paul was The Glorious Folly, an historical novel by Louis de Wohl.  It’s been awhile since I last read it, but I do remember how Paul came alive to me.  Not to sound too dramatic, but when St. Paul entered my life, I was never really the same afterwards.  His overwhelming spousal love for Christ has fueled my own love for the Lord.  Nothing stood in his way when it concerned his mission of carrying the Love of Christ to all men.  How inspiring!  And now we’ve been given a great gift from Our Holy Father Pope Benedict XVI to learn about St. Paul, spending time musing and meditating over his letters, and allowing him to continue his mission to lead us to Christ!

I would like to end this month’s rumination on St. Paul with one of my favorite quotes about him from Father C. C. Martindale, the English Jesuit:

“I can’t even properly describe his character – his genius for friendship, his quivering sensitiveness, his exquisitely responsible gratitude; his passionate interest in everything – why, in athletics!  He says he has his race to run, and runs it, no doubt about his goal; he fights, not like a man who is shadow-boxing – his almost motherly tenderness, his white-hot earnestness of conviction, his attention to the smallest details, the sublimity of his ideal, his total disregard of physical pain, of danger from brigand or from secret assassin, or from official police, or from sea, or from fire.  I can’t even express to you his delightful sense of humor, his perfect courtesy; the obstinate courage required for his monotonous work; first trying (and failing) to persuade his fellow Jews; and then trying to convince the pagan populations (and succeeding) and again, straining to keep his converts loyal to the Faith they had professed.  And all this, being a man, small, ugly, constantly ill, often feeling horribly frightened, desperately lonely.” 

Happy Jubilee of St. Paul!

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