St Mary: The Beautiful Dove

He sent forth also a dove after him, to see if the waters had now ceased upon the face of the earth. But she, not finding where her foot might rest, returned to him into the ark: for the waters were upon the whole earth: and he put forth his hand, and caught her, and brought her into the ark. And having waited yet seven other days, he again sent forth the dove out of the ark. And she came to him in the evening, carrying a bough of an olive tree, with green leaves, in her mouth. Noe therefore understood that the waters were ceased upon the earth. And he stayed yet other seven days: and he sent forth the dove, which returned not any more unto him.
Genesis 8:8-12

The Coptic Christians, whose ancient communities are enduring a prolonged martyrdom in the Middle East, have long given the Blessed Virgin the title of The Beautiful Dove because they see a type or figure of our Lady in this story from Genesis. In common with all of Christendom prior to the time of Luther the Copts find the New Testament present within the Old. In its pages, the stories, the people, the artefacts used, the sacrifices offered and so on everything which Jesus and the Apostles make plain can be seen under a veil as it were. Christians have long delighted in piercing that veil and in unfolding into plain sight the truths which we can now see thanks to the revelation of Christ and the faith passed on through the Apostles. The three journeys of the dove are types of, respectively, the girlhood of Mary, her role as Mother of God and her Assumption into heaven.

The earth covered in waters represents a world drowned in narrow materialism, sin and self-regard. From the moment of her Immaculate Conception our Lady became a pilgrim: in this world but not of it. Noah and his family in the Ark stand for the anawim the humble righteous ones looking with hope for the coming kingdom which would dry up the waters and flood the world instead with the spirit of love and devotion. Mary became in a special way the representative and ambassador of the anawim. She flew forth across the waters filled with love and hope but could find nowhere where here foot might rest. She was sustained only by the wings of faith and the winds of the spirit. Finally she came to rest in the hands of St Ann, her mother, and St Joseph, her betrothed.

At the Annunciation she takes to flight once more, the wind beneath her wings is the Father who chose her, the Holy Spirit who espoused her and the Son who was formed in her virginal womb. Already the waters have begun to diminish, St Zechariah, St Elizabeth, John the Baptist, Simeon are so many islands emerging into the light and filled with the joy of a new birth in and for the earth. The dove returns, so the Septuagint tells us- "carrying a bough of an olive tree, with green leaves, in her mouth." This symbolises the Passion of her Son, the tree reminds us of the Cross of Golgotha, the leaves of the Resurrection and Ascension. The combination of the two reminds us that life and death are united in the Crucifixion and that life has the final triumph. It carries too an echo of the words of our Lord on His Way of the Cross "if in the green wood they do these things, what shall be done in the dry?" (Luke 23:31) That this Good News is borne in the mouth of the dove recalls also the canticle of praise that came from Mary's lips, the Magnificat-
My soul doth magnify the Lord.
And my spirit hath rejoiced in God my Saviour.
Because he hath regarded the humility of his handmaid; for behold from henceforth all generations shall call me blessed.
Because he that is mighty, hath done great things to me; and holy is his name.

The receding of the waters is a symbol for the completion of the redemptive work of Jesus, sin and death have been finally conquered. The dove resting in the Ark among the family of Noah represents Mary after the days of the Passion, Ascension and Pentecost resting in the family of the Church. And after she completes her full time on earth (in the scriptures the number seven is a signifier for completeness) she flies one more time, raised by the angels to be reunited once more and forever with her Risen and Glorified Son. We are more fortunate than Noah, however, for if the dove never returned the Virgin certainly has many times. Because of the victory won by her Divine Son she now has numerous places upon which she can rest her foot, above all in the presence of the Christian anawim the St Bernadette's the St Juan Diego's the humble poor to whom she delights to appear at Lourdes in France, at Tepeyac in Mexico, at Fatima in Portugal and in numerous places. Always she carries with her the olive bough with the green leaves reminding us of her Son, of His Passion and Resurrection of the hope that He brings to the world and of the need for us to turn to Him with repentance and love.

The Beautiful Dove has not forgotten the Copts of Egypt. In the late 1960's as our Lady of Light she appeared at Zeitoun in Cairo perhaps to prepare them for the torment of persecution they now face. The dove of Noah symbolises hope, life appearing from out of a dead earth. Mary, the God bearer, is a sign for us of that hope and she brings to us the One who in His Person defeats death and the forces of darkness. May we all turn to her and join our prayers with hers on behalf of the Christian people of the Middle East. By the grace and power of God may it be that the dove of peace, the dove of light, the dove of joy, the Beautiful Dove may find her home in the lands that gave birth to our Christian faith. It is in Egypt too that we find the oldest of all prayers to Mary the Sub Tuum Praesidium-
We fly to your patronage, O holy Mother of God; despise not our petitions in our necessities, but deliver us always from all dangers, O glorious and blessed Virgin
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The painting is a detail from The Annunciation by Fra Filippo Lippi

Why be Reborn?

                                        Christ and Nicodemus- Cijn Hendricks

Nicodemus said to him, ‘How can anyone be born after having grown old? Can one enter a second time into the mother’s womb and be born?’  Jesus answered, ‘Very truly, I tell you, no one can enter the kingdom of God without being born of water and Spirit
John 3:4-5

"What's in it for me?" is a perfectly reasonable question to ask whenever someone tries to persuade you to take a risk. It may not be the only or even the most important question but it is certainly one which can legitimately be put. One cannot, therefore, blame non-Christians for taking it into consideration when hearing the appeals of evangelisers to be 'born again in Christ Jesus.' To people who believe in neither heaven nor hell the promise of the one and the threat of the other will make no impression. Likewise those who have no sense of sin are conscious of no burden of guilt from which they have to escape. None of these things then can be advanced as being relevant to the "what's in it for me?" criteria.

The idea that the population would be susceptible to such appeals is the heritage of a time which has now past. Where you have a society in which almost everyone accepts the basic ideas of Christianity the task is to energise them, to get them to move from theory to practice. In the West today there are few if any such societies so the strategy requires to be revised. Fortunately the Church has experience in dealing with a world in which most people were ignorant of, indifferent to or antagonistic about basic Christian doctrines. This was the gentile world of the first century Mediterranean where the Apostles and their associates did the work of planting the Catholic Church in the first place. I think that they made three distinct promises which each convert would receive as a gift when becoming converted to the faith, promises which the Church can still make and which provide the answer "this is what is in it for you."

The first is this; new Christians will receive the Holy Spirit. This was clearly an expectation in the primitive Church "Paul passed through the inland regions and came to Ephesus, where he found some disciples.  He said to them, ‘Did you receive the Holy Spirit when you became believers?" (Acts 19:1-2.) The idea that this is something which will necessarily cause people to jump about shouting Hallelujah! and waving their hands does not on the face of it make it an attractive promise to many people. However this is not the case. The Spirit is infinite and infinitely variable, He manifests Himself in many ways. In some He descends like a thunderbolt and sets them aflame and keeps them aflame for a lifetime. In others He gently infuses himself into the mind and heart slowly turning them into havens of peace and joy. What is certain is that He makes Himself present to believers in ways that He does not to those who reject faith (the Holy Spirit is certainly at work in non-Christians but the form and content of that work is qualitatively different from that among those united to Christ.)

The second promise is Christ Himself. Him you will certainly receive. By this I mean the whole Christ not the attenuated wise teacher of so many timid sermons or relativist theologies. The full red-blooded Son of God and Son of Mary, crucified on Calvary, risen from the dead, ascended to the Father. Many people have a vague idea about Jesus, He is a sort of blank space of vacuous goodness upon which can be written or projected whatever a person wants to impose upon Him. He is cited in defence of this political project or that abnormal form of conduct. A Christian receives Him in all His dimensions, present in the Gospels and all Scripture, made present in His body the Church, seen suffering in the world among the vulnerable and outcast, encountered under the appearance of bread and wine in the Eucharist.

And then there are miracles. Many Christians get a bit shifty when it comes to miracles explaining that biblical accounts are either metaphors or psychological cures for psychosomatic ailments. There are healing ministries in places but these are out of the mainstream and all too often tainted with charlatanism. Yet the scriptures couldn't be clearer "Now many signs and wonders were done among the people through the apostles" (Acts 5:12.) The early Church was acquainted with the miraculous and that was part of the package that believers signed up to. Nowadays educated opinion frowns on the idea so the Church often appears apologetic about it or hushes it up altogether. This approach is nonsense, if Christians believe that Jesus rose from the dead why should they disbelieve in varicose veins being healed? Moreover impressing the intellectual elite is not the sole purpose of the Church, millions of people do not have an a priori belief that miracles cannot happen therefore they do not happen and to close off from them this part of the Good News because we are afraid of appearing foolish in front of the worldly wise is a dereliction of duty.

Certainly the possibility of fraud or hysterical temporary 'cures' is always present when miraculous healings are the matter at hand. The Church has no interest in such things save to denounce and expose them. Nonetheless there are inexplicable cures and events associated with Christianity. The case of Lourdes provides a template for what is possible. Claims of cures are not accepted until thoroughly investigated by qualified physicians, including those who are not associated with the Church and are sceptical of her faith. A miracle is not declared until some very tough criteria have been met. The point about this is not that miracles are common, by definition they are exceptionally rare, so that believers can expect to have their problems solved by them. No, the point is that by accepting the Christian faith a person begins to inhabit a world, a universe, in which the miraculous is possible. Their experience of life is fundamentally altered by this simple change of perspective. The little pamphlet A Protestant Looks at Lourdes (PDF) by Ruth Cranston gives us a glimpse into this-
" Time after time I have been told at Lourdes—by doctors, nurses, brancardiers, even by the man who sweeps the paths: "The sick? Oh, Madame, they've forgotten about their own cure. All they care about is that the man in the next row shall get well. . . . 'Don't bother about me—that fellow over there needs you more.' . . . 'Never mind, nurse, I can wait.' . . . 'Look after this poor lady in the next carriage—she really needs attention'."
Naturally the pain comes back again, but it hasn't the same hold. Their minds are not centred on it any longer. And when the time comes to go home, though they haven't been physically cured, though they know what hardships and suffering yet another pilgrimage will mean, their one cry is: "If only I can come back next year! If only I can come again to Lourdes!"

So, "what's in it for me?" You get the Holy Spirit, Jesus and miracles. The proof of all this is experimental, that is these are gifts that you can only have by having not by being told about. The invitation to be born again is a risk, there is so much that you have to give up, to leave behind. But there is also so much to gain. The choice is yours to make.
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Mary- Mirror of Perfection

Luca Mombello (1518-1520/ 1588-1596)

Immacolata Concezione con Dio Padre / The Immaculate Conception with God the Father

Now, consider that Mary loved her Divine Son with an unutterable love; and consider too she had Him all to herself for thirty years. Do we not see that, as she was full of grace before she conceived Him in her womb, she must have had a vast incomprehensible sanctity when she had lived close to God for thirty years?—a sanctity of an angelical order, reflecting back the attributes of God with a fulness and exactness of which no saint upon earth, or hermit, or holy virgin, can even remind us. Truly then she is the Speculum Justitiæ, the Mirror of Divine Perfection
Blessed John Henry Newman

Is Mary, the mother of Jesus, truly a mirror which reflects in the most perfect way possible to humans the Divine attributes or is it more true to say that she is a mirror which reflects mostly the work of the Catholic imagination? I would argue that to some degree that she is both and that moreover the two things are really one thing approaching the same object from different angles. Critics of the Church often assert that the Mary of the Gospels and Catholic Mary are two very different figures with little in common. The person whom the Church venerates under that name is based less upon the Bible than it is upon fantasies, legends, speculation and liberal borrowings from pagan cultures. Most arguments which have the power to persuade large numbers of people usually contain an element of truth and that is so here. I propose to demonstrate briefly what is false in the allegation and then to suggest that what is true in it does not contain the meaning that the critics suppose that it contains.

 First then, the references to our Lady in the New Testament. No woman has more references made to her in the Gospels than Mary although that still means that the total number is quite small. As I demonstrated in my earlier series The Bible & The Virgin however the Evangelists had the ability to compress masses of information into very few words. Close consideration of the verses will enable a person to learn explicitly and deduce implicitly much that the Church holds to be true regarding the Mother of our Lord. The same applies to the appearance of Mary in the Acts of the Apostles and the figure of the woman clothed with the sun in Revelation (Apocalypse 12) whom it is not unreasonable to identify with the Theotokos. The Church also holds it to be axiomatic for Christians that they should always read the Old Testament through the lens of the New. This means that we see in the OT much which prefigures or foreshadows the new dispensation in archetypal form. Included in this are any number of figures, like the bush that burns without being consumed or the Ark of the Covenant or Rachel the mother of Israel, which refer to Mary. Perhaps above all there is the figure of Eve and the Protoevangelium in Genesis 3  I will put enmities between thee and the woman, and thy seed and her seed: she shall crush thy head, and thou shalt lie in wait for her heel. (Gen 3:15) Taken together all the references in Scripture which can be readily understood to refer to our Lady fill up in great measure the figure of Catholic Mary and identify her with the historical Mary of Nazareth.

It remains true nonetheless that the image of Mary which Catholics hold in their hearts and minds with such devotion is in part based upon extra-biblical sources but that is hardly the devastating critique that its opponents suppose it to be. The Church has never held it to be a truth that the Bible is the only resource which gives us accurate information about the revelation of God to Man and the Bible indeed makes no such claim for itself. The Sacred Traditions passed on by the Apostles to the faithful are of at least equal value and the two things balance each other, nothing in Tradition can contradict Scripture and nothing in Scripture can contradict Tradition. We can see, then, from the very ancient liturgies and prayers of the Church and the writings of Early Church Fathers much material which is now incorporated into the Marian cult of the Church. A third pillar to the understanding of revelation which we possess is the use of reason. By applying reason to Scripture and Tradition we can that deduce certain things must be true or can be accepted as being true without contradicting either of the other two. Hence speculative theology adds another element to the picture that we can form of our Lady. Where these things, Scripture, Tradition and Reason are in harmony with each other we can have some confidence that their collective wisdom forms a truth and so what they tell us about Mary means that the figure whom the Church honours is the same as the young woman who first heard the words of the Archangel Gabriel some two thousand years ago.

There is a fourth source to our picture of the Mother of God which proceeds from the reports that over the centuries many visionaries have given of their encounters with her in visible form. These constitute what are called 'private revelations' to distinguish them from the age of public revelation which ended with the death of the last Apostle. At that point all that was necessary for a saving faith had been made known to Man and nothing could be added to or taken away from it. What private revelations, insofar as they are authentic, do is recall to mind this or that aspect of revelation which it is particularly necessary for a particular epoch or society to remember. Some supposed revelations are spurious and consequently are rejected by the Church. Others which are consonant with Scripture, Tradition and reason are considered worthy of belief although the Church does not insist that they be actually believed in any case. From this deposit of private revelations many Catholics draw their image of Mary as a person among us with whom they can and do form a strong personal attachment and devotion. And this is the figure who can be described in a sense as the mirror of the Catholic imagination.

If a mirror reflects what is before it then Mary does not reflect most actual Catholics. She reflects them as they desire to be, as they should be. In many ways the apparitions of our Lady of Lourdes is typical of much that we can learn about our Lady from visions. If we focus on her for a while then we can see where the lines of Mary as the mirror of Catholic imagination and Mary as the mirror of perfection intersect and merge. For the 2008 Jubilee celebrations marking the 150th anniversary of St Bernadette's encounter with our Lady of Lourdes the Church issued a special prayer which contained in summary form the essential elements to be learnt from this Marian apparition. It concludes thus-
Because you are the smile of God,
the reflection of the light of Christ,
the dwelling place of the Holy Spirit,
because you chose Bernadette in her misery,
because you are the star of the morning, the gate of Heaven,
and the first resurrected creature
we praise you,
we acclaim you
and with you we sing the wonders of God

The word 'smile' here is a central part of the whole encounter. Bernadette later recalled the first apparition in these words  She smiled and smiled at me, beckoning me to come closer as though she were my mother, and she gave me to understand in my soul that I was not mistaken. One of the factors which began to convince the people of Lourdes about the apparitions was the sudden transformation that would come over Bernadette's face when she saw the Lady. The visionary was transfigured and a smile transformed her appearance in a remarkable way. This was a reflection of the one which she saw before her proceeding from Mary. What does this simple thing tell us about the Mary of Catholic imagination?

The smile reassured Bernadette who was frightened. It proceeded from the kindness of the Lady. The perfection which Catholics seek in their lives begins with kindness, the kindness they receive from Jesus who died for them and calls them to Salvation, the kindness which should overflow from them casting its light upon all who surround them. In Mary they see that quality, it has flowed from Jesus to her and she mirrors it, it flows from the faithful to her in earnest desire and she reflects that also and it is not two types of kindness but one. The smile is a product too of happiness. Who can be happier than the one who is closest of all to Jesus, who loves Him with a perfect love and is sure that she is loved in return? Mary's life had more than its share of sorrow, the exile in Egypt, losing her Son in the Temple, seeing the hatred and envy His mission provoked, sharing in the agony of His Passion and Death yet that underlying solid happiness never vanished and never could vanish, founded as it was in the strongest of loves. The faithful too know sorrow and loss and they too love Jesus. Mary reflects the love she has received from above and she reflects also the earnest desire of the faithful to share in that love and they are not two loves but one which intersect in her slender graceful figure. A smile shared is more than a smile doubled. Our Lady of Lourdes shared her smile with Bernadette who smiled in return, it was an act of companionship, of friendship of sharing it established a unity. The smile of Mary is a reflection of her union with Jesus her Son and it is a reflection too of the earnest desire of the faithful to be united through Mary with Jesus. And union always means one.

The Jubilee prayer reminds us that our Lady chose Bernadette. This is no small thing. When the Saint was asked why she thought she had been singled out she replied "if she could have found some one poorer and more ignorant, then she would have chosen them instead." The history of Marian visionaries shows that our Lady has a predilection for the poor, the humble, the discarded and despised. In Bernadette she found possibly the least regarded girl in Lourdes and gave her a gift that the Empress of France would have envied. This is what you would expect from the woman who sang the Magnificat
He has put down the mighty from their thrones,
and has exalted the lowly.
He has filled the hungry with good things,
and the rich He has sent away empty.       
Here there is no doubt that the Mary of the Gospels and the Mary of the Church are one and the same. Here too we see that, as the prayer says she is the dwelling place of the Holy Spirit the same Spirit which inspired the Canticle of Mary inspires her choice of little Bernadette Soubirous. In this preferential option for the poor our Lady is a reflection of the Divine preference and she is a mirror of the desire of the faithful poor to be included in the Kingdom and these two are one, the desire to save and the desire to be saved which intersect in the person of Mary.

It is of significance that not only did Mary choose the poor despised one but that she treated her with a tender courtesy. At their third encounter Bernadette reported that our Lady said Would you have the graciousness to come here for fifteen days? This is the august Queen of Heaven, the Mother of God speaking to a girl that lived in a disused prison cell considered unfit for prisoners but suitable for the Soubirous family. Mary spoke as to an equal for in the young Saint she recognised one for whom her Son had willingly become incarnated and suffered the ignominy of the Cross. More than that in making a request and not issuing a command our Lady reflected perfectly the respect that God has for human freedom. And in coming to Lourdes she reflected also what the response of the faithful to the requests of God looks like. The Mary of the Gospels who said Behold the handmaid of the Lord is the same as the Mary of the faithful who comes to do the work of the Lord in the midst of His people.

In saying  you are the star of the morning, the gate of Heaven the prayer recalls to our minds that the name that the Lady of Lourdes called herself by was this- 'I am the Immaculate Conception.' The first light that hinted at the coming of the Son who would dispel all darkness was that moment when Mary was conceived in the womb of Saint Ann. For the first time since Eve a human person entered into life who was not under the dominion of sin. When the faithful look upon Mary they see reflected their own earnest desire for liberation because in Mary they see a mirror which shows that freedom from darkness which our Lady shared with Jesus because of Jesus. And the freedom desired is not a different freedom  from the freedom achieved they are the same thing viewed from different angles.

In describing Mary as the first resurrected creature the prayer recalls that our Lady is the pioneer that shows us the destiny of all the faithful, to follow Jesus body souls and spirit into the joy of the new heaven and the new earth. She is the mirror in which we see the gifts that God showers abundantly upon His beloved ones and she is the mirror in which the faithful see that life which they so earnestly desire to enter in upon and the two things are one.

I could go on, the Apparitions reveal so much more about prayer, sorrow for sin, love of the Church and many other things besides. But I have wearied you enough and, I hope, made my point too. The Mirror of Divine Perfections and the Mirror of the Catholic imagination reflects the same things because they come from the same source. It is the work of the Holy Spirit who creates in the faithful what I have been calling imagination and what you might equally call the Catholic faith. There are those who think that the word 'imagination' means 'making stuff up' or 'fantasising' but that does not exhaust the possibilities of the word. The active imagination may do these things but there is a passive imagination also. This receives impressions and works them into forms which are understandable to the mind by blending different elements each of which is real. We see an example of this in the parables of our Lord who took truths and wove out of them striking images which inhabit the mind and heart and make those truths live in a way that bare sermonising never would.

The Mary of the Gospels is real and identical with the Mary of the Church and with the Mary of the authentic visionaries. The Catholic imagination is no more than the act by which the faithful blends these different impressions as they come to them and form them into a unified picture. It does not create a new Mary it makes the one Mary present to us in a vivid way. Speculative theologians take concepts derived from revelation and distil them down to ideas which the combine to create dogmatic statements or doctrinal propositions. Speculative theology is the imagination of the intellect, devotion to Mary is the theology of the heart. Theologians and popular sentiment can sometimes err by making over extravagant claims or by failing to give all that is due to the Mother of God. In both cases the error can be corrected through submitting to the judgement of the Church which has been granted the authority and given the guidance to be wise with a spiritual wisdom in such matters.

A final word about the apparent contrast between the Catholic Mary and the Mary of the Gospels. Critics constantly make the error of confusing the titles with the person. They see our Lady referred to as Queen of Heaven, Queen of the Angels, Refuge of Sinners, Mediatrix of All Graces, Help of Christians, Mother of Mercy, our life, our sweetness, our hope and so on. They actively imagine that we attribute to the person who holds such titles all that they would imply upon earth of pride and inaccessible splendour. But Catholics see no contrast between the most glorious creature in God's creation being at the same time the humble young Nazarene maiden and also the kindly figure who smiled so sympathetically and encouragingly at little Bernadette. Mary is not her titles, they do not alter her but she, because she is in truth the Mirror of Perfection alters instead our understanding of what it means to be queenly, to be honoured, to have power. It is not imagination but truth which tells us that it is only humility and love which enables a person to fulfil their purpose as a person and Mary as Queen and as the young mother in flight to Egypt is never anything other than the perfect image of love and humility.

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The Case of the Forgetful Saint

And it shall come to pass after this, that I will pour out my spirit upon all flesh: and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy: your old men shall dream dreams, and your young men shall see visions.  Moreover upon my servants and handmaids in those days I will pour forth my spirit.
Joel 2:28-29

About 20 years or so ago when I was a new Catholic I was more than slightly sceptical about the various stories or legends surrounding many Saints. In particular the miracles and visions which were directly or indirectly associated with them seemed to me for the most part far fetched. This week I have been reading Blessed John Henry Newman's Essays On Miracles and it recalls to my mind how and why my attitude began to change. I haven't yet finished the essays but Newman has made one salient point about the different attitudes towards miracles associated with the Church (Ecclesiastical miracles) which have been expressed on the one hand by Christians of the Reformation traditions (often called Protestants) and on the other by Catholic Christians. Protestants accept the miracles which are recorded in the Scriptures but for the most part deny those associated with the Church in subsequent eras. Catholics not only accept the miracles in the Bible but also believe that in some way the miraculous will always be associated with the Church without denying that in many cases reported miracles are merely legendary or susceptible to non-miraculous explanations. Newman makes the point that the determining factor for belief in this or that miracle is not the evidence adduced for it but the attitude towards the Church which one takes as a starting point.

Protestants do not deny that God may well have worked miracles in this world  since the age of the Apostles. What they deny is that He associates the Church in any special way with this work of His. Indeed, insofar as miracles tend to confirm Catholic doctrines which Protestants reject, such as the invocation of Saints or the special honour accorded to the Blessed Virgin Mary, they must either be spurious or the work of the devil. Miracles are, they suppose, no more common among Catholics than they are among pagans or idolaters. Catholics, on the other hand, would argue that Jesus promised that special powers, particularly healing of the sick and exorcism would always be present with the Church, and that we would anticipate from prophecies like that of Joel that visionaries also would ever be associated with Catholicism. Each person then will evaluate the evidence presented to them in each particular case through the lens of their a priori expectations. Still more of course does this apply to those who deny any Divine agency at all who will simply decline to examine the evidence on the basis that their assumption tells them it must always and everywhere be false or misleading.

Thus far Newman. I think in one way, which I shall come back to, his argument is ultimately decisive but, as it happens, my path towards accepting the reality of a good many reported Ecclesiastical miracles and visions proceeded less from my attitude towards the Church as such and more from the forgetfulness of St Bernadette of Lourdes. Her story is well known to many Catholics but for the benefit of those who are not familiar with it I shall speed-narrate my way through the most important points. In 1858 a poor, sickly and largely uneducated teenage girl, Bernadette Soubirous, reported seeing visions of a beautiful young woman in a small cave (grotto) near her home in Lourdes, a town in the French Pyrenees. On one occasion following the directions of the apparition Bernadette uncovered a spring which was previously unknown to her. On another when asked her name the young woman replied in the local dialect "que soy era Immaculada Councepciou" meaning "I am the Immaculate Conception" a title which the Church had only a few years previously definitively ascribed to Mary the mother of Jesus although, again, it was previously unknown to Bernadette. From within a few hours of its discovery the spring had become associated with inexplicable cures of diseases, taking this together with the honour in which the Catholic world held and holds the Virgin Mary Lourdes very quickly became a major pilgrimage centre. Today, indeed, it receives about seven million pilgrims a year. In the meantime Bernadette ceased having visions after a few short months and subsequently she became a nun in Nevers a French town some hundreds of miles from Lourdes where she died aged 35 in 1879.

I first became interested in our Saint in about 2000 when I heard the book Lourdes. Body and Spirit in the Secular Age by Ruth Harris being read. One of the threads running through it is the way that Bernadette moves from her brief role centre-stage ever more into the shadows symbolised by her departure to distant Nevers and her early death. There is an air of sadness about this, somewhat reminiscent of John the Baptist's comment about Jesus He must increase, but I must decrease. (John 3:30) This admittedly is a sentimental response which perhaps deserves the rebuke which our Lord gave to St Peter thou savourest not the things that are of God, but the things that are of men (Matthew 16:23) since there is no indication that either the Baptist or our Saint were ever less than joyful at the attention paid, respectively to our Lord or our Lady of Lourdes. Sentimental or not I became interested in Bernadette and subsequently read the scholarly biography by Therese Taylor Bernadette of Lourdes: her life, death and visions It is important, I think, to emphasise that this was an academic exercise and not a hagiography because it has some bearing on what follows.

Apart from my sympathy for the young visionary I approached her story with a number of other pre-conceptions. Firstly, as a Christian I accepted in principle that it was possible that from time to time God does intervene in human history via, among other means, miracles and visions sent by Him. Secondly, I did not feel at all obliged to accept that He actually had done on any particular occasion since the heroic age of the Church. I had, moreover, a frankly elitist approach approach to Lourdes specifically; thinking that the pilgrims and believers in our Lady of Lourdes tended to be either poorly educated or especially credulous or both. As I became immersed in the life of the young visionary I was very forcibly struck by the girl's character. Bernadette was a transparently honest and straightforward person. She was possessed of a lively sense of humour but not of an equally lively imagination. It is important to note that time and again after she had started encountering the apparition she refused, often indignantly, offers of money or other material benefits for herself or her family which poured in to her. At one point her brother ran a stall selling holy memorabilia, a lucrative occupation shared then and now by many Lourdais, and Bernadette absolutely forbade him to operate on a Sunday thus significantly reducing the profitability of the operation. Thus, there could be no reason to suppose that she invented the story in order to profit from it.

Sister Marie Bernard, as she became in the convent, was one of the most examined and prodded about women in France at one point. The unanimous conclusion of all who examined her was that she was of sound mind. no symptoms of mental illness or a propensity to hallucination was ever discovered in her. So there could be no reason to suppose that mental unbalance had led to her to report her visions which were confined to a few weeks of one year of her life. Both in Lourdes and at Nevers she was frequently sought out as the seer of the Mother of God, a distinction which plainly irritated her and which she developed considerable skills in avoiding. So there could be no reason to suppose that a desire for notoriety had prompted her to report her experiences. On the basis of all the evidence about her character the only reasonable conclusion to which a person could come, in my opinion, is that she saw something which nobody else could see and then she reported as honestly as possible what she had seen. The question which remains is did she report accurately or did she cast into a form acceptable to her culture and religion a phenomenon which was not exactly as she described it? Therese Taylor makes the point that in the Pyrenean region there are a number of shrines to our Lady and stories circulating about her appearances which contains many similar elements to those described by Bernadette, a grotto, a spring, miraculous healings and so on. Our Saint's subconsciousness may have processed this material and combined it with whatever phenomenon it was that she saw to produce the story which so electrified Catholic France and scandalised secular France.

This naturalistic explanation is not only plausible but, I suspect, for atheists and hard core anti-Catholics the only possible narrative account if you discount the possibility of Bernadette being a liar or in some way mentally ill. Against it though stands the collateral evidence independent of Bernadette herself, by which I mean the inexplicable cures associated with the spring and the shrine of the grotto. From the beginning doctors, including robust sceptics were all over these claims like a rash and some of them can be discounted as of doubtful veracity or purely psychosomatic. there remains though a definite residuum of purely physical diseases which have been cured immediately. These the rationalists account for by saying either that science cannot explain them yet but one day it will be able to, which is a faith statement if ever I heard one, or that they exhibit a syndrome known as 'spontaneous remission' which is a fancy way of saying 'miraculous.' The combination of Bernadette's testimony and the related emergence of inexplicable cures mutually reinforce each other and lend weight to the likelihood that the Mother of God really did appear to that little girl in Lourdes.

The datum which finally convinced me, however, was the drama of the last few weeks and months of the life of Sister Marie Bernard. From her youth Bernadette had a very poor memory, she had been delayed in her progress through school and catechism classes as a result of this. As it became apparent that her life was soon to end she was constantly badgered by those who planned to write histories of the events and were desperate to get a full account of the story of the apparitions. Again and again she was questioned about them. This was not only a trial to her, as we can well imagine, but they added another dimension to her suffering. "My God", she said to her fellow nuns "what if I should forget?" With most people when they tell a story about their lives find that with each repetition the story grows longer and longer and more details, accurate or not, are added in. This is rarely an outright process of lying usually it is the simple effect of a normal human imagination dwelling upon a sequence of events which we place in the past. Elements that we think should be in it find their way in, things that we ought to have said it turns out that we did say and so on. With Bernadette though her story got shorter and shorter as she just forgot details and was unwilling to fill in the gaps in her memory with any old thing. The concessions she made to her forgetfulness by simply saying "I don't remember" seem to me to be the hallmarks of an honest person trying as hard as possible to recall an actual event and preferring to be thought of as stupid rather than say anything about it which she could not remember.

So, taken together accepting the possibility of a Divine Agency at work in the world,  the character (and memory) of the witness or witnesses, and the existence of collateral evidence could serve to act as persuasive arguments in favour of any claim to the miraculous or the visionary. However, they may be a necessary basis but they are an insufficient one. Which brings us back to Newman's suggestion that our prior attitude to the Church plays a decisive role in the decision we come to about a claim. It is certain that if we look across the history of the world we will see a number of cases where witnesses are unimpeachable and collateral evidence of some kind exists but yet the visionaries or miracle workers say things which are mutually incompatible. For example Baha’u’llah a contemporary of Bernadette's and the founder of the Baha'i faith was clearly an honourable and noble man who reported seeing visions and of whom it was reported that he performed miracles. Yet, despite Baha'i claims to the contrary, his religion is radically incompatible with the Catholic faith. We need therefore a standard by which to judge such things. The Scriptures say believe not every spirit, but try the spirits if they be of God (1 John 4:1) And the highest possible standard by which to judge anything is Jesus, His person and His revelation. Any purported vision or miracle which is compatible with that standard may be worthy of belief (though the Church compels no one to accept any post-Apostolic revelation) and any which is not so compatible cannot be accepted. This implies no dishonesty on the part of visionaries nor even necessarily denies the presence of Divine agency, it merely supposes that at the least they have misunderstood the significance of what they have seen and heard. And the only sure custodian of that revelation is that body to which it was made, the Apostles and their successors, that is to say the Bishops of the Catholic Church united around the See of St Peter the Prince of Apostles and his successor the Bishop of Rome.


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A Gentle and Peaceful Spirit

3 Your adornment should be not an exterior one, consisting of braided hair or gold jewellery or fine clothing,

4 but the interior disposition of the heart, consisting in the imperishable quality of a gentle and peaceful spirit, so precious in the sight of God.

1 Peter 3

This comes from the advice that St Peter gives to Christian wives. If I was offering a literal response to the passage then I would be obliged to explain it, if I were a Conservative, or explain it away, if I were a Liberal. Since I am responding to it at a spiritual level then I can cheerfully ignore these vexed questions altogether. I have, I think, some warrant for doing so. Ancient Christian tradition has characterised a number of things as feminine. The soul of each believer, male or female, is referred to as 'she' with the notion that the soul is a bride to the bridegroom Jesus. The Church too is often referred to in similar terms. Scripture itself characterises Wisdom as a woman (Proverbs 8) And, of necessity, Mary the Mother of God is a woman. So it is reasonable to suppose that these words from the Prince of Apostles have universal applicability.

The central point of the passage is, I would suggest, to be found in the words  the imperishable quality of a gentle and peaceful spirit . These qualities are the leaven which leavens the whole disposition of the Christian heart which is adorned by them. It is an interior beauty which bears fruit not only in the relationship between a person and their God but also in the outward actions of that person-
 The good person out of the good treasure of the heart produces good
Luke 6

A peaceful spirit is not only one that is peaceable and at peace she is also peace itself. She manifests her peaceableness through deeds and words. A soft answer turns away wrath, but a harsh word stirs up anger (Proverbs 15) Where voices are raised she speaks softly, where tempers are hot she is cool, when demands are insistent she is undemanding. She serves peace before she serves herself. She is at peace because wherever she is and whatever she is doing she has within herself what St Catherine of Siena called the interior cell into which she can retire at will. Catherine suggested that the advice of Jesus would be this  “Dearest children, if you wish to discover and experience the effects of My will, dwell within the cell of your soul”  (Letter 41) A heart which communes with Jesus as with a friend cannot but be serene and still and at peace.

When asked by St Bernadette what her name was our Lady of Lourdes replied I am the Immaculate Conception (Que soy era Immaculada Concepciou.)  She might have said 'I am she who was immaculately conceived' but she did not. This suggests that there was such an inextricable link between herself as a person and the phenomenon of the Immaculate Conception that the two could be identified as one. When I say that a peaceful spirit is peace itself I am suggesting a similar identity between the spirit and the phenomenon. This would be hyperbole if we were merely to consider the spirit of a person as being both unique to them and wholly independent (autonomous in the favoured word of our era.) But we cannot so consider a person. Unique, yes certainly. Wholly independent, no, never. A person is always in bondage either to their desires in this world or to the transcendent love who is ever present in all worlds and times. And she who casts herself unreservedly as a bride into her beloved Divine Bridegroom's arms becomes one person with Him. As He is peace itself in His essence she becomes peace itself through participation in Him. As St John of the Cross put it-
 the soul seems to be God rather than a soul, and is indeed God by participation; although it is true that its natural being, though thus transformed, is as distinct from the Being of God as it was before.  
Ascent of Mount Carmel

A gentle spirit is not only gentle in what she does but she is gentling and also gentleness itself. Gentleness is a thing of delicacy. It is a light touch, it allows another person to be themselves yet offers them the strong external support which they need to be just that. In some ways it is a quality easier to define by what it is not. It is not harsh, or authoritarian or cruelly judgemental. It is the softest of the human qualities and requires great strength to be lived out. The gentling qualities of the gentle spirit may have been at the forefront of St Peters mind when he recommended this as the path for Christian wives to convert pagan husbands. However that might be it is a spirit which has an effect on all those whom it encounters. One effect on the hard and the obdurate is that they seek to bully and dominate all the more, they mistake gentleness for weakness. In this they display not only their wickedness but their lack of wisdom. The reed may bend but she does not break.

Imperishable quality. The longer I have been ill the more I have come to see the difference between that which perishes and that which does not. Even those without a belief in God, or specifically the God of the Christians, may see that while our insignificant human lives might come and go peace and gentleness remain forever as qualities which lie at the heart of what it means to be a good man, a good woman, to be goodness itself. The things which pass away are spasms, the passions of anger, envy, spite, lust and so on. That which endures, the kindnesses we remember, the heroes who have captured our hearts, is founded not on passion but upon values which flow from the steadfast spirits of gentleness and peace. Where the fruit is tranquility the tree on which it grows is the true Tree of Life.

Over the years I have read many (too many?) spiritual books, articles and guides. One feature they often have in common is that they spend a lot of time describing in glowing terms the beauty of the destination and very little time giving you practical advice on how to get there. Now I am writing I begin to see why that might be. The destination is not a place, it is a relationship. We are all different, unique as I said earlier. How can I say what the best way for you, the unique and only you, might be to enjoy the closest possible relationship with the One who made you to be what you are? It might help if I told you what works for me you say. Well, it would be presumptuous to say that anything has worked for me. I have done so much that is foolish and wrong, I have lived so long in darkness. Tomorrow might see me, for all I know, plunged into ever deeper darkness, ever more culpable follies. Besides, it has often been borne upon me, sometimes painfully so, that I am not like other people. I am odd, although the word 'weird' has been used with rather more frequency. So my guidance might be worth less than nothing.

I will, notwithstanding, make a recommendation. I do so not because I place any confidence in my own judgement, I am not at least that foolish, but in the judgement of those great Saints before me who have made the same recommendation. It is towards the figure of Mary, the Virgin Mother of Jesus, that I look. She is the gentle and peaceful spirit par excellence. She, the Immaculate Conception, is so at one with her divine Son that she is Gentleness, she is Peace and she leads us to Him and points us towards Him, and pleads for us with Him and for Him with us. Invite Mary into your heart and you will be invaded by peace, occupied by gentleness. She will lift you up from this perishing world and place you into the embrace of the imperishable and Divine  Bridegroom.


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Mercy Surrounds You

Psalm 23

Walk through the shadowed

Valley without fearing death

Mercy surrounds you

Immaculate Heart

Protean love which
Adapts its beautiful self
To meet every need

Hibiscus blossom 
Pointing up, towards the light
Seasonal flourish

Delicate blossom

Jade clusters swaying in breeze

Soft colours soothe sight.

Brooding sky, black wings

Extended, threatening all.

Starlings build their nests.

Lourdes

Underground streamlet

Coursing clear, through living rock.

Springs into the light

Immaculate Mary

Saturated with

Love, as grass with morning dew

Mary's gentle heart

2 Timothy 4:6,7

Near at hand is the

Time of my dissolution 

I have kept the faith

Feast of the Transfiguration

Briefly the veiling 

Flesh is transfigured by light.

For eyes that can see.

Proverbs 8/9:35,36

Who finds Me finds Life

All those who hate me love death

Hurting their own souls

Psalms 149:2

Let the children of

Zion be joyful in their King.

Loving hearts rejoice

Eyes

Windows of the soul

Expressive eyes. See farthest

When looking inward

Rusty leaves falling

In slow light russet showers.

Sun's dappled shadows.

The year fades away

Tints become rich, colours deep

Swallows flee sunward 

Slowly rotating

In a downward fluttering

Autumn's herald leaves

Harshly croaking Crow,

Sits funereally clad, 

Waits for carrion

Feather-like fingers

Of cloud across morning sky.

Pointing to the dawn

Enjoy the failing

Light, delight in passing scenes

Dwell in what endures

 More of my haiku can be seen on +stevhep on google+ and @stevhep on Twitter

Girl Power

When I was in the monastery I wrote a number of reflections on passages from the Gospels. This is what I wrote about Luke 20:1-8

1One day, as he was teaching the people in the temple and telling the good news, the chief priests and the scribes came with the elders2and said to him, "Tell us, by what authority are you doing these things? Who is it who gave you this authority?"3He answered them, "I will also ask you a question, and you tell me:4Did the baptism of John come from heaven, or was it of human origin?"5They discussed it with one another, saying, "If we say, "From heaven,' he will say, "Why did you not believe him?'6But if we say, "Of human origin,' all the people will stone us; for they are convinced that John was a prophet."7So they answered that they did not know where it came from.8Then Jesus said to them, "Neither will I tell you by what authority I am doing these things."
Back in the Middle Ages the inhabitants of Italian city-state Siena coined a brand new word to describe a strange phenomena that was happening in their town. Many talented, highly educated and extremely intelligent men; priests, friars, hospital administrators and others were putting promising careers on hold. Instead they were sitting at the feet of a frail illiterate young woman called Catherine Benincasa, a dyers daughter, and being taught by her. It wasn't only locals either. Many came from much further afield. Some professors and doctors of theology visited the city for the sole purpose of exposing the girl as some sort of hysterical fraud. Having heard young Ms Benincasa, or St Catherine of Siena as she is now known, they instead abandoned all their property and possessions in order to follow the poor Christ. In the local parlance they had been becatherined.

The new word had more than a hint of an old word, bewitched, about it but there could not be two more widely different phenomena. One has had been bewitched finds themselves unwillingly under the influence and power of another, through the manipulation of the lower spirits of the air. One is becatherined when one joyfully recognises the Holy Spirit of God himself at work in the person one is encountering. Then one willingly and gladly hears such a charismatic (i.e. a gifted person) because through such a person one can discern Gods will for us is today.

In the following century there was an even more spectacular example of becatherining to be seen in the life life and career of the teenage charismatic Joan of Arc. First of all she becatherined the French heah of state into putting her in charge of his army. Next she becatherined the officers and soldiers into obeying her orders, often against their own better judgement. The result was a series of victories which set in motion a process that led to the liberation of France from her wicked foreign oppressors (the English). Even in this modern world of gender equality it is rare to find seventeen year old girl generals, in Medieval Europe it was unique. The epoch is also known as "the Age of Belief" and here at least we can see why. Medieval Europeans knew that Gad still acted directly in the lives of his children and they were often willing to stake everything they had in the belief that they had discerned his presence among them.

The subsequent career path of Joan, she was burnt at the stake for witchcraft (there's that W word again), shows some of the limits of becatherining. Many people, often the most outwardly 'religious', will fiercely resist being becatherined because it forces them to change their own definition of what 'religious' means. Which may explain why it was priests who brought about the condemnation and execution of St Joan. All of which brings us, rather neatly, on to the figure of John the Baptist whose becatherining actions Jesus asked the chief priests and scribes about.

John had been very successful in his mission to becatherine the ordinary folk of Judea, Jerusalem and beyond but the official religious establishment had been, on the whole, much less impressed. The counter question that Jesus posed in the Temple was not some random piece of repartee plucked out of the air to confuse his opponents. It went to the very heart of his own mission. Merely by hesitating at all the scribes implicitly conceded that there was, after all, a legitimate source of authority independent of Temple, priest and scribe. The history of Israel and their sacred scriptures, beginning with the Law of Moses all testified to the authority of the inpired prophets of God. They could not then deny the possibility that prophets had again risen in Israel without also denying the very religion they professed to be guardians of. The problem is that in every age religious authorities are focussed, quite properly, in running a tight ship while prophets aim at rocking the boat. The two do not always get on well together.

Just before leaving the Baptist behind we should note another variant on a theme, the semi-becatherine. John was a prisoner of Herod who "feared John knowing that he was a righteous and holy man" (Mark 6:20). "When he heard him he was greatly perplexed and yet he liked to listen to him". The semi-becatherined are those who know that God is speaking to them but are afraid to act on what they know to be true. It is an unstable condition, faced with pressure from his wife Herodias and the bewitching charms of her daughter Salome, Herod had the Baptist beheaded.

The reason why the opponents of Jesus were bound to accept the arguments in favour of heeding charismatic voices was because they took their stand on the Law of Moses, itself named after the most influential charismatic leader in Jewish history. And he had received a mission statement from the Almighty which all subsequent becatheriners could lay claim to. "I have made thee a God to Pharaoh" (Exodus 7:1 KJV). Which sounds quite extreme but Jesus himself confirmed and made explicit this becatherining charter "it is not you who speak but the Spirit of your Father speaking through you" (Mark 10:19). So once it is granted that the person who is speaking is a genuine charismatic then it is also granted that it is not them that is being heard but the Creator of all that is, seen and unseen.

The Law itself foretold that one day a prophet would arise in Israel who would be as great as Moses himself (Deuteronomy 18:15-19). If therefore the chief priests and scribes had said "only if you have authority vested in you by ourselves or some other recognised human institution like the Rabbinic schools can you legitimately act in this manner" then they would have been explicitly denying the very scriptures they claimed to be defending. A similar kind of situation involving yet another girl charismatic occurred in the nineteenth century. The girl, a poor frail teenager, reported seeing visions of an extraordinarily beautiful woman near her home town. Although many common folk received her story gladly the authorities and the priests called her a "little liar" and tried to stop her reporting these things. What the priests, unlike the state police, could not do was deny the possibility the the girl might just possibly be telling the truth. Like those in the Temple nearly two thousand years earlier they also believed that God spoke the truth when he said "I will pour out my spirit on all flesh; your sons and daughters shall prophesy.Your old men shall dream dreams and your young men will see visions. Even on the male and female slaves, in those days, I will pour out my spirit"(Joel 2:28,29). The way the rest of the situation subsequently played out showed that, perhaps, they were premature to accuse St Bernadette of Lourdes of lying.

It is a fact, common to both the old religion of the Jews and the new one of the Christians, that God has, as it were, built in with the bricks of his revelation the concept of his Spirit at being at work-teaching, commanding, consoling. And so if a teacher or visionary arises in any generation of the People of God, becatherining here and becatherining there then the religious authorities of the day are unable to say outright "it is against our Law to do such things" because plainly it is not. Becatherining is a divinely instituted factor in the life of Gods people and always has been. All that the establishment can do is "test the spirits to see that they are from God" (1 John 4:1). By that test, in the time of the Gospels Jesus could not be faulted which is why his opponents could only produce false witnesses against him at his trial (Matthew 26:60).

There are a couple of features about charismatic authority worth highlighting at this point. One is that it can be exercised in ways apart from the spoken word. Our Lord hinted at this by asking his question about John's baptism rather than about John's preaching. It is quite common, in fact, to becatherine by actions, deeds, instead of, or as a companion to, words. St Francis of Assisi, who single handedly becatherined thousands of young men into becoming vagrants for Christ, is reputed to have said "preach the Gospel at all times, if absolutely necessary use words as well." Books are another becatherining tool. Many people have decided to change their lives after reading classics like "Pilgrims Progress", St Augustine's "Confessions" or "The Cross and the Switchblade". Little did they realise that they had been becatherined. Ms Benincasa herself wrote, or rather dictated, a book now known as "The Dialogues of St Catherine of Siena" and still today, seven hundred years later, people reading it find themselves like their medieval predecessors literally and metaphorically becatherined.

Another characteristic feature of charismatics is that they often precede their mission with a period, long or short, of of withdrawal from the world, fasting and prayer. John the Baptist lived long years in the wilderness until he appeared before Israel (Luke 1:80). Jesus spent 40 days in the desert without food (Mark 1:12,13). The compulsive becatheriner by letter St Paul was three years in Arabia before setting of on his travels. St Catherine herself also took three years although in her bedroom rather than in a desert. Many other teenagers have spent similar amounts of time in their bedrooms thus demonstrating that this conduct does not inevitably lead to sainthood. The very first Israelite, Jacob, did it all in a single night. He sent everybody he loved and everything he possessed away and then, as it were, naked spent the night wrestling with an angel. After it was done he received a new name, Israel, and was told "you have striven with God and with humans and have prevailed" (Genesis 32:22-28). Then he went of to becatherine his warlike brother Esau.

Possibly the most dramatic of becatherining episodes in scripture is that involving the normally shy girl charismatic Esther. The Book of Esther has come down to us in two forms, one originally Greek and one originally Hebrew. It is the Greek version that has the drama and the beauty of Esthers exploits most clearly displayed. Unfortunately because of an argument between Christian hundreds of years ago some Bibles only contain the Hebrew version. The classic King James Version (KJV) of the Bible contains the Greek parts under the title "the rest of the chapters of the Book of Esther" and uses vivid language of great power in translating them into English. One can only feel sad that despite the intentions of the original translators and indeed the wise King James himself so few modern editions of the KJV contain these chapters. Still they are there to be found if you search diligently enough.

Briefly the becatherining build-up is as follows. Esther, the favourite wife of the very bad tempered (and sexist) King Artaxerxes, is Jewish but prudently keeps quiet about it in the huge royal palace. The King's chief adviser Haman (or Aman) hates Jews and persuades Artaxerxes to put his name to an edict which will bring about a general massacre of Jewish people in his kingdom on a particular date. Esthers uncle Mordecai (or Mardocheus) urges her to visit the King in order to change his mind and save the Jews from destruction. The plan would be straightforward but for the fact that it is against the law to appear before the King without first being summoned. To do so usually leads to a swift but unpleasant execution, yes, he really was that bad tempered,

Queen Esther then went into pre-becatherine mode. A period of fasting and prayer was now begun, She "laid away her glorious apparel, and put on the garments of anguish and mourning: and instead of precious ointments, she covered her head with ashes and dung" (Esther 14:2) Not a girl who did things by halves obviously. While praying Esther specifically asked for the becatherining charism "Give me eloquent speech in my mouth before the lion: turn his heart to hate him that fighteth against us" (Esther 14:13)

Following those days of agony, alone before God, the Queen then spruced herself up being "gloriously adorned" as befits a beautiful talented young lady of Royal status. Looking cheerful but feeling absolutely dreadful she set of for her encounter with Artaxerxes. Very briefly scripture records "having passed through all the doors, she stood before the king" (Esther 15:6). It is worth pausing and putting yourself in Esthers, no doubt glamorous, shoes for a moment. Artaxerxes ruled over a mighty empire and had a palace to match. It was a very, very long walk from the woman's quarters to the audience chamber. As befitting a Queen Esther had two servants with her and still other servants would be required to open each door as she came to it. Door after door after door. Esther, remember, believed that she was going to meet almsot certain death and yet all along that terrible journey she maintained a cheerful countenance and a queenly manner to suit her "glorious apparel". What she did that day displayed greater courage than many a soldier advancing under enemy fire has been required to show.

The moment of truth "Then lifting up his countenance that shone with majesty, he looked very fiercely upon her"(Esther 15:7a). Providence decreed then that Esther was to work her becatherining by deed rather than word; and by the very deed that came most naturally to her under the circumstances "the queen fell down, and was pale, and fainted"(Esther 15:7b). "Then God changed the spirit of the king into mildness" (Esther 15:8). "The king said to her, "What is it, Queen Esther? What is your request? It shall be given you, even to the half of my kingdom."" (Esther 5:3). And, as the Jewish feast of Purim still to this day records, Esther saved the day for the Jews.

Words do not appear in scripture by accident. Many centuries after Artaxerxes another monarch promised the dancing girl Salome "Whatever you ask me I will give you, even half my kingdom". Herod's promise to a sensuous woman led to the execution of a charismatic man of prayer. Artaxerxes promise to a virtuous charismatic woman led to a whole people escaping from execution. There is a meaning and purpose behind these not quite parallel situations which repays meditating upon.

The question asked of Jesus was "by what authority"? Those asking it believed that as custodians of established religion they had God for their authority. Nor were they entirely wrong as the Lord said on another occasion. "the scribes and the Pharisees sit in Moses seat therefore do whatever they teach and follow it"(Matthew 23:2,3). On the other hand Jesus by his divine Sonship and the power of the Holy Spirit certainly had the authority of the living God for his words and actions. Then as now there was a constant tension in the People of God between being stewards of his historical self-revelation recorded in scriptures and his dynamic intervention into the affairs of today through charismatic agents. A prominent Italian Christian recently put it like this "There can, then, be no real opposition or conflict between the invisible mission of the Holy Spirit and the juridical commission of Ruler and Teacher received from Christ, since they mutually complement and perfect each other -- as do the body and soul in man -- and proceed from our one Redeemer "(Mystici Corporis Christi 65)

One of the signs of a genuine charismatic is that she (or sometime he) never contradicts the the revealed truth although they often force us to focus on those elements of it that make us feel most uncomfortable. The reason why they rock the boat is that it is the most potent way of getting Gods people to re-balance the cargo in the hold. Wise religious leaders recognise this. In her day Catherine of Siena wrote a stream of letters to the reigning Popes. In those letters she frankly bullied and hectored them demanding that they should act in particular ways. Whatever their other failings, and they had many, the Popes in question meekly accepted her letters and often sought to comply with her instructions. They, after all, were only Popes and Ms Benincasa was a becatheriner.