Art and Prayer

We would like to share the images of a few new icons that some of our sisters have 'written' during an Icon Course with Mihai Cucu at the end of August (see below), and this reflection by Pope Benedict XVI on Art, Beauty and Prayer.

"A work of art is a product of the creative capacity of the human being who in questioning visible reality, seeks to discover its deep meaning and to communicate it through the language of forms, colour and sound. Art is able to manifest and make visible the human need to surpass the visible, it expresses the thirst and the quest for the infinite.

In this antiphon the coming Messiah is given the title of Key of David. A key is used to open and close, to lock and unlock. How are we to use this key? The answer is found in this morning’s Gospel of the Annunciation.
As I have been sitting with this Gospel what stands out for me are all the emotions: the joy, fear and uncertainty, but above all, the excitement of the Angel Gabriel.

In a few minutes we will sing the second great ‘O’ antiphon in Latin, just before the Magnificat. The translation in our breviaries reads:

O Adonai, and leader of Israel, you appeared to Moses in a burning bush, and gave him the law on Sinai. O come and save us with your mighty power.

The first Advent ‘O Antiphon’, ‘O Wisdom’, is woven from the book of Wisdom of Sirach (24:3) and the book of Wisdom (8:1). The wisdom that has come from the mouth of the Most High is His Son, the eternal Word of God. As St. John of the Cross say, in this one Word that the Father spoke, there is hidden everything he had to say - all Divine Wisdom. According to it, he created the world, according to it, he rules it and saved it.

The Mass readings for this first Sunday of Advent provide us with a wake-up call: St Paul tells us “you must wake up now” and in the Gospel Jesus tells us to “stay awake!” while the Prophet Isaias invites us to “walk in the light of the Lord.” So as we begin a new Church year we are invited to come into the light – to remove the blinds from the windows of our hearts and to let the light shine in – remembering that the true Light is Jesus Himself. He is the True Light shining on us and who desires to penetrate and posses our inmost being.

In our preparation for the Feast of our Father St. Dominic we had an 8-Day Retreat with Fr. Vivian Boland O.P. who awoke in us a thirst for the Face of the Lord. On the Feast of the Transfiguration (6th August) we finished our Retreat with the blessing of new icons that some of our sisters had 'written' during an Icon Course with Mihai Cucu at the end of July.

We often hear the phrase ‘the war is being fought on two fronts.’ This is as true for the war in the Ukraine as it is for any previous war. But there is also a deeper sense in which this war is being fought on two fronts. There is a battle going on between light and darkness, between good and evil, between grace and sin. It has never been put any better than it was by St. James over 2000 years ago. “Where do all these battles between your selves begin? Is it not in your own hearts? Is it not your passions that are at war in your members?

In 1997, St. John Paul II chose the 2nd February, feast of the Presentation of the Child Jeus in the Temple as the World Day of Consecrated Life. In this way, the Holy Father wanted to create an opportunity for the whole Church to reflect more deeply on the gift of consecrated life being consecrated to God.

Referring to the gospel of the Presentation in the Temple I would like to highlight the sacrifice of the two pigeons, which Mary and Joseph made in the Temple to God for their firstborn Son. This sacrifice is very significant because the second of these pigeons was offered as a burnt offering to the Lord