Advent 2012

The Little Way

Advent begins with Mary
Dorothy Day reflects on Mary in Reflections During Advent, Part One, Searching for Christ

It is fitting to write about her in Advent, and I would like to tell in simple fashion about Mary in my life. WHEN I was a very little child, perhaps not more than six, I used to have recurrent nightmares of a great God, King of heaven and earth which encompassed all, stretched out over all of us in a most impersonal way, and with this nightmare came also a great noise like that made by a galloping horseman which increased in volume until the sound filled all the earth. It was a terrifying dream and when I called out, my mother used to come and sit by the bedside and hold my hand and talk to me until I fell asleep. That passed, and then a few years later I met a little girl by the name of Mary Harrington who told me about the Blessed Mother and a heaven people with saints, and this also was a great comfort to me. Years passed and I attended high school and college and then went to work for
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House News
The Rev. Dr. Colin Miller

We've now been at it for about four months at the new hospitality house, Maurin House. It's named after Peter Maurin, co-founder of the Catholic Worker movement and one of the great uncanonized saints of the last century. The new place is six bedrooms large and currently houses ten of us.

ing instead of cleaning the place themselves. All this amounted, to our surprise, to showing up with a houseful of furniture amidst an already fully furnished and fairly dirty house. But many hands made light work, and after a week or so and about three trips to the dump and a bunch of arguments about what we were not going to keep, we have a very livable space. The BishThe move was a bit challenging. We op consecrated a chapel right away had all the stuff from the old hospitali- (now Clare Chapel), and there are ty house and all the stuff that each of two kitchens plus a large front room us were bringing to the move. Because that serves as a refectory. The study is we were afraid we wouldn't have full of everyone's books and often enough furniture to fill such a large doubles as a bedroom when we run house, we gladly accepted when the out of space. outgoing tenants offered to leave a bunch of items they didn't want. They We keep a fairly regular routine, with also offered to give us $300 for clean- Morning and Evening Prayer at St.

Joseph's Episcopal Church on weekdays (followed by breakfast in the parish hall). The chapel at Maurin House is always open for prayer, and the Sacrament is reserved there for adoration. Each night there is Compline at 8:30pm. There is a Solemn Evensong every Sunday at 6pm. Often the room is overflowing with people as well as incense. We eat dinner together after Evening Prayer on Wednesdays, Fridays and Sundays. Besides the ten of us that live at Maurin House, there are always guests of all sorts and conditions. We are grateful for the opportunity to offer hospitality, as we entertain the angels among us. Please continue to keep us in your prayers!

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Mercy is our Vigil

Luke Wetzel

Over the last few years I have gone on a couple different monastic retreats at Trappist monasteries in South Carolina and Kentucky. The monks in these communities follow a rigorous daily schedule of prayer and work. They have seven daily prayer offices as well as the work of study, agriculture, cooking, maintenance, arts, and crafts. It is in the daily rhythm of work and especially prayer that the monks fit their souls for heaven. Most striking about their daily routine is its beginning at about 3:30 a.m. with the prayer office, Vigils. In the middle of the night they pray, and watch, for the return of Christ. They live in profound hope of Christs return and faith that because of their disciplined watching, they will see him. In the middle of the night when the world sleeps, the monks are awake singing their psalms and prayers, watching and waiting for Christs coming. At St. Josephs Episcopal Church and the Community of the Franciscan Way, we also pray the Daily Office. I usually manage to drag myself out of bed to pray Morning Prayer at the early hour of 7:30 a.m. Evening Prayer ends the working day at 5:30 p.m. Since there are so many now living together, 8:30 p.m. has us praying Compline in the Clare Chapel. This piety of prayer is very important to us. Day in and day out the psalms and prayers both express the deep desires of our hearts and seep into our bones. At least as important in the Franciscan and Catholic Worker piety (to which we are heirs) are the

works of mercy. We feed the hungry, clothe the naked, visit the sick and imprisoned because of our deep faith that we can personally meet Jesus Christ our Lord in the poor man or woman in need. Just as you did to the least of my family, the hungry, the thirsty, the sick, you did it to me, Jesus says.

die, seeking money for the funeral expenses and witnessing to their lives made invisible to the world by their destitution, because we know that God has numbered the hairs on our heads and will raise them up on the last day. All of that is to say that the

The works of mercy are a vital way in which we encounter Christ each day and likewise in which we watch and wait for his return. In the works of mercy we see glimpses of his kingdom that is to come. The works of mercy are signs. We have heard our Lord tell of the heavenly banquet where all people, but the poor especially, will be called in from the streets. And so five days a week we boil some eggs, stir up a big pot of grits, brew some coffee and throw open the doors of the parish hall. We have heard that the prison doors will be opened, and so we visit the jail, figuring we ought to get to know some of the people who live there before they are released. The scriptures tell us that suffering will be no more and so we visit the sick, seeking to be ready vessels for the balm of love. We even help bury people when they

better way to look for the coming reign of God than to lavishly give away the love that has been given to us through Jesus Christ. We watch and wait, not in the middle of the night when the world sleeps, but during the day when it goes zooming by. One day the poor man or woman who is Christ will be Christ for the last time and those caught up in mercy will be among the first caught up in the Lords return.

works of mercy are our Vigil. We know no

Like the monks who yearn to see their Lord come again into their lives of disciplined prayer and labor, I too have some hope that Christ will return in the midst of our labors. We will hear a sound like a trumpet outside the parish hall. A strange but familiar man will walk in the door. A deep peace will descend; all the pain, and weariness, and shame in the room will melt away. Someone will offer to scoop him some grits. He will smile. Ill see James, our homeless brother who died in April, sitting across the table from me. And we will all look up and everything will have changed.

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Go a little crazy on St. Francis Day

The Rev. Dr. Rhonda Mawhood Lee
...a sermon preached on the Feast of FrancisOct. 4, 2011

Why do we only take animals to church once a year? Aside from service animals, most churches only allow them into worship on the Feast of St. Francis of Assisi. Why is that? Its because bringing animals into church is crazy. Every year when they join us, chaos lurks just beneath the surface. We all wonder, will the dogs chase the cats, the cats chase the hamsters, and the birds and spiders scatter to the four directions? Or more accurately, when will all that happen? Celebrating St. Francis Day is risky, because theres no way to know in advance what the proportion of growling to wagging, and hissing to purring, will be. Human nature being what it is, thats true every Sunday. But celebrating the Feast of St. Francis with our companion animals makes us more aware of the fact that relationship always involves risk, and that the God who risked everything for us calls us into relationship anyway -- with him, and with all our fellow creatures, the infinitely varied works of the divine hands. Its appropriate to go a little crazy on St. Francis Day, because during his own lifetime, many people thought Francesco Bernardone was insane. They thought he was crazy in his 20s, when he stripped naked in the town square to renounce his inheritance in front of his parents, the bishop and the entire population of Assisi. And when he kissed and hugged lepers, cleaning their wounds with his ungloved hands. They thought he was crazy when he preached to the birds, calling them his little sisters and remarking that they paid better attention to the gospel than people did. And later, when he founded an order grounded in the belief that Jesus Christs disciples could live as their Lord had, owning nothing, begging for what they needed and trusting God to provide for them as he did for the birds, the fish and the lilies of the fields. People who had more possessions than they needed thought Francis was crazy because he refused to distinguish between the deserving and the undeserving poor. He gave to everyone who begged from him -- money or food if he had any, or a smile and a kind word if he had nothing else to offer. People who resented the rich couldnt understand why Francis wouldnt condemn their selfishness; instead, he asked his wealthy sisters and brothers simply to open their hearts to the Holy Spirits call and respond as their consciences commanded. Even though many of his contemporaries already venerated him as a saint, almost everything Francis did was interpreted by someone as a sign that he had lost his mind. Francis didnt argue with them. He openly admitted that he was a fool, but not just any kind of fool. He was fool enough to believe that Jesus actually meant his disciples to live as he had instructed. Sell what you own, and give the money to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; then come, follow me. Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you. Give to everyone who begs from you; and if anyone takes away your goods, do not ask for them again. If your brother or sister sins against you, forgive, not seven times, but seventy times seven times. Over 2,000 years, learned scholars have labored endlessly to explain away those teachings. The gallons of ink spilled and the forests of trees sacrificed in that effort constitute an ecological disaster in their own right. But Francis was no scholar. Not burdened by the responsibility to tame or tone down Jesus message, he was free to respond by letting his whole life embody the gospel. When, as a grown man, Francis experienced his conversion to a life of holy poverty, he became one of the infants Jesus mentions in Matthew 11: the people who know that the risen Christ is with us and will sustain us as we seek, together, to live as his body in the world. Francis latched onto that pure faith as firmly and single-mindedly as an infant latches onto the breast or bottle that is its only source of nourishment. And from that moment on, he lived a life of deep vulnerability and deep joy, unconstrained by any of the barriers human beings erect to make ourselves feel safe. The barriers between us and those who have less than we do, in whose presence we feel ashamed; between us and those who have more than we do, in whose presence we feel jealous; between us and those weve hurt; and between us and those who have done us harm. The barriers between human and nonhuman animals, whom we too often treat as objects, disregarding the fact that they have their own inner lives of which we understand very little; and between us and the rest of creation, which we try more often to control than to respect. Francis called his friends -- he calls us -- to stop trusting walls, physical and emotional, to keep us safe. Instead, he invites you and me to join him in a life of holy adventure, entrusting ourselves to the care of the one who entered this world as a helpless infant, who relied as an adult on the generosity of friends and strangers, who suffered torture and public execution -- and who rose again as the Lord of all creation. The Feast of St. Francis is a day to bless animals and to ask Gods forgiveness for our mistreatment of them and of the Earth, the home we share with them. And in celebration of our brother from Assisi, its also a day to bless children, a day to bless the poor, a day to bless our enemies, and a day to bless holy fools who are crazy enough to live as citizens of Gods kingdom in this life, not waiting for the next. Having lived his life that way, on his deathbed Francis offered his friends a final prayer: I have done what is mine. May Christ teach you what is yours to do.
Article originally published by Faith & Leadership, a leadership education offering of Duke Divinity School. Accessed 11/8/12: http://www.faithandleadership.com/sermons/rhonda-mawhood-lee-go-little-crazy-st-francis-day

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Advent begins with Mary continued from page 1

the Socialist and Communist movements in the early 20's. Nevertheless, I often dropped into churches. One winter when I was working in New Orleans and living across the street from the cathedral there I found great joy in attending Benediction. That Christmas a Communist friend gave me a rosary. "You were always dropping into the cathedral," she explained. I did not know how to say the prayers but I kept it by me A year or so later my friend, Peggy Cowley, as she was then, gave me a tiny statue of the Virgin, pale blue and white with hair like golden noodles and a gold wire halo around her head. Later, it was my own motherhood which finally brought me into the Church, the joy and thankfulness I felt at the birth of a child. I had to thank God. I felt the need of worship, so Sister Aloysia of the Sisters of Charity who lived at St. Joseph's by the Sea, on Staten Island, taught me my prayers and my catechism and I became a Catholic. I had known before, as I am sure many children do, the Our Father and the psalms as prayers and I had heard the canticles sung in the Episcopalian Church where I had been baptized at the age of 12. But the Hail Mary and the Salve Regina and the Memorare were new to me. Certainly it was the need to adore, to worship God that led me to religion. A sense of joy and thankfulness and exaltation made me want to raise my arms aloft to the sky and with my whole being praise the Lord God was our Father, so I could approach Him, daring to say, Our Father. But it was the readings of Jesus Christ in the New Testament that made me want to put off the old man and put on Christ, as St. Paul said. And who had given me our Lord but the Virgin Mary? Saying the rosary, I felt I was praying with the people of God, who held on to the physical act of the rosary as to a lifeline, a very present help in time of trouble. Franz Werfel said of an old woman that she held her beads as though she were knitting garments for the poor. I appreciated the physical aspects of prayer. All the senses of the body were engaged in the worship of the Church, the eyes through color and stained glass and statue and icon, rich vestments, jewels, sparkling lights, candles, the smell of incense and beeswax, the sound of music, psaltery and harp and all the other instruments listed, the taste through the reception of the Body of Christ in the Host and last of all, the touch through the fingering of the beads. "Pray without ceasing," St. Paul wrote, and here was one way to pray without ceasing. What if there was repetition and the mind wandered? It could always be drawn back through remembering the mysteries, the joyful, the sorrowful and the glorious. (I never think of the Visitation to Elizabeth without thinking of some pregnant woman who needs our prayers.) I have said rosaries on picket lines and in prisons, in sickness and in health in peace, working for peace, suffering for peace, and suffering in war, in times of joy and pain and terror, Mary has been Refuge of Sinners. Every day at the Catholic Worker Farm when we gather for meals we say the Angelus before asking God's blessing on us and the food we eat. And it rejoices me to hear all the men, who are in the majority, saying, "Behold the handmaid of the Lord, be it done unto me according to Thy Word," and repeating together that marvelous and yet terrible prayer, "Pour forth we beseech Thee, O Lord, Thy grace into our hearts, that we to whom the Incarnation of Christ was made known by the message of an angel, may by His passion and cross be brought to the glory of His resurrection." This Incarnation came about by Mary's consent, she "through whom we have received the author of life." So Advent must begin with Mary, who presents us with the infant Christ. "The flesh of Jesus is the flesh of Mary," St. Augustine wrote. "The Word was made flesh and dwelt among us." When I go to the crib this year I will think, as I always do, that we are not dependent on the governments of this world for our safety, but "the government will be upon His shoulder." This baby cradled in a manger, this boy talking to the doctors in the temple, this youth working with St. Joseph as carpenter, this teacher walking the roads of Palestine, "Do whatever He

tells you, Mary told us.

Day, Dorothy. "Reflections During Advent," Part One, in "Searching for Christ." Ave Maria, November 26, 1966, pp. 8-9. The Catholic Worker Movement. http://www.catholicworker.org/dorothyday/Reprint2.cfm?TextID=559.

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Fear Not! Life with Mary

Elizabeth Costello

Anglicans have been somewhat ambivalent about our relationship with Mary. From the English Reformation onward, the churchs fear that Mary would replace Christ resulted in her omission from many devotional practices, prayers, and ritesperhaps most especially concerning rites for pregnancy and childbirth. Prayers that linked womens pregnant bodies with Marys pregnancy, miraculous and full of grace, were eliminated. Labor pain was no longer linked to Marys labor pain (which birthed the redemption of the world), but to Eves (seen as just deserts for her sin). Medical advice replaced Marian liturgical preparation. Women were no longer allowed to wear girdles or hold relics associated with Mary, nor ask for her help in childbirth. Womens thanksgiving offerings to Mary for safe delivery were replaced with a general offering to the church. What Anglicans did not realize at the time was that by losing Mary, they lost the ability to see pregnant bodies as sacramental full of grace.1 It is no surprise that in the Anglican rite related to child birth (originally named The Churching of Women and later called Thanksgiving after Childbirth) there was no mention of Mary. It was not until the revision of the rite in the 1979 Book of Common Prayer (now called Thanksgiving for the Birth or Adoption of a Child) that Mary reappeared through the inclusion of the Magnificat. Her reappearance in this particular rite is reflective of an overarching attempt in the Episcopal Church to reclaim our relationship with Mary. In experiencing the loss of Mary and in attempting to reconcile Anglican views with Roman Catholicism (the church against which we formerly defined our Mariology), the Anglican Roman Catholic International Commission (ARCIC) created a shared statement, on Mary entitled, Mary: Grace and Hope in Christ. In this document, Anglicans and Roman Catholics outline their consensus views on Mary: positing Mary as a paragon of grace and hope. Amongst the many points made in this document, one of the most significant is the recognition of Mary as the first disciple. Mary, the first disciple, said Amen to Gods Yes to humanity: Be it to me according to your word. Through her gracefilled response, she gives her whole self unreservedly to God. Her will was obedient to God; her body offered hospitality to the Word. Her soul proclaimed Gods goodness; her mouth advocated for Gods justice for the poor. As the mother of the new humanity, who birthed the redemption of the world, she embodies the discipleship of grace-filled living. In her being, the womb of Emmanuel, we are reminded of our graced material world.
1. Mary Fissell, The Politics of Reproduction in English Reformation, in Representations, Vol. 87, No. 1 (Summer 2004), pp. 44-55.

Through her being, in the birth of Christ, we are reminded of the hope for which we long. Mary as the pattern of grace and hope in the world models for us a radical discipleship. In Marys journey with Jesusfrom cradle to cross to empty tombwe see the pattern of grace and hope lived in the cycles of life, death, and resurrection. We cannot lose Mary again. We cannot lose sight of Marys body as Icona window into Gods grace and hospitality. We cannot forget Marys mind, which pondered the advent of the incarnation. We cannot forget Marys will, filled with Gods grace in saying Let it be to Gods redemption of humanity. If we lose Mary again, we lose our ability to see our new humanity, wrought through Marys divinized flesh. If we lose Mary again, we lose the ability to see Christs full human experience as vulnerable infant, utterly dependent on his mothers milk. Marys very pregnancy evokes the wonder of Gods grace, the bodily anticipation of Christ, and the hopeful expectation for his coming. In this Advent season, let us stand with Mary who was pregnant with the hope of Christ. Who, as the God-bearer, bore Christ for and to the world. Let us hear her words anew and ponder them in our hearts. Let us imagine what it might mean to live lives full of grace and hope, walking with Jesus from the cradle to cross to empty tomb, as Mary proclaims: My soul proclaims the greatness of the Lord, my spirit rejoices in God my Savior; for he has looked with favor on his lowly servant. From this day all generations will call me blessed: the Almighty has done great things for me, and holy is his Name. He has mercy on those who fear him in every generation. He has shown the strength of his arm, he has scattered the proud in their conceit. He has cast down the mighty from their thrones, and has lifted up the lowly. He has filled the hungry with good things, and the rich he has sent away empty. He has come to the help of his servant Israel, for he has remembered his promise of mercy. The promise he made to our fathers, to Abraham and his children forever. Amen.

THE LITTLE WAY

Editors: Colin Miller, Elizabeth Costello, Joseph Wolyniak, Mac Stewart, JR Rigby, Luke Wetzel, Natalie Wetzel, and Andrew Nelson. For information about the community or to get involved, please contact us: Phone: (919) 797-9324 E-mail: cfwdurham@gmail.com Website: http://cfw.dionc.org/ Current Want List: Living Food Winter coats Grits, eggs, shredded cheddar cheese Clothing (especially mens Fresh fruits & vegetables for cold weather) Breakfast meats Underwear & socks Flour (unbleached, all-purpose or whole wheat) Belts Active dry yeast Walking shoes Coffee & tea Trash bags Etc. Toilet paper Money (for rent, utilities, food, etc.) Cloth napkins Backpacks Personal DATA cards Shampoo (all sizes) Postage stamps Lotion (all sizes) 2 twin beds with mattresses Toothpaste (all sizes) Portable baby crib Lip balm Bookshelves Soap (all sizes) Prayers for the community Disposable razors People willing to cook a meal Monetary donations are received by: Food St. Josephs Episcopal Church Hospitality Fund1902 W Main St., Durham, NC 27705. To make non-monetary gifts please contact Luke Wetzel at 913-522-0066.
The Corporal Works of Mercy To feed the hungry To give drink to the thirsty To clothe the naked To harbor the harborless To visit the sick To ransom the captive To bury the dead

The Little Way is a pamphlet of the Community of the Franciscan Way, a Mission of the Episcopal Diocese of North Carolina. We seek a life of prayer, study, simplicity, and fellowship with the poor. We stand in the tradition of the Catholic Worker Movement, founded in 1933 by Peter Maurin and Dorothy Day. Maurin House and St. Elizabeth House offer shelter and food to the homeless. Rent, food and utilities for the hospitality houses are paid entirely on donations. Funds are always used directly for the performance of the Works of Mercy, and no one in the community draws any salary or other benefits.

The Spiritual Works of Mercy To instruct the uninformed To counsel the doubtful To admonish sinners To bear wrongs patiently To forgive offenses willingly To comfort the afflicted To pray for the living and the dead