Author: Texas OP Nuns

Holy Thursday, 2015

In a few hours, we will celebrate the evening Mass of Holy Thursday. We have the washing of feet before Mass, in our refectory. The prioress chooses twelve nuns and kneels to wash their feet. Monasteries have surely been washing women\’s feet on Holy Thursday long before Pope Francis (although we do it privately). It is awe-inspiring to think that Jesus gave us Himself in the Eucharist, ordaining the first priests, just a short time before His passion began. Tonight we remember this wonderful event, and we stay awake with Jesus in the garden of Gethsemane, keeping adoration of the Blessed Sacrament until midnight.

Spy Wednesday, 2015

Wednesday in Holy Week is sometimes referred to as \”Spy Wednesday\” because it\’s the day the liturgy commemorates Judas Iscariot approaching the chief priest and scribes with an offer to betray Jesus for money. It\’s easy to condemn Judas Iscariot\’s act of treachery but we always have to face the question: how do I betray Jesus for personal gain? We have all done it, at some time or another, in one way or another. The good news is that unlike Judas Iscariot we can choose to accept again the infinite mercy of God, which is always held out to us. Let us fall on that mercy today, and resist the temptation to despair. 

Tuesday of Holy Week, 2015

Though I thought I had toiled in vain, and for nothing, uselessly spent my strength, 
Yet my reward is with the Lord, my recompense is with my God…
And I am made glorious in the sight of the Lord, 
and my God is now my strength! 
–Isaiah 49:4, 5b
In the Liturgy today we continue hearing the Servant Songs from Isaiah, those mysterious passages relating to a suffering servant who trusts in the Lord and becomes great in spite of–or because of–his suffering. As Christians, we usually relate these passages to Christ, who suffered and died for our salvation and was glorified by God, who raised Him on the third day. As cloistered nuns, we are reminded that this suffering, humiliated man is our Bridegroom–and in fact He is the Bridegroom of the Church. He seems to prefer coming to us in this way, hidden, obscure, suffering, poor. Sr. Mary Laurence, O.P., a cloistered Dominican nun from England who wrote several books about the cloistered life in the mid-20th century, once commented that no bride of Christ wants to follow her Bridegroom up to Calvary carrying a bouquet of flowers! Instead she follows the same path her Lord followed, and it is not an easy one. But she continues to follow Him, because she loves Him. In the same way today let us try to follow Christ as He makes His way to crucifixion and death on a cross. We will not perhaps always be faithful all the time. But we can always keep turning back to the path, to follow Christ, in good times and in bad times.

Monday of Holy Week, 2015

In today\’s Gospel, Jesus is again having dinner with his friends Martha, Mary and Lazarus in Bethany. To express her love, Mary anoints Jesus\’ feet with \”a liter of costly perfumed oil made from genuine aromatic nard\” and dries them with her hair. Judas Iscariot is scandalized. Why was this expensive oil not sold and the money given to the poor? But Jesus gently reprimands His soon-to-be betrayer: \”Leave her alone…You always have the poor with you, but you do not always have me.\”
 
There is a connection between Mary\’s loving gesture and the contemplative religious life. People sometimes wonder, \”Why are you in a cloistered monastery? You all have so many talents and abilities that could be put to such good use in the world!\” But there is no worldly logic to explain the choice we have made. It is simply the desire to offer ourselves completely, like fragrant ointment, to the Lord, to pour out our lives in service to Him. If the Lord calls us to serve Him in a way that gets noticed (for example by writing a book), that is His business. If He calls us to live our daily lives in complete obscurity, that is His prerogative. We have given up everything to follow Him, to be completely at His disposal. And it is for us a great joy, a greater joy than most people realize. So too Mary must have felt joy as she anointed Jesus\’ feet and dried them with her hair. There are many, many people who exude the good odor of Christ through their lives in the world, and thank God for them. But it is also necessary to have a few who just want to \”waste\” their lives on Jesus. \”The house was filled with the fragrance of the oil\”. So too is the Church.

Palm Sunday, 2015

One word that keeps surfacing here at the Monastery during this Lent is \”obedience\”. Obedience is an especially important concept for us as Dominicans; it\’s the only vow we take. The vows of poverty and chastity are considered to be included in this one vow. Most of the time we are obedient because it somehow benefits us; how often do we obey simply because it\’s the right thing to do, because it pleases God? We hear in the epistle of today\’s Mass that Christ became obedient for us, even unto death on a cross. He did not die for His own sake, but for our sake. Let\’s examine our motives today as we move in Holy Week and the Paschal Triduum, trying to keep our eyes fixed on Jesus who obeyed not for the sake of the glory God gave Him later, but because he wanted to do the Father\’s will in all things.