Message  to President Joseph Biden  from Pope Francis

The Honorable Joseph R. Biden
President of the United States of America
The White House
Washington, DC

On the occasion of your inauguration as the forty-sixth President of the United States of America, I extend cordial good wishes and the assurance of my prayers that Almighty God will grant you wisdom and strength in the exercise of your high office. Under your leadership, may the American people continue to draw strength from the lofty political, ethical and religious values that have inspired the nation since its founding. At a time when the grave crises facing our human family call for farsighted and united responses, I pray that your decisions will be guided by a concern for building a society marked by authentic justice and freedom, together with unfailing respect for the rights and dignity of every person, especially the poor, the vulnerable and those who have no voice. I likewise ask God, the source of all wisdom and truth, to guide your efforts to foster understanding, reconciliation and peace within the United States and among the nations of the world in order to advance the universal common good. With these sentiments, I willingly invoke upon you and your family and the beloved American people an abundance of blessing.

                                                                                               FRANCISCUS PP

Recently, I came across a Ukrainian artist who is a master of painting on glass. Born in Lviv in 1963 OKSANA ROMANIV-TRISKAgraduated from Lviv College of Applied Arts IN 1982. From 1984 till 1989 she studied at Vilnius Academy of Arts in the studio of Professor A. Stoshkus.  Her personal exhibitions were held at the Ukrainian Free University in Munich (1993), the Museum of Ethnography in Lviv (1994), as well as in Berchtesgaden, Bad Tölz, Bad Vizzey, Freilassing, Munich (all - in Germany), Kufstein ( Austria).

Painting on glass by Oksana represents an interesting approach to this ancient method – “behind the other side of glass”-  inspired by the examples of Ukrainian icon-painting of the 14th-18th centuries. She continues and develops this special art in a very individual way, exploring the folk icon on the glass of the second half of the 18th-19th centuries.Traditional Ukrainian style of painting on glass in reverse where paints are on the opposite side of the glass.

This morning, the feast of the Conversion of  St. Paul, we had a visiting priest, who was ordained in our Archdiocese a few years ago.  He has come several times for  visits and retreats.  The theme of his homily reminded me of words from Pope Francis yesterday:

The history of our life has two rhythms: one, measurable, made of hours, days, years; the other, composed of the seasons of our development: birth, childhood, adolescence, maturity, old age, death. Every period, every phase has its own value, and can be a privileged moment of encounter with the Lord. Faith helps us to discover the spiritual significance of these periods: each one of them contains a particular call of the Lord, to which we can offer a positive or negative response. In the Gospel we see how Simon, Andrew, James and John responded: they were mature men; they had their work as fishermen, they had their family life.... Yet, when Jesus passed and called to them, “immediately they left their nets and followed him” (Mk 1:18).

Dear brothers and sisters, let us stay attentive and not let Jesus pass by without welcoming him. Saint Augustinesaid “I am afraid of God when he passes by”. Afraid of what? Of not recognizing Him, of not seeing Him, not welcoming Him.

May the Virgin Mary help us to live each day, each moment as the time of salvation, in which the Lord passes and calls us to follow him, every second of our life. And may she help us to convert from the mentality of the world, that of worldly reveries which are fireworks, to that of love and service.

(Painting:  James B. Janknegt)

We did the Blog  Feb  2020 on Bl Alfredo Cremonesi (d.1953), but it is interesting to note that this missionary order has no fewer than 10 either canonized or up for canonization (includes already one saint and  five  blesseds.) As we have settled into "ordinary time", I want to present a few of the men who stand out in this order.

PIME(The Pontifical Institute for Foreign Missions) was born in 1850 from a desire to help the poor, and the need to witness God’s love to those who have not yet heard the Word of God.

VENERABLE BISHOP ANGELO RAMAZZOTTI, along with Pope Pius IX started the first Italian Missionary Seminary in 1850. Eventually, in 1947, PIME was invited to the United Statesby Archbishop Cardinal Mooney and eventually settled in the Archdiocese of Detroit.  

Born in 1800 in Milan,  he studied in Pavia where he obtained a doctorate in both canon law and civil law on 10 August 1823. He practiced law for three years before entering the seminary.

He became well known across Venice for his love of the people and for his careful attention and consideration of the social and pastoral issues that faced the archdiocese. He brought to Venice his sense of calmness and resolve in tending to the social needs of the poor and to all people in general as a means of rekindling the Christian virtues in Venice.

Today we mark the 76t^h anniversary of the liberation  of  Auschwitz (which I visited in 1998), yet more dreadful news tells us that terror goes on in our world today.

The situation in northern Ethiopiais most alarming!  Communication is very precarious and for almost three weeks the Tigray region has been totally isolated from the rest of the world.

Then over the weekend came the news that around 1,000 people - including priests and other church leaders - have been killed in a series of attacks in Ethiopiaculminating in a massacre at a church where the Ark of the Covenant is believed to be held.

Following reports that 750 people were killed in a raid on the Orthodox Maryam Tsiyon Church in Aksum, thought to contain the Ark of the Covenant, an anonymous source from inside the country spoke to Aid to the Church in Need

The attack was the latest in a long line of fatal assaults against innocent people, as part of the ongoing conflict in the Tigray region of the country.    Christianity has a long and venerable history in Ethiopia. The first community of Christians had just been established in Jerusalem, when, according to Acts 8:26-40, the Apostle Philip was sent to witness to “a eunuch of Great authority under Candace queen of the Ethiopians.” 

In the 4th Century, Christianity was proclaimed the official faith of the EthiopianAksumiteKingdom and it became the first nation in the world to use the image of the cross on its coinage.  

We can only pray that there be a cessation of killing and peace in so many parts of the world.

He was born  in Lombardy of humble stock, one of five children. His mother died when he was five and his father  when he was eight.  He was then raised by relatives.

During World War I, he was called up and sent to the front as a private of the 80th Infantry Regiment Brigade Rome. He was honorably discharged on in 1919, with three medals for bravery and the rank of sergeant major.

Ordained in 1923, he immediately set out for Burma. At the mission in Mong Lin the misery was great, the food poor and totally inadequate, and tropical diseases killed many of the missionaries (6 during the decade 1926-1936, all young people) so that in 1928 the General Superior of the Pontifical Institute for Foreign Missions (PIME), Father Paolo Manna(later Blessed), visiting Mong Lin, threatened the bishop of Kengtung that he would abandon the mission if other young missionaries died for lack of nutritious food or because they lived in huts of mud and straw.

Bl. Clement identified the pagan and fatalistic conception of life as the blocking element of tribal society: men often do not work and are addicted to opium, women and children are commonly abused, abandoned, sold or killed.

He concentrated his efforts on giving more rewarding jobs to indigenous people becoming first a farmer, then a breeder, a tailor, a barber, a mason, a lumberjack and so on. His objective was mainly to help orphans and widows, women who were abandoned by everyone and considered bearers of bad luck. Unlike other missionaries he tried, whenever possible, to maintain a healthy lifestyle: schedule of day, cleaning, suitable clothing, ordered eating, use of dishes. This behavior, along with his strength, improved his stamina.

In June 1941, while the Japanese planned to occupy Burma, Bl. Clement was interned by the British army in Kalaw with twelve other Italian missionaries because they belonged to an enemy nation. In January 1942, the Japanese army invaded Burmaand in late April they freed the Italian missionaries held in Kalaw. The Mong Lin mission was intact but almost occupied by the Japanese army. Bl. Clement reopened the orphanage and undertook work as a woodcutter for the soldiers, together with his boys.

In 1945, the war ended and in 1948 Burma got its independence, followed by the beginning of separatist guerrillas which involved ethnic groups of the area (in the years 1950-1955 five brethren of PIME were murdered: Pietro Galastri, Bl. Mario Vergara,  St. Alfredo Cremonesi, Pietro Manghisi, Eliodoro Farronato). In the first 31 years of his mission Bl. Clement was able to turn Mong Lin into a town with about 4,000 baptized people.

Bl. Clement’s inspiring letters have been preserved in the book Clement Vismara: Apostle of the Little Ones. The children’s book ”The Man Who Never Grew Old” is a tribute to Bl. Clement.

An adventurous, fun-loving child who felt an early call to the missionary life, BL. MARIO VERGARAentered the PIME seminary in Monzain 1929. After enduring a life-threatening illness his first year in seminary, he finally returned to his studies in 1933.

He was ordained in August of 1934 by the Cardinal Archbishop of Milan Bl. Alfredo Ildefonso Schuster, OSBand left one month later for Burma. Known for his love for children and the sick, he was always on the move, undeterred by discomforts, bad weather, and attacks of malaria.

Father Vergara was entrusted a small village and it was there that he ensured that there be regular catechesis lessons and the celebration of the sacraments. He also established various assistance services and an orphanage for children. 

When WWII broke out, and Italydeclared war on England, all Italian missionaries were declared “fascists.” Bl. Mario was sent with the other missionaries to a concentration camp in India. He was released in 1944 and assigned to the mission of Toungoo. The British were no longer in control, but rebels sought to overthrow the government, where Bl. Mario was killed by the rebels, along with Isidore Ngei Ko Lat*, on May 24, 1950.

*Born in Burma in 1918 to peasant parents, Bl. Isidore was baptized into the Catholic faith. After his parents’ untimely death when he was still young, both Isidore and his younger brother were taken care of by their uncle and aunt. From an early age, Bl. Isidore expressed an interest in using his life to serve God. He began studying in the seminary and remained there for six years, up until the beginning of World War II. During World War II, he  returned to his native village, where he served as a catechist, opening a small school for the children of his region.

We end the Month of January with BL. PAOLO MANNA, who was the first Superior General of PIME in Italy, although his heart remained in Myanmar.

Born in Naples, like Bl. Clement, his mother died when he was a small child. He studied in Rome  and Milan, and right after ordination was sent to Burma. He served for 12 years in Myanmar until TB forced him to permanently resign from his mission.  St Pope John XXIII attributed to him the title of “the Christopher Columbus” of missionary cooperation and Pope Paul VI described him as “one of the most effective promoters of missionary universality in the 20th century.”

He spent the following forty years of his life promoting missions to all Catholics: lay, religious, and ordained. In order to spread the mission call to all Catholics through missionary priests and religious, Bl. Paolo started the Missionary Union of the Clergy – which is now worldwide – in 1916, established the Sacred Heart Seminary in Southern Italy for overseas missions  and founded the Society of the Missionary Sisters of the Immaculate.

According to the Vatican, “Fr. Manna’s greatest legacy is the example he left behind: he was driven by an overwhelming passion for the missions that  sickness, suffering and setbacks could never diminish.” 

He is also acknowledged for his “prophetic role” in promoting Ecumenism.

His book Thoughts and Reflections upon Vocations to the Foreign Missions was published in 1909. An edited version entitled “Forward with Christ” was published by Fr. Nicholas Maestrini, PIME in 1954.

November was Black History month, and we published information on the six Americans up for canonization.*  One is Venerable Pierre Toussaint  (Blog  Oct. 26, 2012), whose holy wife is now being considered. For Black History month (Feb) we need to ponder  the lives of the people who continued the faith, as well as politicians and other public figures we see in the daily news. 

Interestingly enough, PBS is  doing a series "The Black Church":

“In this intimate four-hour series from executive producer, host, and writer Henry Louis Gates, Jr., we trace how this came to be in the 400 year-old story of the black church in America, all the way down to its bedrock role as the site of African American survival and endurance, grace and resilience, thriving and testifying, freedom and independence, solidarity and speaking truth to power.”

JULIETTE NOEL TOUSSAINT, born around 1786 in Haiti, was a freed slavewho became an American philanthropist, collaborating closely with her husband Pierre  in helping the poor as well as doing charitable works in New York city. Pierre and Juliette deeply esteemed and loved each other, and became models of married people.

Little is known about the early life of Juliette, except that she was born into slavery in the former French colony of Haiti. The Noel family came to Baltimore with their slave owners at some point during the Haitian Revolution. There she labored as a housemaid, assistant cook and nanny.

In the wake of the Haitian Revolution, Pierre Toussaint's master also went into exile in New York City.  Thus Pierre and Juliette met in circumstances unknown. . Juliette was twenty years younger than Pierre.

They adopted Euphemia, the daughter of Pierre's late sister Rosalie who had died of tuberculosis, raising the girl as their own. They provided for her education and music classes. Euphemia would die before her adoptive parents, of tuberculosis, like her mother.

The couple attended daily Mass and began a career of charity among the poor of New York City regardless of color and creed. They often brought baked goods to the children of the Orphan Asylum and donated money to its operation. In their own house, they sheltered and fostered numerous street children, travelers and homeless people.

Together the Toussaints organized a credit bureau, an employment agency, and a refuge for priests. They helped  many Haitian refugees in finding jobs for them. They often arranged sales of goods so they could raise money to live on. With the Oblate Sisters of Providence, they established a school for black children.

In May 14, 1851, Juliette died of natural causes. Two years later, Pierre Toussaint died on June 30, 1853. They are buried alongside with Euphemia, in the cemetery of St. Patrick's Old Cathedral.

(Photo of Euphemia)

 * Venerable Father Augustus Tolton, Ven. Henrietta Delille, Servant of God Sister Thea Bowman,  S of God Mother Mary Lange, and S of God Julia Greely

Since we are in the midst of  the Year of the Eucharist in our Archdiocese (Seattle),  I am presenting a recent the letter by one of my favorite Bishops.

A Pastoral Letter from Bishop Thomas J. Olmsted
To all the Faithful of the Diocese of Phoenix

January 28, 2021

Memorial of Saint Thomas Aquinas, Priest and Doctor of the Church

Son of French aristocrats, orphaned at six years of age, twice dismissed from the French army, recklessly adventurous, the life of Charles de Foucauld was eventually seized by the love of Jesus. Not many years after his return to faith, Charles was ordained a priest and lived several years absorbed in prayer as a Trappist monk. Yet his personal love for the Lord now united to his zealous nature made complacency unthinkable. Brother Charles left the Trappist monastery and lived the last twenty-some years of his life essentially homeless without companions, dedicated to loving the Lord in the Eucharist and serving the needy with warm hospitality. It was clarity about the transformative power of the Eucharist that unleashed in him an unshakable confidence and love. For him, the Eucharist was simply “Jesus handing over His life for His people.” Blessed Charles de Foucauld shaped his life around this simple truth.

My dear sons and daughters, I write to you now because we need the clear and simple faith in the Eucharist of Blessed Charles de Foucauld.

Many have shared with me the heavy grief they have carried during the COVID-19 pandemic at the loss of regular accessibility of the great Sacrament of the Eucharist. As a spiritual father and spouse of the Church, it grieves me to see the flock entrusted to my care suffer separation from the Lord whom I have dedicated my life to serve and to make present among His people. Deprivation of the Eucharist is deprivation of Christ. Whether it was due to my prudential decisions or yours, I am aware of the pain you have suffered. What is more, I know your grief does not stop there.

A recent Pew Research Center survey (July 2019) showed that most Catholics don’t believe in the Eucharist. Nearly seven-in-ten Catholics (69%) say they personally believe that, during Catholic Mass, the bread and wine used in Communion “are symbols of the body and blood of Jesus Christ.” Just one-third of U.S. Catholics (31%) say they believe that “during Catholic Mass, the bread and wine actually become the body and blood of Jesus.” This report was a confirmation of what had long been known but not often voiced: there is a grave crisis of faith in the Eucharist as the Real Presence of Jesus Christ, our Lord and God. 

These are our own friends and family, our sons and our daughters. What suffering to see those we love not sharing our faith and devotion to our Redeemer.

This crisis of faith affects us all, not only from outside but also from within our souls. Doubt and mistrust are like a virus that spreads from heart to heart at an exponential rate.

A renewal of faith in the Eucharist is desperately needed!

My brother priests and deacons of the diocese, those for whom I have ever-increasing gratitude and affection, you, too, have suffered greatly the pain and confusion caused by this crisis of faith. You are the men who have “left houses or brothers or sisters or father or mother or wife or children or fields” to serve the Lord at the Altar (Matthew 19:29). You have shouldered with Christ the weight of this loss and felt much of the grief our Lord felt as he wept for Jerusalem(cf. Luke 19:41ff).

What value does the Sunday Mass have? For a group of forty-nine Christians in the 4th century, it was fuel for life. Emperor Diocletian of Rome found these faithful believers guilty of celebrating Sunday Mass which had been outlawed. When they were asked why they broke the law, one member of the group, named Emeritus, spoke in response: “Sine dominico non possumus,” which our Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI once explained to mean, “without ‘Dominicum’ [Sunday], that is, without the Sunday Eucharist we cannot live” (Angelus, 26 June 2011). Why did they feel so strongly?

For more than nine years I was blessed to observe and learn from the spiritual fatherhood of Pope Saint John Paul II as an assistant at the Secretariat of State of the Holy See. Permit me to share an exhortation he gave us nearly 22 years ago, expressing our faith in the Sunday Eucharist:

“From the beginning of my Pontificate, I have not ceased to repeat: ‘Do not be afraid! Open, open wide the doors to Christ!’ In the same way, today I would strongly urge everyone to rediscover Sunday: Do not be afraid to give your time to Christ! Yes, let us open our time to Christ, that he may cast light upon it and give it direction. … The rediscovery of this day is a grace which we must implore, … so that we may respond concretely to the deepest human yearnings. Time given to Christ is never time lost, but is rather time gained, so that our relationships and indeed our whole life may become more profoundly human” (Dies Domini 7).

I wish to unite myself to the words of our late Pope: as the pandemic subsides over the coming weeks and months, I would strongly urge everyone to rediscover Sunday Mass! I invite you to implore from God the grace of rediscovering the joy and rest of the Lord’s Day.

My dear brothers and sisters, sons and daughters, with love and care as your spiritual father, I call you to turn your hearts with renewed fervor to our Lord in the Holy Eucharist and to unwavering fidelity in keeping holy the Lord’s Day every Sunday.

These are difficult times with health concerns and conflicting information about what is needed to remain healthy and to prevent the spread of disease. However, we all have a real need to find our security and life in Christ. Are we not in need of a Savior? Is He not the only Lord?

I wish to assist and accompany you to an ever-increasing knowledge, love, and commitment to this great gift of our God. To seek to do so in a short letter would not give due reverence to either the needs of our times or the thirst of our souls.

For this reason, I now would like to announce a forthcoming Apostolic Exhortation on the Eucharist.

The time is now to speak to the Heart of it all.

Another humble man with a great Eucharistic heart is St. Thomas Aquinas who wrote the familiar Eucharistic hymn, Tantum ergo, among many others. For the name of the forthcoming Exhortation I have chosen two words from the second line of this hymn of praise of the Eucharist: Veneremur cernui. It is difficult to translate these words, yet they capture the reverence we should foster: Let us venerate with body prostrated which are expressed in reference to the Great Sacrament of the Eucharist.

In my forthcoming Apostolic Exhortation, I wish to offer a thorough exploration of the Church’s faith on the Sunday Eucharist with a particular attention to the following:

The Gift of the Real Presence in the Eucharist

Eucharist as Sacrificial Offering and heavenly banquet

How the Eucharist unleashes peace, charity, and justice to our society

Ways for parishes and families to deepen their Eucharistic faith and love

Proper Disposition for the Reception of the Eucharist

How to reach out to friends and family who do not share our faith.

You can expect this document to be made public on the Feast of the Lord’s Supper, Holy Thursday of the Sacred Triduum, which this year falls on the first of April.

In 1916, Blessed Charles de Foucauld was engaged in Eucharistic adoration when he was attacked and killed for his Christian faith in North Africa. All hope seemed lost, his life and faith without noticeable effect. French soldiers who came upon his ransacked hut found a monstrance with the Sacred Host still inside. They placed the monstrance with the Host exposed on the saddle of a horse and walked back to the French camp—the first Eucharistic procession in that part of the world. Charles’ blood had hardly dried and his Catholic faith was being boldly announced to the world. Since then, the Church in Africa has been blessed with breathtaking growth and remarkable strength.

My dear brothers and sisters, faith in the Eucharist is always fruitful when it is cherished and lived. My hope is that our rediscovery of the beauty and truth of the Eucharist might be similarly blessed.

With sincere hope and fatherly affection, I remain

Sincerely yours in Christ,

+ Thomas J. Olmsted
Bishop of Phoenix

On the occasion of the inauguration of Joseph Biden, his wife Jill presented the nation with a piece of art by a very talented artist who has been all but forgotten.  And while the piece in question is lovely and certainly symbolic of hope with a rainbow, it is not my favorite.  When studying in Europe he spent time in the Scottish Highlands (where my grandmother was born) and something there touched him deeply as seen in his painting.

 ROBERT SHELDON DUNCANSON (1821-1872) was born in New York state, the grandson of a freed Virginia slave on his mother’s side and a white father. He started out as a house painter, but his talent and creative ambition exceeded this work. In 1840, at the age of 19, he moved to Cincinnati, Ohioto begin his art career. Cincinnati was rapidly growing and had a strong arts community, earning the nickname the “Athens of the West.” It was also home to a large free black community and sympathetic white abolitionists. 

With the onset of the American Civil War, Robert exiled himself first in Canada, and then in the United Kingdom. This is where the story of MountOrford, on display at the MinnesotaMarineArt Museum, picks up. The tranquility of this Quebec mountain scene serves in stark contrast to the turmoil of war raging across the United States.

Robert was accepted enthusiastically by the art community of Montrealbefore traveling to the United Kingdom where he was again well received, gaining recognition in the international art scene.

He returned to the United Statesand continued to paint. However, his health deteriorated quickly, likely due to lead poisoning suffered as a result of his years as a house painter, and he died in 1872, only 51 years old. His work was largely forgotten, a symptom of racism prevalent in art history, until the 1960s and 1970s, when advancements made by the civil rights movement began to shed light on the historical and artistic accomplishments of African Americans. 

Today, Robert Duncanson’s legacy is as one of the few African American painters to achieve international recognition during this time.  We are grateful to Jill Biden for exposing his work to our nation.

                             (2 bottom paintings- Left-  "Loch Long",  Middle-   "Scottish Landscape")

While researching Robert Sheldon Duncanson, I noted that while there have been many fine Black artists in America, few are known.

A very talented Catholic Black sculptor, whose life was fascinating, was EDMONIA LEWIS, who was born around 1844 in Greenbush New York. She descended from African American and Native-American ancestry, becoming the first professional sculptor representing both communities and the only Black female of the era recognized in the American art scene. 

She was orphaned at an early age and, as she later claimed, was raised by some of her mother's relatives.

With the support and encouragement of a successful older brother, Edmonia attended Oberlin College in Ohio where she emerged as a talented artist. The abolitionist movement was active on the Oberlin campus and would greatly influence her later work. But life at Oberlin came to a violent end when she was falsely accused of poisoning two white classmates. Captured and beaten by a white mob, Edmonia recovered from the attack and then escaped to Boston, after the charges against her were dropped.

There she met sculptor and mentor-to-be Edward A. Brackett and abolitionist William Lloyd Garrison. After setting up her own studio, she began creating plaster medallions of famous abolitionists starting in the early 1860s, but it was her 1864 bust of Civil War hero Colonel Robert Shaw, who led the African American 54th Massachusetts Regiment, that brought her national prominence.

With the funds she earned from the copies she made of the Shaw bust, Edmonia furthered her art in Rome, sculpting in Neoclassical-style, where she was celebrated for works like Arrow Maker (1866), a sculpture of a Native American father teaching his daughter how to shape an arrow, and Forever Free (1867), a piece that emotionally captures two Black slaves encountering freedom for the first time. In Italy, Edmonia continued to work as an artist. Her work over the next several decades moved between African American themes to subjects influenced by her devout Catholicism.

Along with her busts of American presidents Abraham Lincoln and Ulysses S. Grant and works that paid homage to her Catholic faith, Edmonia was also known for her marble depiction of Cleopatra called The Death of Cleopatra, which was on display at the Philadelphia Exposition in 1876.

Much like her childhood,  her final years are shrouded in mystery. Until the 1890s, she continued to exhibit her work and was even visited by Frederick Douglass in Rome, but little is known about the last decade or so of her life. It was speculated that she spent her last years in Rome, but the recent discovery of death documents indicate that she died in London, England, in 1907.

In recent decades, however, Lewis's life and art have received posthumous acclaim. Her pieces are now part of the permanent collections of the Howard University Gallery of Art and the Smithsonian American Art Museum.

In contrast to the work of Edmonia Lewis, is  a modern sculptress, of no less talent.

AUGUSTA SAVAGE, born in  1892,  was an American sculptor associated with the Harlem Renaissance. She was a teacher whose studio was important to the careers of a generation of artists who would become nationally known. She  also worked for equal rights for African Americans in the arts.

Augusta began making figures as a child, mostly small animals out of the natural red clay of her hometown, Green Cove SpringsFlorida. Her father was a poor Methodist minister who strongly opposed his daughter's early interest in art. "My father licked me four or five times a week,” Augusta once recalled, “and almost whipped all the art out of me.” This was because at that time, he believed her sculpture to be a sinful practice, based upon his interpretation of the "graven images" portion of the Bible. She persevered, and the principal of her new high school in West Palm Beach, where her family relocated in 1915, encouraged her talent and allowed her to teach a clay modeling class. This began a lifelong commitment to teaching as well as to creating art.

She arrived in New York Cityin 1921, applying  to Cooper Union, a scholarship-based school. She was selected before 142 other men on the waiting list.[ Her talent and ability so impressed the Cooper Union Advisory Council that she was awarded additional funds for room and board.  She studied under sculptor George Brewster completing the four-year degree course in three years.

In 1923 she applied for a Summer art program sponsored by the French government; although being more than qualified, she was turned down by the international judging committee solely because they refused to award a spot to a Black person. Augusta was deeply upset and questioned the committee, beginning the first of many public fights for equal rights in her life. Though appeals were made to the French government to reinstate the award, they had no effect and Augustawas unable to study at the Fontainebleau School of Fine Arts. The incident got press coverage on both sides of the Atlantic, and eventually, the sole supportive committee member sculptor Hermon Atkins MacNeil – who at one time had shared a studio with Henry Ossawa Tanner – invited her to study with him. She later cited him as one of her teachers.

She obtained her first commission for a bust of W. E. B. Du Bois for the Harlem Library. Her outstanding sculpture brought more commissions. Her bust of William Pickens Sr., a key figure in the NAACP, earned praise for depicting an African American in a more humane, neutral way as opposed to stereotypes of the time.

In 1929 with pooled resources from the Urban League, Rosenwald Foundation, a Carnegie Foundation grant, and donations from friends and former teachers, Augusta  was finally able to travel to France when she was 37. She lived on Montparnasse and worked in the studio of M. [Félix] Benneteau [-Desgrois].

While the studio was initially encouraging of her work, Augusta later wrote that "...the masters are not in sympathy as they all have their own definite ideas and usually wish their pupils to follow their particular method..." and began primarily working on her own in 1930.

Knowledge of Augusta's talent and struggles became widespread in the African-American community; fundraising parties were held in Harlem and Greenwich Village, and African-American women's groups and teachers from Florida A&M all sent her money for studies abroad.

In 1929, with assistance as well from the Julius Rosenwald Fund, Savage enrolled and attended the Académie de la Grande Chaumière, a leading Parisart school. In Paris, she studied with the sculptor Charles Despiau. She exhibited and won awards in two Paris Salons and one Exposition. She toured France, Belgium, and Germany, researching sculpture in cathedrals and museums.

Augusta returned to the United States in 1931, energized from her studies and achievements, but The Great Depression had almost stopped art sales. She pushed on, and in 1934 became the first African-American artist to be elected to the National Association of Women Painters and Sculptors. She then launched the Savage Studio of Arts and Crafts, located in a basement on West 143rd Streetin Harlem. She opened her studio to anyone who wanted to paint, draw, or sculpt.

 Her many young students included the future nationally known artists Jacob Lawrence, Norman Lewis, and Gwendolyn Knight. Another student was the sociologist Kenneth B. Clark whose later research contributed to the 1954 Supreme Court decision in Brown v. Board of Education that ruled school segregation unconstitutional. Her school evolved into the Harlem Community Art Center; 1500 people of all ages and abilities participated in her workshops, learning from her multi-cultural staff, and showing work around New York City. Funds from the Works Progress Administration helped, but old struggles of discrimination were revived between Savage and WPA officials who objected to her having a leadership role.

Augusta was one of four women and only two African Americans to receive a professional commission from the Board of Design of the 1939 New York World's Fair. She created Lift Every Voice and Sing (also known as "The Harp"), inspired by the song by James Weldon and Rosamond Johnson. The 16-foot-tall plaster sculpture was the most popular and most photographed work at the fair; small metal souvenir copies were sold, and many postcards of the piece were purchased. The work reinterpreted the musical instrument to feature 12 singing African-American youth in graduated heights as its strings, with the harp's sounding board transformed into an arm and a hand. In the front, a kneeling young man offered music in his hands. She did not have funds to have it cast in bronze or to move and store it. Like other temporary installations, the sculpture was destroyed at the close of the fair.

Augusta opened two galleries whose shows were well attended and well reviewed, but few sales resulted and the galleries closed. The last major showing of her work occurred in 1939. Deeply depressed by her financial struggle, in the 1940s she moved to a farmhouse in Saugerties, New York. While there, she established close ties with her neighbors and welcomed family and friends from New York City to her rural home. She cultivated a garden and sold pigeons, chickens, and eggs.  She taught art to children and wrote children's stories.

The K-B Products Corporation, the world's largest growers of mushrooms at that time, employed her as a laboratory assistant in the company's cancer research facility. She acquired a car and learned to drive to enable her commute. Herman K. Knaust, director of the laboratory, encouraged Augusta to pursue her artistic career and provided her with art supplies. She created and taught art and sculpted friends and neighbors. Her last commissioned work was for Knaust and was that of the American journalist and author Poultney Bigelow, whose father, John, was U.S. Minister to Franceduring the Civil War. Her few neighbors said that she was always making something with her hands.

Her style can be described as realistic, expressive, and sensitive. Though her art and influence within the art community are documented, the location of much of her work is unknown.

Augusta died of cancer on March 26, 1962, in New York City. While she was all but forgotten at the time of her death, she is remembered today as a great artist, activist, and arts educator; serving as an inspiration to the many that she taught, helped, and encouraged.

Fortunately for us,  birds do not know there is a pandemic going on, so are in their usual habitats. The COVID-19 pandemic with all its trials,  like social distancing, work-at-home directives, and  so many dos and don’ts, has made life complicated, and many say enough is enough.

But for many it has been a time to stop and smell the roses, or in other cases see the birds. They’ve had to find different ways to amuse themselves that don’t require being in enclosed public spaces or around other humans.

One friend in Brooklyn, gets up with the birds every morning at dawn- break, and goes across the street to a huge park to scan the skies, trees and ground for birds.

One of our Oblates in San Diegogets in a kayak, also at the crack of dawn,  watching the birds from her socially distanced vessel.

Another local friend of 25 years, called last week excited about birds she had seen off her deck.  She has never been a birder, but said “ I think I have caught the bug - birding bug that is!  You get so excited when you see birds, I said to my husband, what is this all about?”

A young couple on a neighboring island have taken up this “sport”, as it has been something they could safely do together, does not cost anything, except for the binoculars and a book or two. Now they excitedly bird watch every weekend  and even though they both grew up in the islands, they find new places to explore.

For me, it is watching birds in the warmth of the monastery, watching through the large windows.  Also, I have connected with a man on the island, who has been a naturalist all his life.  We now we do bird counts together and look forward to the Great Backyard Bird count in mid February  (12-15th).

For those who have tried getting outdoors more than usual and stopped to smell the roses or see the birds, it has brought a peace and serenity connecting with nature, and we have not had to travel far. In this time of stress and uncertainty,  birds rescued us from anxiety even if for short periods in the day.

(Photos of young birders on Shaw Island)

The Great Backyard Bird Count (GBBC) is a community science project in ornithology. It is conducted annually in mid February. The event is supported by the Cornell Lab of Ornithology and the National Audubon Society. During this four-day event birdwatchers all around the world are invited to count and report details of birds in the area in which they live. Data is submitted online via a web interface, and compiled for use in scientific research. The GBBC was the first community science project to collect bird sightings online and display results in near real-time.

Since 2013, the event has been observed by international bird watchers, and anyone can now participate in the event. Additional wildlife and conservation institutes around the world have also supported and participated.

Data collected during the event is subjected to verification by experts, in order to overcome potential shortcomings in the abilities of amateur participants. Data resulting from the event has raised awareness about changes in population and habitats of common birds.

In 2020 Great Backyard Bird Count resulted in:

              268,674 Estimated Participants

             27,270,156 Total Birds Counted

               6,942 Species of Birds Identified

              194 Countries

For more information go to: https://www.birdcount.org/

JAMES RICHMOND BARTHE (known as Richmond Barthé)  was an African-American sculptor associated with the Harlem Renaissance. He is best known for his portrayal of black subjects. The focus of his artistic work was portraying the diversity and spirituality of man. He once said: "All my life I have been interested in trying to capture the spiritual quality I see and feel in people, and I feel that the human figure as God made it, is the best means of expressing this spirit in man."

He became one of 20th century America’s greatest sculptors of the human form, and Mississippi’s preeminent artist in the field. 

Richmond was born in Bay St. Louis, Mississippi.  His father died at age 22, when Richmond was only a few months old, leaving his mother to raise him alone, working as a dressmaker.

Richmond showed a passion and skill for drawing from an early age. His mother was, in many ways, instrumental in his decision to pursue art as a vocation. He once said: "When I was crawling on the floor, my mother gave me paper and pencil to play with. It kept me quiet while she did her errands. At six years old I started painting. A lady my mother sewed for gave me a set of watercolors. By that time, I could draw very well."

His teachers in grammar school encouraged him and when he was only twelve years old, he exhibited his work at the Bay St. Louis Country Fair.

Richmond was beset with health problems, and after an attack of typhoid fever at age 14, he withdrew from school.  Following this, he worked as a houseboy and handyman, but still spent his free time drawing. A wealthy family, the Ponds, who spent summers at Bay St. Louis, invited him to work for them as a houseboy in New Orleans.

Through his employment with the Ponds, Richmond broadened his cultural horizons and knowledge of art, and was introduced to Lyle Saxon, a local writer for the Times Picayune. Saxon was fighting against the racist system of school segregation, and tried unsuccessfully to get Richmond registered in an art school in New Orleans.

At age 23, with less than a high school education and no formal training in art, Richmond applied to the Art Institute of Chicago, and was accepted.  He became one of 20th century America’s greatest sculptors of the human form,  and Mississippi’s preeminent artist in the field. 

Richmond mingled with the bohemian circles of downtown Manhattan. Initially unable to afford live models, he sought and found inspiration from on-stage performers. Living downtown provided him the opportunity to socialize not only among collectors but also among artists, dance performers, and actors. His remarkable visual memory permitted him to work without models, producing numerous representations of the human body in movement.

His works were exhibited at the Chicago World's Fair in 1933. In summer 1934, Richmond went on a tour to Paris with Reverend Edward F. Murphy, a friend of Reverend Kane from New Orleans, who exchanged his first class ticket for two third-class tickets to share with Richmond. This trip exposed  him to classical art, but also to performers such as Josephine Baker, of whom he made portraits in 1935 and 1951.

During the next two decades, he built his reputation as a sculptor. He was awarded several awards and experienced success after success and was considered by writers and critics as one of the leading "moderns" of his time.

In 1945, Richmond became a member of the National Sculpture Society.  The tense environment and violence of the city began to take its toll, and he decided to abandon his life of fame and move to Jamaica in the West Indiesin 1947. 

His career flourished in Jamaica, and he remained there until the mid-1960s when ever-growing violence forced him to move again. 

Richmond was a devoted Catholic. Many of his later works  depicted religious subjects, including John the Baptist (1942), Come Unto Me (1945), Head of Jesus (1949), Angry Christ (1946), and Resurrection (1969). 

Works like The Mother (1935) (see right), Mary (1945), or his unfinished Crucifixion (ca. 1944) are noticeably influenced by the interracial justice for what he was awarded the James J. Hoey Award by the Catholic Interracial Council in 1945.

The Argentinian-Slovenian Lazarist missionary FATHER PEDRO OPEKA (See Blog  Oct. 28, 2019)  and his humanitarian association “Akamasoa” (“City of Friendship”) have been nominated for the Peace Nobel Prize by the Prime Minister of Slovenia, Janez Janša.

According to the Prime Minister,  the Akamasoa Community - which Father Opeka founded over 30 years ago and which Pope Francis visited in September 2019 during his Apostolic Journey to Mozambique, Madagascar and Mauritius - has given an outstanding contribution to "social and human development" in Madagascar, helping it to achieve the 2030 UN goals for sustainable development. Janša has also remembered the former Malagasy President Hery Rajaonarimampianina as saying that  Father Opeka “is a living beacon of hope and faith in the fight against poverty". 

Born in 1948 in Argentinato Slovenian refugee parents, Father Opeka started working for the poor at a young age when he traveled to various countries. After entering the Congregation of the Mission (also known as Lazarists or Vincentians), he became a priest in 1975 and subsequently transferred to Madagascar. In 1989, because of his success with young people and his impressive high qualifications and knowledge of languages,  his superiors appointed him director of a Vincentian theological seminary in Antananarivo, the capital of Madagascar, where he soon noticed the extreme poverty in the slums of the city and discovered the human degradation of the “garbage people ” scavenging the waste hills to find something to eat or to sell.

He thus convinced a group of them to leave the slums and improve their lot by becoming farmers, teaching them masonry skills, which he had learned as a young boy from his father, so they could build their own homes. The idea was to give these people a house, a decent job and an education. Since then the project has grown by leaps and bounds, offering housing, work, education and health services to thousands of poor Malgasies with the support of many international donors and friends of the association.

During his visit to the Akamasoa City of Friendship, on September 8, 2019, Pope Francis remarked that at its foundations “is a living faith translated into concrete actions capable of ‘moving mountains’” and that its success shows “that poverty is not inevitable”.  It is wonderful that a little known country has been enriched by one missionary, and his many years of toil are being recognized.

CLEMENTINE HUNTER was another black Catholic painter  whose scenes  were of Catholic ceremonies,  often including biblical characters represented as black. A large theme of her work was of a black Jesus on the cross.

She was born in 1887-or 88 into a  Creole family at Hidden Hill Plantation near Cloutierville, in Natchitoches Parish, Louisiana and was baptized  on March 19, 1887. When she was around five years old  she was sent to St. John the Baptist Catholic Church School, which was segregated.  The rules were so harsh  Clementine left school at a young age. She never formally learned to read or write and began working in the fields at eight years old, picking cotton alongside her father. (Our Mother Ruth began at age 4 in Georgia) Throughout her life she moved around in the Cane River Valley while her father looked for work. 

When Clementine  was about twenty in 1907, she give birth to her first child, Joseph Dupree, called Frenchie, by Charles Dupree, a Creole man about fifteen years  her senior. Charles is rumored to have built a steam engine with having only seen a picture and was well known for his highly skilled labor.Their second child, Cora, was born a few years later. Charles and Clementine never married, and he died in 1914.

In the late 1920s, Clementine began working as cook and housekeeper for Cammie Henry, the wife of John H. Henry. She was known for her talent adapting traditional Creole recipes, sewing intricate clothes and dolls, and tending to the house's vegetable garden. Before long, Melrose evolved into a salon for artists and writers in this period, hosted by Cammie Henry. In the late 1930s, Clementine Hunter began to formally paint, using discarded tubes from the visiting artists at Melrose.

She sold her first paintings for as little as 25 cents. But by the end of her life, her work was being exhibited in museums and sold by dealers for thousands of dollars. Clementine produced an estimated 5,000 to 10,000 paintings in her lifetime. She was granted an honorary Doctor of Fine Arts degree by Northwestern State University of Louisiana in 1986, and she is the first African-American artist to have a solo exhibition at the present-day New Orleans Museum of Art. In 2013, director Robert Wilson presented a new opera about her, entitled Zinnias: the Life of Clementine Hunter, at Montclair State University in New Jersey.

 In 1949, a show of Clementine’s paintings at the New Orleans Arts and Crafts Show garnered attention outside of the CaneRiverValley. An article was published about her in "Look"in June 1953, giving her national exposure.

Her paintings changed throughout her lifetime. Her early work, such as "Cane River Baptism" from 1950, features more earth tones and muted colors.[ Before the patronage and support from François Mignon and others, Hunter used paint left by visiting artists at Melrose Plantation, therefore she was working within other artists' palettes. Additionally, Clementine would frequently thin out her supply of paint with turpentine, creating more of a watercolor effect, which caused many Hunter scholars to believe she had a watercolor experimental phase. Beginning in the 1950s, her painting style was altered by arthritis in her hands.

From this period on, she leaned more towards abstract and impressionist work, with less fine detail, because it was difficult for her to paint. In 1962, her friend James Pipes Register encouraged her to become even more abstract, painting works like Clementine Makes a Quilt. However, by 1964, she returned to more narrative works. In the 1980s, as she approached one hundred years old, she began painting on smaller, more handheld objects like jugs. She died in 1988 at the age of 101. Obviously that hard work as a child did not effect her negatively.

She painted from memory, stating: "I just get it in my mind and I just go ahead and paint but I can’t look at nothing and paint. No trees, no nothing. I just make my own tree in my mind, that’s the way I paint."

The glory of winter is its bare simplicity:

                                           The freshly pruned fruit tree glows in shallow light,

                                           Concentrating its energy to swell the bud.

                                           Like an athlete trim and trained it is prepared

                                           For its coming season.

                                           Disciples too submit to pruning.

                                           Cut away cross purposes that slowly develop,

                                           Ill-conceived attachments that won’t bear up,

                                           Dead wood destined to never thrive again,

                                           Profuse clutter that saps and stunts growth,

                                           Spent but never taken fruit no longer wholesome.

                                           With sharp tools reshape

                                           The very structure of the frame toward vitality.

                                           There will be wounds slow to heal,

                                           There will be diminishment of size and scope.

                                           But soon each limb will share in purpose,

                                           Cleanly withstanding storm,

                                           Supporting heavy fruitfulness.

Beautiful poem  by our Oblate Rob Wilson  (2021) in time for Lent and spring.

A beautiful prayer for LENT by our old friend Servant of God Father Walter Ciszek, SJ,  who spent 20 years in Russian prisons- Fifteen in confinement and hard labor in the Gulag, and five preceding them in Moscow's infamous Lubyanka prison.

        The Prayer of Surrender

Lord, Jesus Christ, I ask the grace to accept the sadness in my heart, as your will for me, in this moment. I offer it up, in union with your sufferings, for those who are in deepest need of your redeeming grace. I surrender myself to your Father’s will and I ask you to help me to move on to the next task that you have set for me.

Spirit of Christ, help me to enter into a deeper union with you. Lead me away from dwelling on the hurt I feel: to thoughts of charity for those who need my love, to thoughts of compassion for those who need my care, and to thoughts of giving to those who need my help.

As I give myself to you, help me to provide for the salvation of those who come to me in need. May I find my healing in this giving. May I always accept God’s will. May I find my true self by living for others in a spirit of sacrifice and suffering.

May I die more fully to myself, and live more fully in you. As I seek to surrender to the Father’s will, may I come to trust that he will do everything for me.

As we continue to look at Black Catholics in the Church, we findSISTER ANNE MARIE BECRAFT, an American educator and nun. One of the first African-American nuns in the Roman Catholic Church, she established a school for black girls in Washington, D.C.

Anne Marie was born in 1805 to William and Sara Becraft, prominent free Black Catholics.  Her Father,  William Becraft, served as chief steward for many years at the Union Hotel and Tavern in the vicinity of what is now M and 30th Streets N.W.

  Anne Marie's grandmother, also a free Black, worked as a housekeeper for Charles Carroll (the only Catholic signer of the Declaration of Independence) and was likely his concubine. Carroll presented Annie Marie's father with several of the Carroll family’s prized relics, paintings, and other keepsakes just before Carroll’s death in 1832.

The oldest of seven children, Anne Marie began her formal education at the age of four at the white-operated Potter School in Washington, D.C. Race hostilities forced her to leave the school in 1812. She continued her studies at another white-operated school, New Georgetown, until 1820, when it closed because white involvement in the education of black people was discouraged. 

On September 8, 1832, Anne Marie received the religious name Sister Aloysius. The following year she took her vows and became the 11th sister to join the Oblates founded by Mother Lange.* She was a teaching oblate who instructed her students in arithmetic, English and embroidery.

From the age of 15 she had suffered from a chronic chest ailment. In 1833 her condition worsened and she was admitted to the order's infirmary. She died on December 16, 1833, at the age of 28.She was buried in Baltimore's OldCathedralCemetery.

On April 18, 2017, Georgetown University renamed Remembrance Hall  after Sister Anne Marie (Aloysius) Becraft.  Anne Marie Becraft Hall is the first building at GeorgetownUniversity to be named after an African-American woman. Marcia Chatelain, associate professor of history and African American studies and a member of the Georgetown University Working Group on Slavery, Memory, and Reconciliation, described Sister Anne Marie as "a devout Catholic and deeply committed to educating young girls of color in the nation’s capital. Though she experienced both anti-Catholic and anti-black intimidation, she nevertheless responded to her calling to teach and to serve God.”                                      

The 1870 “Condition and Improvement of Public Schools in the District of Columbia" stated that Becraft "is remembered, wherever she was known, as a woman of the rarest sweetness and exaltation of Christian life, graceful and attractive in person and manners, gifted, well educated, and wholly devoted to doing good.

 *Mary Lange, O.S.P., born Elizabeth Clarisse Lange, was a Black Catholic religious sister who founded the Oblate Sisters of Providence, the first African-American religious congregation. She was also, the first-ever African-American Mother Superior.