Shema

SOUL SCULPTING 2008


From an email written on 14 August 2008

Now for the latest news from LA P.
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Last night (August 13, 2008) at around 9 30 the doorbell rang. We had not even had dinner yet. At first we were not going to entertain these guests as the two rooms were not ready because I was going to do them today for the family of five that is arriving. BUT. I had a feeling. III, the informed Irish intuition, at work....

So we welcomed these particular angels.

This morning Odile informed me that they are from Paris but now live in Israel where...................she teaches French. Her "dream" has been to create a "cours intensif" in France for her students and, my dear Elissa (Gelfand who is a professor of French at Mount Holyoke and who directed my undergraduate and one and only thesis!), it looks like she has found the perfect place to do so. Yes, indeed. La Prévenchère (English) Language Academy cum B & B.

In a note written to Andrea Sununu, who is now a professor of English at DePauw but who was my first professor at Mount Holyoke:

Andrea-- One of my dearest friends is an orthodox rabbi who has always called me "Reverend Mother." No kidding. He is from London and his parents (his father was also a rabbi) sent him to Catholic grade school so that he would learn about "the other side." Barry is 69 years of age and has lived in MN for many, many years. We met in 1993 at the largest Lutheran church in the US -- Mount Olivet -- where I had organized a weekend-long conference on mental illness and where he spoke on the Sunday morning.Read on concerning our recent angels from Israel.C.OH. PS. My parents' bequest was used at Bradley Hills Presbyterian Church in Bethesda, MD to create art for the common area. The common area because for more than 30 years BHPC has shared its sanctuary and space with the Bethesda Jewish Congregation. Yes. Really. Bethesda.AND. The work of art commissioned with the bequest (equal to the amount my parents paid for our home...did I say "Beth"??????????????) is titled, "The Light of One God."
And as we know. "As above, so below."

The following is a note I wrote to Rabbi Barry Woolf on 15 August 2008, the Feast of Mary—Assumption:

My dear,When I make beds and clean toilets, I pray.Here is the prayer I usually say when I make beds: http://quieteyevirtualconvent.blogspot.com/2008/05/celtic-prayer.html

From
The Celtic Way of Prayer
Esther de WaalMarked by Claudia with a Salvador Dali bookmark from her 2003trip to France to this:"Making the bed provided them with the opportunity to reflect on God's many blessings.....
'I make this bed
In the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit
In the name of the night we were conceived,
In the name of the night we were born,
In the name of the day we were baptised,
In the name of each night, each day,
Each angel that is in the heavens.'"

HOWEVER.The other night after telling my newest angels about the "Grand Pardons" today in Brittany -- it is the Feast of the Assumption as you know -- and their having replied, "Nous sommes juifs" and my having then told them about you, my dear "rabbin" educated in Catholic schools --when I made their beds I said the Shema.***

I told Odile that this morning and she was very moved. She said, "How do you know about this?" And I forgot to tell her about "The Light of One God" at Bradley Hills and Bethesda Jewish Congregation!


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17 August 2008

Andrea Sununu asked me the other day how I prefer to be called: Christie or Christiana.

Here is my reply.

Dear Andrea,Funny you should ask. I have had a lovely time today thinking about this while making beds, etc.There is of course a story to tell. Or several. Read: AND several.

My full given name is Margaret Christiana. My mother's name was Mary Margaret. My sister's name is Mary Beth and we call her Beth. I understood after my mother died that she had given her name to her two daughters. Mary Beth and Margaret Christiana.

My paternal grandmother's name was Christiana. Her family and friends called her "Yonnie." Second generation German in Pittsburgh. In the late 19th century, she married Edward Adams, second generation Irish. (That is a story for another day because as you know, I am sure, marriages then not only between different ethnicities but ! Roman Catholics and Protestants were verboten....especially in cities like Pittsburgh.) My grandmother raised all eight of her children as Catholics. Their third child, whose name was Margaret Christiana, died when she was three years of age (as we say in the Midwest). Bless her heart, my grandmother always thought my mother had named me after her daughter when in fact.... My mother, to coin Elissa's phrase, never disabused her mother-in-law of this notion. I am so fortunate that none of my father's siblings chose this beautiful name for their children. My father was the eighth and last child and I am the last grandchild of Edward and Christiana Adams.******

My mother, as you know from "Soul Sculpting", loved words. Her wish was that I be called "Christie." Never Christiana when I was a child. "Christie." I think you understand why. Please remember that my father was then the Dean of the School of Pharmacy at Duquesne University and we were surrounded by the Holy Ghost Fathers and all of the nuns who were studying pharmacy with "Iron John." Christie.

Sidebar story: One evening my parents were entertaining...angels?...several Holy Ghost priests at our home in Pgh. Suddenly a three-year old Christie shouted and I do mean shouted, "JESUS CHRIST." My parents were absolutely mortified; in our home the Lord's name was never taken in vain, or rarely! And only by "Iron John" when he was in a fix! "GD IT" was what he said then. Never, never "JC."That being said he never said even the "GD" in the hearing of this little child. Not then.But wait, Andrea! There is more. As my mother told the story, the little Christie immediately dropped to her knees, raised her hands in prayer and said, "My Lord."This, my dear Andrea, is yet another true story. Really.End of sidebar.

My family called me "Chris." Even my mother very often called me "Chris." Three people in my life called me "Chrissie." Actually five. My father, Monique Legrand, her sister Suzanne, her best friend Elisabeth (also deceased ... just five years after Monique, from a brain aneurysm; I knew Elisabeth very well also and she was so young, so young when she died), and my friend Bob, who died in November 2004.***

When my father introduced me to people, he always introduced me as "my daughter, Chris." When my mother introduced me, it was always "my daughter, Christie."At school (grammar, junior high, senior high and MHC) and then when I moved here the first time, I was and still am actually "Christie."Another true funny story. In school of course when Miss Marjorie Baldwin, my first grade teacher, called the roll at Storrs Grammar School, she called, "Margaret Adams." I naturally did not reply "Here" because I am Christie Adams!***

When I moved back to the US in 1988 and in the circumstances you know, I asked very close friends in NYC to call me "Chris." I was so lonely and "Chris" reminded me of my family.When I moved to Minnesota I was even lonelier! (Thank God for Dorothy Day and _The Long Loneliness_ and for HJM Nouwen and for _Markings_....) I therefore introduced myself everywhere I went (Mary's lamb of sorts) as "Chris." That is what everyone from those years calls me.***Another sidebar. When I was at MHC and living on the German floor of Ham so that I could get a single but did not! one of my dearest friends, Carol Fitton, (and yes, there is another story there as well that I will tell you) used to call me Christiana. (She pronounced if for fun as CHREESTIANA". Her father was a Presbyterian minister.)She loved my name. And now there is Christie II as Carol named her daughter after me. Christiana Fitton Moyle.Christie II.End of this sidebar***

Fast forward now to 13 January 2005. "Chris," said Patti. "Meet Chris." Unbelievably many, many of his friends from MN call Christian "Chris." He is just not a "Chris"! Not, in my opinion, a "Chris." He is a Christian, Martin, Raphaël (mmmhmmm......). I have always called him Christian and he has always called me "Christiana." I am so glad as I love our name.

Final sidebar: I, too, love Montaigne's essay on friendship that Christian selected as his secular reading for our marriage. What then should I choose? I just could not find what I wanted; I could not find the perfect secular passage. No problem for the Biblical passages!I looked through all of my books of poetry (including one from a certain class in 1974--no kidding!) and essays or nearly all of them. And then I was inspired (yes, truly) to go to a book my mother had given me a very long time ago: _The Four Loves_ . Where I immediately came upon the reference to _The Pilgrim's Progress_ and another Christian and Christiana. (I cannot remember if I have sent you the second attachment. If so, here it is again. If not...well...read on!)End of last sidebar for this evening!

Here, finally, is the answer to your question. Call me "Christie" as that is how you think of me. I call myself "Christie" too! And my "Christie II" is a very special girl. Attached is a poem she wrote when she was eleven years of age. She is now twelve.I sent her the poems of Hilda Conkling, whose mother as you most likely know, was an English professor (or assistant prof) at Smith.

With my love,
Christie I


From the evening of 16 August 2008:

My dears,
It is late and I am tired. So many angels! One who is here for two weeks a professor of French, Latin and Education ... And there is so much more. But as I said it is late and I am tired. Those will be stories for another day.***A few minutes ago, I went to bed but wanted to read the Missal to relax and to be "inspired." (In both the literal and figurative senses!) Before going to sleep I wanted to "breathe deeply of God's peace", as Susan Andrews (our pastor for many years and through the best of times and the worst of times...) told me to do when I had a sinus operation in 1990.(Because in addition to entertaining all of these angels, my dear cat, Mistinguett, had a stroke three weeks ago and then last Monday fluid on the lungs. I have been hand-feeding her for three weeks. Equivalent of Ensure, vanilla milkshakes with egg now, chicken, tuna, water, ginger vaporizer inhalations and so forth and so on. Und so weite, und so weite... Well. Basically everything I did for my beloved parents and Aunt Lorraine. Including singing. My cats, by the way, always come to me when I sing...you simply will not believe this but ‘tis true, 'tis true..."Jesus Loves Me." Many people can now attest!Dear Mistinguett. Her illness has provoked all of the tears I never shed for my beloved ones. The human ones that is. I have cried a river and more tears in the past three weeks than in my entire life. Truly. This is a good thing for me. A very good thing.)***Back to a few moments ago.The Missal from Duquesne University was edited by one of my father's favorite Holy Ghost Fathers. It of course belonged to my dad and I have read it, shall we just say religiously, for many years and I always look to it for solace. Just now I looked at today's feast. Yesterday of course was the Assumption of the BVM, if you happen to be Catholic! Then I looked forward to August 22, the anniversary date of my father's passing.Lo and behold.August 22 is yes. That is correct. The Feast of the Immaculate Heart of Mary.****For those of you who did not know them. My mother's name was Mary. My father's name was John.Peace and blessings.C.


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Finally, we entertained English angels the other day. Here follows the email I received from Susie Bromwich last night. Susie is also a development director for grammar schools in England. Her nine-year-old daughter’s name is Lucie.

Dear Christiana

We had such a great time staying with you at La P, thank you so much.

I have looked out my copy of 'Labyrinth' and will send, it is a great story, not too highbrow, but a 'must' for all Grail followers, and set in Languedoc.

How is your little cat? Lucie said she thought she might be a a Russian Blue - I wonder... when I was little we had a Russian Blue called...'Magnificat'!!! (my brother was a chorister and we are all musicians, and also Russian Blues orginate from the town of Archangel in Russia, so that's how the name came about. Anyway, we hope your little cat is ok.

Lucie loves Eloise and promises me she will finish it tomorrow and then I can read! I read all of 'Thirst' last evening and will read some again, I like her sea, sky and earth. I did enjoy your reference to angels: - travellers (of course!) - in our home we have always lit a candle in our window every evening for travellers, but I hadn’t made the connection to angels till you forwarded the
e mail. Glad that more angels are calling in.

We had a rough crossing, everyone sick except us, we got home at 3am!

Thanks for finding my nightdress, sorry to have put you to trouble, please give best wishes to Christian, lots of hugs to your both from us

Susie and Lucie