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July
4, 2005 
VOL.
43, NO. 13Oakland,
CA
COMMENTARY
•Our Lady of Refuge is patroness of both Californias
•Getting a progress report—for prayer?
•U.S. ambassador to Vatican set the ‘gold standard’ for diplomacy
Our
Lady of Refuge is patroness of both Californias
In a side altar niche inside the Santa Clara Mission
church a painting reveals the Blessed Mother and Infant Jesus side by
side, their crowned heads inclined toward one another. Both look outward,
towards the viewer.
Their appearance is to portray Our Lady of Refuge, the patroness of California,
from the Oregon border to the tip of the Baja peninsula, a patronage that
spans the frontier. She has held the title, Patroness of Both Californias,
since 1843, and her feast is still celebrated here today - on July 5 in
Alta (Upper) California and July 4 in Baja.
The first Bishop of the Californias, Francisco Garcia
Diego y Moreno, proclaimed Our Lady of Refuge patroness of the new diocese
on Jan. 4, 1843 at Mission Santa Clara. “With so great a patroness
and protectress what can we not promise ourselves?” he wrote in
the proclamation. “What can be wanting and whom can we fear?”
Bishop Garcia Diego adopted a coat of arms that included nothing more
than the image of Our Lady of Refuge, and after his proclamation her image
graced each mission church. The paintings were usually the work of a local
or native artist.
All California missions and the parishes established later celebrated
her patronal feast with great solemnity, but over the years, with political
and historical shifts, the practice waned. It was revived in 1982 when
the Vatican approved a request from the California Catholic Conference
of Bishops to observe her feast day as an obligatory memorial.
During the last century and a half, the original Diocese of Both Californias
was divided many times on both sides of the border as the local Church
grew, but the image of Our Lady of Refuge remains as a reminder of that
early moment of Church history.
Until the end of the 19th century, priests in the Archdiocese of San Francisco
prayed a special liturgical office for the feast of Our Lady of Refuge.
The feast has always been observed in the Diocese of San Diego.
The original painting of Our Lady of Refuge came to the Franciscan College
of Zacatecas in Mexico from Italy via an Italian Jesuit missionary. Devotion
to the Mother of Jesus under this title and this pictorial representation
gained wide popularity among the Mexican and Californian Franciscans and
the people they served.
The proper name Refugio is still given to both male and female Mexican children at the time of birth and baptism, and her feast is still celebrated with its own proper prayers for the Eucharistic Liturgy and the Liturgy of the Hours.
Getting a progress report—for prayer?
I hate to admit it, but sometimes I wonder if I’m making any progress
in my prayer life. I study about prayer, teach about prayer, and write
about prayer, but am I really praying very well or just blabbing about
it? Am I growing any closer to God? How could I tell one way or the other?
I’ve been warned in the past—and by people who should know—that
there are dangers in becoming too obsessed with trying to figure out one’s
spiritual progress. Older spirituality manuals spoke of stages of the
spiritual life as various rungs on a ladder ascending to union with God
in heaven. Get too caught up in how high you’ve ascended, and you
run the risk of pride or a general holier-than-thou attitude.
Nevertheless, I believe there is a time, every now and then, when we should
take stock of our prayer lives. Why? Because prayer is about relationship,
our relationship with God, and even the best relationships can turn sour
when we don’t nurture them. Friends can grow distant and marriages
can gradually fall apart when not tended to lovingly. We don’t measure
relationships in terms of grades or statistics, but relationships can
develop deeper intimacy, oneness, and love—or die out from neglect.
Some people think that pleasant, happy, or exciting feelings during prayer
time are signs of progress. Not so. You might be blessed with consolations
or a natural high now and then, but this is not necessarily an indication
of progress. After all, Jesus experienced great anguish during prayer
on the night before he died. Was he regressing in his prayer life?!
Many of us Catholics calculate our net worth in prayer by counting the
number of rosaries, litanies, holy hours, or other devotions performed—or,
alternately, how many parish meetings, civic activities, and service projects
accomplished. (I’m guilty!) Although prayer practices and service
to others are good, sheer number of devotions or activities is not the
measure of one’s deepening intimacy with God.
Maybe some think if their spiritual life is really flourishing, they will
receive whatever they ask for in prayer. Not necessarily—it’s
more complicated than that. When Jesus asked God to spare him the pain
of the cross, God basically said no.
So, just what are the signs that your prayer life is “working”?
Writer Father Thomas Dubay gathers together classic indicators in his
book “Prayer Primer” (Ignatius Press, 2002). If you want to
know if your prayer life is improving, think about how you treat other
people. Are you gradually becoming more patient and humble? Are you growing
in the virtues? Do you exhibit more selfless love and fidelity to the
responsibilities of your calling? Do you serve others generously, even
people you don’t find interesting or attractive?
A long list of indicators of spiritual progress is also given in “An
Introduction to Spiritual Direction” by Father Chester Michael (Paulist
Press, 2004). Many of these relate to attitudes. Are you growing in gratitude,
recognizing that all that is good is a gift from God? Do you have greater
trust in God? How about more self-control? Do you yearn more for God?
Are you open to changing old ways of thinking, acting, judging, and speaking?
It’s important to note that spiritual maturation does not happen
overnight. Think back one year, five years, or even ten years when pondering
the above questions. Growth in even one area is forward movement.
Above all, progress in prayer is measured in terms of love. Christian
“perfection consists chiefly in charity,” writes classic Catholic
author Father Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange. It’s not about the number
of college degrees, volunteer hours, or warm fuzzy feelings, but the intensity
of compassion for others.
“God is love,” proclaims St. John the Apostle, “and
those who abide in love abide in God, and God abides in them” (1
John 4:16). Love is the true measuring rod of prayer because God is love,
and communion with this loving God is the true aim of prayer.(Julie McCarty
is a freelance writer from Eagan, Minn., whose syndicated column on prayer
appears in diocesan newspapers around the country. Contact her at soulwriting@yahoo.com.
)
U.S.
ambassador to Vatican set the ‘gold standard’ for diplomacy
Sometime in the next few months, a new U.S. ambassador
to the Holy See will be moving into Villa Richardson on Rome’s Janiculum
Hill. The shoes waiting to be filled there, and at the U.S. embassy to
the Holy See (which overlooks the Circus Maximus),
are large indeed.
Since the post was created during the first Reagan administration, Americans
of all faiths and political persuasions have been well-served by their
ambassadors to the Holy See: a distinguished group of men and women who
have brought lives of
accomplishment and good judgment to their work in the Vatican, and with
the diplomatic corps accredited to the Holy See.
Some served in relatively quiet periods; others had to tread a rockier
road. Still, I trust none of his distinguished predecessors, no matter
what the circumstances in which they served, will object if I suggest
that the recently-returned U.S. ambassador to the Holy See, R. James Nicholson
(now Secretary of Veterans Affairs), set a
new standard of excellence.
Jim Nicholson grew up in poverty on a tenant farm in northwest Iowa, knowing
hunger in his bones. After graduating from West Point
in 1961, he did eight years of active duty as a paratrooper, qualifying
as a Ranger and earning the Bronze Star in Vietnam. He retired from the
service with the rank of colonel after
22 years in the Army Reserve.
His active military career was followed by law practice and successful
ventures in real estate development; yet Jim Nicholson would likely say
that his greatest achievement was persuading Suzanne Marie
Ferrell, a wonderful woman and distinguished artist, to marry him.
They raised three children, even as Jim was becoming involved in politics,
becoming Colorado’s representative on the Republican National Committee
in 1986. Elected chairman of the RNC in 1997, he served through the tumultuous
2000 election,
after which President Bush nominated him as ambassador to the Holy See.
Ambassador Nicholson presented his credentials to Pope John Paul II days
after 9/11, and the years ahead would be dominated
by issues of war and peace. During times of real tension between Vatican
officials and the U.S. government, especially in the run-up to the war
in Iraq, Jim Nicholson kept his head, kept his cool – and kept the
conversation-partners in conversation. It was a remarkable performance
that earned the respect of everyone in Rome.
At the same time, he launched a series of initiatives that deepened the
conversation between the U.S. government and the Vatican on key global
issues of mutual concern.
One of the gravest human rights abuses of the early 21st century is the
awful practice of trafficking in persons, usually for purposes
of sexual exploitation. Jim Nicholson brought the trafficking issue to
Rome and compelled the representatives of countries
that might prefer to ignore the issue to face it squarely, in all its
moral squalor and human drama.
Ambassador Nicholson did the same in addressing the question of genetically-modified
foods.
Working with the Pontifical Academy of Sciences, Nicholson staged an international
conference that usefully challenged European protectionists and western
anti-corporate activists more inclined to scratch their ideological itches
than to see poor people fed; as the once-poor and hungry Nicholson put
it in a sharp op-ed piece in the
International Herald Tribune, there was something very strange about anti-corporate
ideologues who seemed to be telling faminestricken Africans that it was
“better to die than eat the food that Americans eat every day.”
Whatever their concerns about agricultural globalization, senior Vatican
officials seemed to agree. Jim and Suzanne Nicholson were gracious and
generous hosts, welcoming a broad cross-section of Americans into their
residence (where His Excellency, the ambassador, could sometimes be found
at 3 a.m. on Monday mornings, watching Denver Broncos’ games on
TV).
At the same time, their ambassadorship was a kind of four-year retreat:
every Lenten morning at 7:30 a.m., you could find
the Nicholsons at Mass in the Roman station church of the day.
I say “their” ambassadorship because Jim and Suzanne were
a marvelous team. Together, they set the gold standard. All
U.S. Catholics owe them a debt of gratitude for services brilliantly rendered.
(George Weigel is a senior fellow of the Ethics and Public Policy
Center in Washington, D.C.)
The image of Our Lady of Refuge remains on display at most of the 21 missions in Alta California, in the church or museum. Some of the best known are to be found in the church and museum at Santa Clara, Mission Dolores in San Francisco, Mission Santa Barbara, Mission San Carlos Borromeo at Carmel, and Mission San Luis Obispo.
U.S. Ambassador to the Holy See James
Nicholson at a talk at the Center for
American Studies in Rome by American
theologian Michael Novak, Feb. 10,
2003. Nicholson had invited Novak to
argue that the war with Iraq was a “just
war.” However, Novak failed to convince
the Vatican, and Pope John Paul
II sent a special envoy to President Bush
to urge him not to attack Iraq.
RNS PHOTO/CHRIS WARDE-JONES
