‘Finish Your Life on the Cross’: Spiritual Motherhood in Saint Catherine of Siena’s Letters to Priests” by Sister Gabriella Yi, O.P was published in\u00a0<\/i>L’Osservatore Romano (August 12th-19th English edition). The author, Sister Gabriella Yi, O.P., is a member of the Congregation of St. Cecilia in Nashville, TN (also known as the Nashville Dominicans). A few times in the past I have posted some items on spiritual maternity and its necessity in the Church today, especially in the life of the priest.<\/i><\/p>\n
At the foot of the cross, in the heart of the redemption, Our Lord Jesus Christ instituted a “new motherhood of Mary,” as he\u00a0entrusted his mother to his beloved disciple and his beloved disciple to his\u00a0mother. From this entrustment flows Our Lady’s spiritual motherhood of each\u00a0member of Christ’s body, the Church, and especially her motherhood of his\u00a0priests. Her maternal care for each priest was brought to our attention in a\u00a0particular way by the Congregation for the Clergy’s teaching that,\u00a0in union\u00a0with Mary, all women are invited to live out their vocation to spiritual\u00a0motherhood by offering their prayers and sacrifices for the salvation of souls and the holiness of Christ’s priests.<\/p>\n
In his 1988 apostolic letter,\u00a0Mulieris\u00a0Dignitatem<\/i><\/b><\/a>, Pope John Paul II speaks of motherhood and virginity as two important and related dimensions of a woman’s vocation. He describes how the\u00a0vocation to motherhood is inscribed in the very being of a woman<\/i>: she is not\u00a0only physically but also psychologically endowed with the capacity to create a\u00a0space within herself for another human being. John Paul speaks of this as a special\u00a0“entrustment” that God has made to woman; she has the beautiful\u00a0privilege of bringing forth new life into the world by the generous use of her\u00a0feminine gifts.<\/p>\n Even those called to a life of consecrated virginity are not\u00a0excluded from this vocation to motherhood. For them, John Paul says, there is\u00a0the possibility of “a different kind of motherhood: a motherhood\u00a0‘according to the Spirit\u2019. “In the life of consecrated women, this\u00a0motherhood “can express itself as concern for people, especially the most needy<\/i>\u2026.\u201d John Paul is careful to point out that this concern for others on\u00a0the part of consecrated women is\u00a0motivated by spousal love for Christ<\/b>. Just as\u00a0natural motherhood is the fruit of the spousal love in marriage between husband and wife, spiritual motherhood is the fruit of the spousal love in religious\u00a0life between the consecrated virgin and Christ.<\/p>\n What may come as a surprise to\u00a0some is John Paul’s insistence that spiritual motherhood is not limited to\u00a0unmarried women: “And does not physical motherhood also have to be a\u00a0spiritual motherhood, in order to respond to the whole truth about the human\u00a0being who is a unity of body and spirit?” John Paul II evidently sees it\u00a0as an important dimension of every woman’s vocation.<\/b><\/p>\n The doctor of the Church who\u00a0most clearly articulates this vocation to spiritual motherhood is the 14th\u00a0century Dominican tertiary Saint Catherine of Siena, who is perhaps best known\u00a0for the prayers, sacrifices, and counsel she offered Pope Gregory XI in his\u00a0decision to return the papacy from Avignon to Rome. In looking to her as a\u00a0model of spiritual motherhood for priests, we discover that Catherine teaches\u00a0not only by the example of her prayers and sacrifices, but also by the counsel\u00a0she offers in her letters: “See that in everything you turn to Mary as you\u00a0embrace the cross,” “Make your home in the\u00a0pulpit of the cross,”\u00a0and “Finish your life on the cross,” encouraging her spiritual sons\u00a0to identify themselves ever more closely with Christ the High Priest.\u00a0Catherine’s spiritual motherhood, as seen in these letters, offers us a rich\u00a0source of inspiration as we enter into this “Year for Priests.”<\/p>\n Catherine’s\u00a0letters to priests often include words of encouragement in times of difficulty,\u00a0as she writes to Blessed Raymond of Capua, referring to herself in the third\u00a0person: “I’ve heard from a servant of God who constantly holds you before\u00a0God in prayer, that you have been experiencing tremendous struggles and that\u00a0your spirit has been overtaken by darkness because of the devil’s illusions and\u00a0deceits.” With this image of holding a soul before God in prayer, as a\u00a0mother holding her child out so that its Father might take it up into his arms,\u00a0Catherine reveals the maternal quality of her prayer. With a mother’s intuition\u00a0illumined by the Holy Spirit, she perceives the spiritual darkness he has\u00a0fallen into and explains the enemy’s tactics: “He wants to make you see\u00a0the crooked as straight and the straight as crooked, and he does this to make\u00a0you stumble along the way so you won’t reach your goal.” In the face of\u00a0such diabolical attempts to impede his priestly ministry, Catherine assures\u00a0Raymond, “But take heart. God has provided and will continue to provide\u00a0for you, and his providence will not fail you.”\u00a0A priest’s confidence is to be placed, not in himself, where it is sure to fail, but in God’s\u00a0providential care for him, especially in the form of his mother. As Our Lady’s\u00a0maternal love for her son embraced him from the moment of his Incarnation to\u00a0his death on the cross, so, too, does her maternal love embrace his priests in\u00a0her constant intercession for them. Thus, they can entrust their priestly\u00a0hearts wholly to hers, especially in times of discouragement, as Catherine\u00a0advises, “See that in everything you turn to Mary as you embrace the\u00a0cross.”<\/p>\n But it is not enough to embrace the cross-it must be mounted, as\u00a0Catherine explains in her letter to Frate Bartolomeo Dominici: “After the\u00a0fire of the Holy Spirit had descended on [the disciples], they mounted the\u00a0pulpit of the blazing cross, where they felt and tasted the hunger of God’s\u00a0Son, his love for humankind.” With this striking image,\u00a0Catherine\u00a0expresses the complete identification of Christ and his priests on the cross,\u00a0blazing with the fire of divine charity, where they feel what he felt and taste\u00a0what he tasted in his all-consuming love for us<\/b>. Only from such a pulpit of\u00a0divine charity do the words of priests wield supernatural power: \u201cThen their words came forth as does a red-hot knife from a furnace, and with its\u00a0heat they pierced their listeners to the heart and cast out the devils.”\u00a0Indeed, many of Catherine’s own listeners were pierced to the heart, not only\u00a0by her words, but also by those of the priests to whom she sent them in the\u00a0pulpit of the confessional. Whether he is casting out devils in the\u00a0confessional or at the altar, the pulpit of the cross is where the priest of\u00a0Christ belongs, as Catherine implores, “So, my dearest son, I beg you-it\u00a0is my will in Christ Jesus-make your home in the pulpit of the cross.”<\/p>\n From\u00a0this pulpit, a priest of Jesus Christ engages in a battle for souls, beginning\u00a0with his own, which is why in her letter to Frate Ranieri Catherine urges,\u00a0“I long to see you a real knight, fighting against every vice and\u00a0temptation for Christ crucified with a true holy perseverance.” With such\u00a0chivalric imagery, she appeals to his masculine instincts for battle and\u00a0adventure, as she continues, “For it is perseverance that is crowned. You\u00a0know that\u00a0victory is achieved by fighting and perseverance. In this life we are\u00a0set as on a battlefield and we must fight courageously, not dodging the blows\u00a0or retreating, but keeping our eyes on our captain, Christ crucified, who\u00a0always persevered.” Just as no soldier goes into battle at his own\u00a0initiative, but solely at that of his captain, so too must a priest take his commands from Christ, who:<\/p>\n . . . didn’t give up when the Jews said, ‘Come\u00a0down from the cross!’ Nor did the devil or our ingratitude make him give up\u00a0fulfilling the Father’s command and our salvation. No, he persevered right up\u00a0to the end, when he returned to the eternal Father with the victory he had\u00a0achieved, the victory of having rescued humankind from darkness and given us\u00a0the light of grace once again by conquering the devil and the world with all\u00a0its pleasures. And it killed him: this Lamb took death for himself in order to\u00a0give us life; by his dying he destroyed our death.<\/p>\n Finally, as no soldier\u00a0dies for an abstraction he holds,\u00a0but for a beauty he loves<\/b>, so too must\u00a0Christ’s priests live and die for love of the beauty of his bride, the Church<\/i><\/b>.\u00a0Hence, Catherine concludes her letter to this priest simply with, “Finish\u00a0your life on the cross.”<\/p>\n In these letters to Blessed Raymond of Capua and\u00a0other priests, the voice of Saint Catherine of Siena as a spiritual mother is\u00a0unmistakable. The authority with which she speaks is that of one whose\u00a0spousal\u00a0love for Christ united her so closely to him that his desire for the salvation\u00a0of souls and the holiness of his priests has become her very own<\/i>. As Catherine\u00a0joins “that gentle mother Mary” in interceding for Christ’s priests,\u00a0she invites us to do the same. In light of the Congregation for the Clergy’s\u00a0document calling for spiritual mothers for priests and Pope Benedict XVI’s\u00a0dedication of the current year as a “Year for Priests<\/b><\/a>,” a rediscovery\u00a0of this spiritual mother’s letters to priests could not be more timely.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" ‘Finish Your Life on the Cross’: Spiritual Motherhood in Saint Catherine of Siena’s Letters to Priests” by Sister Gabriella Yi, O.P was published in\u00a0L’Osservatore Romano (August 12th-19th English edition). The author, Sister Gabriella Yi, O.P., is a member of the Congregation of St. Cecilia in Nashville, TN (also known as the Nashville Dominicans). A few … Continue reading Spiritual Maternity in Saint Catherine of Siena<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[19,32],"tags":[1959,2156,1792,2076,32104],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/communio.stblogs.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25027"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/communio.stblogs.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/communio.stblogs.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/communio.stblogs.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/communio.stblogs.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=25027"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/communio.stblogs.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25027\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":29393,"href":"https:\/\/communio.stblogs.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25027\/revisions\/29393"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/communio.stblogs.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=25027"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/communio.stblogs.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=25027"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/communio.stblogs.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=25027"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}