by Mark Salzman
I am
The cloister bell, the voice of Christ.
He spoke again:
I am
She tried to obey but was frozen in beauty, like a fly trapped in amber. She could not move.
Nothing exists apart from me.
Self had been an illusion, a dream.
God dreaming.
AUGUST 15
Assumption
Recreation, the hour of speech and laughter.
The nuns drifted through the garden like sailboats, some in pairs, some by themselves. Sister John paused at the fountain to dip her fingers in the water, then touch them to her lips. Someone had placed a spray of wildflowers at the feet of Saint Joseph, whose statue rose from the center of the fountain to welcome all thirsty visitors. Sister John splashed water over the blossoms so they would last longer. Each drop held an image of the world.
Sister Bernadette approached, dragging a garden hose behind her. She topped the fountain off with water, then she and Sister John stepped back to let the birds drink.
A wren eyed them from its perch in the ginkgo tree. It hopped down, one branch at a time, then made a nervous dash for Saint Joseph’s toes. Before it could dip its beak, a shrieking jay dove out of the sun and chased it off.
Sister Bernadette wagged her finger at the statue. “You’re not doing your job, pal.” Formerly a Dominican, Sister Bernadette had been a schoolteacher for a dozen years, then chaplain at a women’s prison for another ten before requesting a transfer to a contemplative order. She turned to Sister John. “Forgive me, but bullies really get under my skin.” She aimed the hose at the jay and squeezed the handle.
She grinned at the results, but her smile faded when she saw Sister Angelica burst out of the dormitory and march toward the fountain.
“Did I just see what I thought I saw?” Sister Angelica demanded. “Did you spray a bird with that hose?”
Sister Bernadette looked more annoyed than guilty. “He wasn’t letting any of the smaller birds drink. He’ll be back soon enough.”
Sister Angelica glowered at her. “Birds do what they do because God made them that way, and that’s his business. Only people can be cruel.” She wheeled around and stalked back indoors.
“She’s touchy when it comes to animals,” Sister John whispered.
“She’s touchy about everything, ” Sister Bernadette corrected. The real penance in cloistered life, most Sisters agreed, was not isolation; it was the impossibility of getting away from people one would not normally have chosen as friends.
Sister Bernadette sighed, then looked up into the trees to search for the little wren. Sister John saw it first. “He’s over there, on the wall.”
“I see him. Come on, little guy—no one’s going to ambush you now.”
The wren flew from the wall to a tree, then to a bush, then to Saint Joseph’s head. After a final look in all directions before making himself vulnerable, he dropped to the lip of the fountain and began drinking.
The two nuns stood still until the bird had quenched its thirst, bathed itself, and returned to the ginkgo tree to preen.
Sister Bernadette adjusted the nozzle to a fine mist and began cooling off the rosebushes. A rose petal dropped onto one of the flagstones. It reminded Sister John of sunsets in eastern Ohio, where the sun looked like a disc of copper welded onto a sheet of tin.
“Have you finished your poem for Saint Thérèse yet?” Sister Bernadette asked.
An obscure French nun while she lived, Thérèse of Lisieux succumbed to tuberculosis in 1897 at the age of twenty-five. Before dying, she managed to complete a brief autobiography, The Story of a Soul. The message of the book was simple: We needn’t fear God, or feel that we must do exceptional things to please him, because he loves the humblest soul as much as he loves the greatest saint.
Not everyone loved the manuscript at first. One prioress read it and huffed that “age and experience would have changed her opinions about spiritual matters.” Another declared, “The thought that this manuscript is now free for anyone to read distresses me beyond words.” Yet the book went on to earn Thérèse the swiftest canonization in Church history. Now, on the hundredth anniversary of her death, Saint Thérèse was to be made a Doctor of the Church, and the Superior General of the Carmelite Order had invited Sister John to compose a poem for the occasion. He had also requested that she make the journey across the Atlantic to deliver the poem in person, at the Vatican, as part of the celebration. The only other American nun scheduled to address the congregation was an abbess who had survived the Mexican Persecution and gone on to make foundations in Arizona, Nevada, and New Mexico.
“I’m working on it,” Sister John said quietly. “What if I get nervous? I’ve never read in front of a group of people before.”
Sister Bernadette laughed and shaded her eyes from the sun. “If you get nervous, they’ll be charmed. People like it when artists are shy.” She pointed the nozzle up for a moment, creating a miniature rainbow in the sunlight, but the mist drifted back on her glasses. As she took them off to dry the lenses with a handkerchief, she said, “Think of the food you’ll get to eat! Even the truck stops in Italy make their pasta fresh. If you don’t come back with a menu from every meal, I’ll spray you like I did the jay.”
AUGUST 22
Queenship of Mary
The scent of fresh bread greeted the Sisters as they filed into the refectory for noon dinner, the main meal of the day. Each nun stopped in the center of the room to bow toward the cross, then went to her place to stand until after grace had been said. At the signal from the prioress, they sat down and fastened their napkins to their habits.
They sat in pairs at small tables, all facing the center of the room. Mother Emmanuel and Mother Mary Joseph shared a table with a replica of a human skull resting on it, a reminder of everyone’s mortality and the insignificance of the austerities they endured now. After the prioress had given the benediction, Sister Angelica took the reader’s place at the rostrum and began reciting the day’s selection, a passage from Augustine’s Sermons on 1 John :
The entire life of a good Christian is in fact an exercise of holy desire. You do not yet see what you long for, but the very act of desiring prepares you, so that when He comes you may see and be utterly satisfied.
Sister Miriam began the server’s slow march around the table, ladling vegetarian soup into each nun’s bowl. The rest of the meal—bread, butter, and a spinach salad—was already on the table. Sister Elizabeth signaled for a spoon for her tablemate by raising her index and middle fingers. A Carmelite never asked for anything for herself in the refectory except bread and water. Sister Miriam signaled back with three taps on the chest—sorry— and returned with a wooden spoon.
The nuns made as little noise as possible while they ate, focusing their attention on the reader’s voice. The contemplative ideal of keeping one’s mind on spiritual matters at all times was never more threatened than while putting food into the body. For that reason, decorum in the refectory was maintained as strictly as it was in the choir; speech was forbidden in that room except during special feasts and nuns’ jubilee celebrations.
God means to fill each of you with what is good; so cast out what is bad! If He wishes to fill you with honey and you are full of sour wine, where is the honey to go? The vessel must be emptied of its contents and then be cleansed. Yes, it must be cleansed even if you have to work hard and scour it. It must be made fit for the new thing, whatever it may be.
When the prioress struck the wooden clapper to end the meal, Sister John winced. A headache had begun troubling her that morning during manual labor, and a whole hour remained before private prayer, when she could retire to her cell without drawing attention to herself. She gathered all of the crumbs on her napkin and ate them, a reminder of Jesus’ admonition: “Gather up the fragments that remain lest they be lost.” To waste anything would
be a fault against her vow of poverty.
She followed the others out of the refectory to the Chapter room, where nine chairs formed an open circle for the weekly community meeting. Shelves of books lined the room, their spines arranged by height to form pleasing, symmetrical designs. Under a portrait of the Virgin Mary, true Mother of the community, the Sisters had hung a bulletin board pinned with messages, special intentions, and scriptural quotes for the day.
When they had all taken their seats, Mother Emmanuel held an envelope in front of her and announced that she had wonderful news.
“I received this letter from Claire Bours yesterday. She’s asked to join us as a postulant!”
Sister Elizabeth looked like a can of soda that had been shaken hard, then opened. She popped up from her chair, clapped her hands, and asked, “Didn’t I say the letter would come this week? I knew it.”
“What made you so sure, Sister?”
“Because she’s just like I was. Her vocation makes perfect sense to me.” A former concert violinist, Sister Elizabeth had given up a career in music to heed the call to Carmel, and felt that this sacrifice only strengthened her commitment to religious life. She walked over to where Sister John sat, and gave her a hug. “You should be feeling so much joy right now!”
Sister John blushed, which made her headache worse. The new candidate had been inspired to look into the Carmelite Order after reading Sparrow on a Roof, Sister John’s book of essays and poems about contemplative life. Every religious hoped that her life of prayer and penance would benefit others, and to have that hope confirmed was a blessing, but too many blessings received by one person could be a problem. In the spiritual life, individual success often came at the expense of community harmony. “I feel grateful,” Sister John said, trying to shift attention away from herself. “We’re all so fortunate to have the opportunity to serve.”
Sister Anne frowned. “I worry that we’re comparing apples and oranges here. Sister Elizabeth was raised Catholic, and sensed a calling for years before she heeded it. Everything is new to this girl—she was only baptized two years ago. And she couldn’t be coming from a world more different from ours. She works in Hollywood. ” Sister Anne forced the word out as if it hurt.
A mixture of excitement and apprehension accompanied their discussion of the candidate. It was not just a matter of liking or not liking the woman; did she seem to have a genuine vocation to contemplative life? Did God want her in that particular community? Would she make a positive contribution there, or would she be a burden to the others?
Claire Bours was thirty-three years old, had a master’s degree in fine arts, and had worked as a film animator for eight years. In her letters to the prioress, she described a persistent questioning—who am I? why am I here? what is my purpose?—which would not go away in spite of her attempts to resolve it through achievements, travel, and intimacy. She wrote:
Four years ago I didn’t even know what a contemplative nun was, and a part of me hopes I am mistaken about this. I have doubts, I admit it. But I feel that I’ve got to give this voice, whatever it is, a fair chance to be heard.
She had visited the cloister for three days, and had impressed the nuns with her intelligence and warmth. An intriguing candidate, but one who raised inevitable questions. Was her sense of a vocation just a phase? Many successful people go through periods when they wonder, “Is this all there is?” and think about giving it all up for the spiritual life. Such vocations rarely last, however. Life in the cloister quickly becomes just as prosaic as life in the world—perhaps even more so. Once the person finds herself asking, “Is this all there is?” while peeling potatoes or laundering habits, she usually returns to the world.
“There’s no need to rush to a decision,” Sister Anne continued. “If her vocation is genuine, a little adversity will only make it stronger.”
Mother Emmanuel returned the envelope to the pocket of her tunic. “I agree that things have moved quickly for her, but I like the fact that she admits to having doubts. I tend to be more skeptical of those who say they are absolutely certain. Would anyone else like to share their thoughts?”
“God is calling her,” declared Sister Angelica, who was rarely equivocal about anything. “What more do we need to know?”
“You’re not concerned that she’s leaping from one extreme to another, with no middle ground?” Sister Bernadette asked.
“There is no middle ground when it comes to loving God. It’s all or nothing.”
Sister Bernadette bristled. “For most people, Sister, it’s more complicated than that.”
“Maybe it shouldn’t be!”
Mother Emmanuel ended the argument by asking for a moment of recollection. These short prayers reminded them of God’s presence in every aspect of their lives together, not just their time in choir or their cells. After this interlude, the prioress turned to Sister Miriam and asked quietly, “How do you feel about the new candidate, Sister?”
Sister Miriam looked startled. Novices did not vote on new admissions, so she hadn’t expected to be called upon during the meeting.
“A first impression, that’s all,” the prioress encouraged.
Sister Miriam folded her hands on her lap and said that Claire seemed enthusiastic, intelligent, and charming. The flatness in her voice undermined the compliments.
“Was there anything about her that made you uncomfortable?” the prioress asked. “You seemed to be keeping her at a distance, I thought.”
The color drained out of Sister Miriam’s face. “She had so little time here, I thought she’d want to spend as much of it as possible with the professed nuns. I didn’t want to get in the way, that’s all.”
Fragile silence. “Mother Mary Joseph?”
The Living Rule smiled. “Good teeth, good manners, sensible shoes. I liked her.”
The community cast a secret ballot and voted, six to two, in favor of offering Miss Bours admission.
“No doubt she will need time to put her affairs in order,” Mother Emmanuel said. “What a glorious year it will have been, between this and the completion of Sister Miriam’s novitiate. We’re seeing new growth in God’s hidden garden.” The others nodded their agreement as the prioress took another envelope out of her pocket. “That wasn’t the only good news to come in the mail this week. Sister John is too modest to mention this, but I’m going to embarrass her anyway: her book is going into another printing. We’ll definitely be able to replace the roof this year.”
The Carmel of St. Joseph traditionally depended on the sale of homemade jellies, greeting cards, and communion wafers to meet expenses, but its economic future had brightened considerably since Sister John discovered her gift for writing.
“None of it is my doing,” Sister John protested when the others congratulated her. She felt herself blushing again.
“Don’t keep your light under a bushel,” Sister Elizabeth advised. “Talent comes from God, but it only bears fruit through hard work.”
“One more fruit like that and we’d be able to make a foundation in Tahiti,” Sister Christine said. “What are you doing sitting here? You should be in your cell, writing.”
Sister John prayed that Mother Emmanuel would conclude the meeting soon. During recreation she could sit in a far corner of the room and pretend to write, without drawing any attention to herself or her malady.
Sister Anne, who changed the subject whenever Sister John’s book was mentioned during meetings, raised her hand and asked how everyone liked the high-fiber cereal she had instructed the extern nun to buy for breakfast. Several faces in the room drooped, but the Living Rule coughed politely and said, “It’s been a blessing for me, I must say,” and at least two other Sisters chuckled in agreement.
“But there is still the matter of the juices,” Sister Anne continued. “We have a choice of three juices now, because everyone seems to like a different kind,
but the cartons take up too much space in the refrigerator. I’m always having to rearrange things to make space for them. Couldn’t we just offer one flavor? Shouldn’t we, I mean? As a matter of poverty?”
In cloistered communities, where everything must be shared, members sometimes become territorial about objects under their care. It was no secret that Sister Anne, whose fidelity to the Rule was otherwise exemplary, had become fixated on the refrigerator.
“That wouldn’t be fair,” Sister Elizabeth teased. “Whoever happens to prefer that one juice would be denied the opportunity to practice poverty.”
Sister Anne—who felt that Sister Elizabeth’s sense of humor often crossed the boundary into sarcasm—asked dryly, “What would you suggest, then?”
Sister Elizabeth ignored the edge in Sister Anne’s voice. “There’s plenty of room in the refrigerator. All you have to do is stack a few things. Has anyone else noticed this, by the way? Nothing can go on top of anything else in the refrigerator. It’s become part of our Constitution, apparently.”
“If things pile up, they go uneaten, and—”
“Sisters,” Mother Emmanuel interrupted, “we have only a few minutes left for Faults, so let’s vote on the juices and move on.”
The community elected to maintain the present number of juices offered at breakfast. Mother Emmanuel struck the clapper to end the meeting and called on the Monitress to take over.
Sister Christine rose and began the ritual of Faults by saying in a voice clear of all emotion, “In charity I accuse Sister Elizabeth of whistling in her cell during spiritual reading, which several of us could hear.”
Mother Emmanuel imposed a standard penance of five decades of the Rosary. Sister Elizabeth nodded respectfully toward both the prioress and the Monitress, and the ceremony continued.
