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FRANCISCAN SISTERS OF PERPETUAL ADORATION

Response to Iverson Freking Award - Sister Marlene Weisenbeck
January 23, 2008

To Offer a Precious Service to the Gospel

Someone remarked that the awardees today represent the best of a feminine Trinity. I couldn't be more pleased to share this recognition with Bishop April Larson and Sheila Garrity; Sheila - the quintessential beatitude woman who brings about God's desire for the world in many known, and yes unknown ways, in our community and beyond; Bishop Larson - a recognized church leader, facilitator, inspired reconciler. CONGRATULATIONS, my friends!

A special note of thanks is due to those who nominated me and to the Bethany St. Joseph Corporation for providing this public venue where we can equally demonstrate our baptismal call. While it is not always possible to share the same stage because of boundaries that separate us in terms of doctrine or governance - even within our own churches, I must say - this award highlights the Gospel that is proclaimed in a way that knows no boundaries. There are times when I think that God really intended that divine Wisdom needs to be expressed in many forms of faith, so that the prism of God's goodness is given full exposure. In this event itself we "offer a precious service to the Gospel" by blending our voices in love and harmony.

Ecumenical academician I am not. I have no academic degrees in ecumenical theology. I have never worked on any international commission recording and interpreting the results of world wide consultations on theological issues of communion, ordination, ministry or baptism. (It's my brother who has done that!) "Practitioner in a few limited situations" is the best I can say for myself. St. Francis himself is sometimes called a vernacular or practical theologian. So I am satisfied to think of myself as an everyday or eclectic ecumenist, witnessing to the Franciscan openness to the work of Spirit in the lives of ALL people of faith.

My ecumenical experience began in a little town in West Virginia with the biblical name of Philippi where I spent two years teaching at a Baptist College. There I was, a Catholic Sister living my faith and vocation on a Baptist campus. There was no choice but to enter into dialogue with my Baptist, Episcopalian, and other-than-Catholic Christian friends. I found myself leading prayer from time to time at the weekly chapel services on the college campus, accompanying the local performances of the Messiah, a Bach Oratorio, Beethoven's Ninth Symphony, teaching Gregorian chant to the college music majors (they were mystified about all the punctums, melismas, scandicus and podatus), or sharing an "O Antiphon" Advent service with the local Christian Churches. The persons there who got me involved ecumenically was Ray Shaw and his wife Ann. Ray was one of the first deacons to be ordained in the post-Vatican II Catholic Church. I couldn't be more pleased that he is here today as I receive this award.

Some years later I found myself with an Orthodox iconographer and a religious community of Sisters of the Byzantine Rite teaching and learning about Greek iconography in Hungary, Slovakia and Romania. By partaking from the palette of Christ's essence among us, we created a more fulfilled image of that which we seek. What we sought was a beatitude life in relationship to one another in community, in local and world transformation. It is interesting to observe how we write with lines, color and hues the numinous nuances of God alive in us.

For me, the spiritual discipline of the arts has provided a methodology needed for dialogue in many different kinds of situations. For example, it is only after hours and days of practice that a musician can announce her message on stage. As well, writing icons or any type of artist's endeavor teaches about the power of process, patience and the striving for the Ultimate. Think, for example, of the lessons learned by an accidental smudge on gold leaf, the creativity needed to mix colors for a hue imagined in the mind's eye, or blending one's voice in harmony with others. The iconographers and musicians here will recognize what this means.

As in the arts, ecumenical dialogue requires attentiveness to the other and keen listening to hear the polyphony of the religious universe. It is about praying in each other's energy fields and in that reverent stance before God, communally manifesting the Presence of God.

In the time of St. Francis there were no Lutherans, Calvinists, Unitarians, Baptists - only Catholics, Cathars, Patarini, Waldensians, Muslims - all having an evangelical penchant for the Gospel. Francis made no judgment on any of them. He simply lived his faith in a radical way, even in the midst of a greedy merchant father, warring uncles, confused clerical leaders. St. Francis committed himself to a relationship with God in the deepest personal way. In the end, all he could exclaim was: Who are You, O God, and who am I?

The pulsing Mystery of the same sacred source of Love beckons us to unite around the realities of our time. In this time of religious pluralism I hope we will continue to know more fully the God beyond all naming through those we are called to serve. There we will find meaning both for ourselves and for the sake of the entire community of life on this planet.

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