Reflection on a Life of Devotion: A little shpeel on My Saint

St. Edith Stein (Teresa Benedicta of the Cross) is my confirmation saint. Unable to find the life of a saint that drew me in, a friend of mine (a very intelligent soul) drew my attention to her.

She was raised Jewish, the youngest in a large German family, but converted to Catholicism in the early 1900's. A little more than a decade later, she entered the Cologne Carmel Order. She was removed to Holland due to the political turmoil in Germany (the rise of Nazism.) When Holland was taken by the Nazis, Edith (Teresa) was arrested and eventually taken to a concentration camp where she died in the gas chambers.

"Out of the unspeakable human suffering caused by the Nazis in western Europe in the 1930's and 1940's, there blossomed the beautiful life of dedication, consecration, prayer, fasting, and penance of Saint Teresa. Even though her life was snuffed out by the satanic evil of genocide, her memory stands as a light undimmed in the midst of evil, darkness, and suffering" (http://www.catholic.org/saints)

But here is something I never knew: She was beatified by Pope John Paul II (the Great) at the Cologne Cathedral (where she was originally baptized into the Faith) in 1987 -- the year I was born!
Coincidence? I think not.

My Sweet, Crushed Angel

You have not danced so badly, my dear,
Trying to hold hands with the Beautiful One.

You have waltzed with great style,
My sweet, crushed angel,
To have ever neared God's Heart at all.

Our Partner is notoriously difficult to follow,
And even His best musicians are not always easy
To hear.

So what if the music has stopped for a while.
So what
If the price of admission to the Divine
Is out of reach tonight.

So what, my dear,
If you do not have the ante to gamble for Real Love.
The mind and the body are famous
For holding the heart ransom,
But Hafiz knows the Beloved's eternal habits.

Have patience,
For He will not be able to resist your longing
For long.

You have not danced so badly, my dear,
Trying to kiss the Beautiful One.
You have actually waltzed with tremendous style,
O my sweet,
O my sweet, crushed angel.

FROM
I Heard God Laughing Poems of Hope & Joy
Renderings of Hafiz
by Daniel Ladinsky

Tipperary

It will take me years to make sense of all this -- to make emotional sense, that is. I know that I'll go back over the "evidence" again and again for things that I insufficiently celebrated.

Such as the size of the spirit possessed by my mother, April Burke -- to use the money she had been left for such a noble and brilliant enterprise, to keep beauty preserved. And to perceive the man who loved her, even if it took her a while. Or did it?

And such as my real father, Charles O'Brien, whose writings taught me that we do not have to continue as we were. Or thought we were.
And that life brings out its brightest colors only when you ask.

FROM
Tipperary: A Novel
by Frank Delaney