It is so simple.
This is excerpted from a talk Cynthia gave at our summer program a few years ago.
Do you realize that as you got of bed this morning, you were creating a Christian culture? You were! And I want to tell you how I can make such an audacious statement.
A couple of years ago, at St Mary’s, we started a lecture series on Christian culture, and I was asked to give one of the lectures. As I prepared, I asked myself, “What is culture?” In the dictionary, culture is described as music, art, literature, etc. In other words, the fine arts.
Yet, as I continued my research, I saw that culture is so much more. Culture is the realm of human life. Everything we do creates culture: our food, our work, our family life, even the clothes we wear. No matter how young or old, how hidden or famous you are, you shape our culture by the way you live.
During my preparation for this lecture, I read some wonderful things. Cardinal Jean-Marie Lustiger, former Archbishop of Paris wrote in an article, “We as Catholics are responsible for our culture. If we live in a secular culture, we are responsible for changing it!”
Jacques Maritain, a French Catholic philosopher said, in his book Art and Scholasticism, “If you want to create a Christian work, then be a Christian and simply make a beautiful work into which your heart will pass. Do not say that Christian art is impossible; say rather that it is difficult, doubly difficult to be an artist, and it is difficult to be a Christian.”
So how do we go about not only creating culture but a Christian culture? It is surprisingly simple!
Last year I was asked to give days of recollection in a couple of parishes on the sanctity of ordinary life. This is a vital part of my life. Catherine Doherty, our foundress, has based our Madonna House spirituality on it, and her vibrant way of describing that to wash a cup with love could save the world was what convinced me to join Madonna House. For these talks, however, I also wanted to see what the Church had to say about this topic of sanctity for the laity.
Lumen Gentium, the Vatican II document on the Church, has some inspiring things to say. The Latin words “Lumen Gentium” mean “light of the world.” Christ is the light, and we, the Church, are meant to be his reflection. If you have never read this document, I encourage you to do so.
In the section on the laity, there is an awe-inspiring quote by the Council Fathers on the role of the laity in the world. “The laity are called in a special way to make the Church present in those places and circumstances where only through them can she become the salt of the earth. Christ vivifies them in his Holy Spirit through baptism and confirmation [and] urges them on to good and perfect work. …
“For all their works, prayers, apostolic endeavors, their ordinary life, their daily labor, their mental and physical relaxation, and the hardships of life, all of these are their participation and their reflection of Christ!”*
These words profoundly affected me. All their works, prayers, apostolic endeavors their ordinary married life their daily labor their mental and physical relaxion …reflect Christ! Amazing!
I like to start my day by sipping a cup of coffee and staring out the window, watching the dawn. I am not thinking of anything in particular. It is my mental relaxation, as Lumen Gentium calls it, and this is reflecting Christ? Really? Yes, now, I believe it.
So how do we build culture? We bake bread, we go to work, we plant food, we cook and clean, we marry, we raise children, we endure sickness and old age, and we die. All of our life, no matter how seemingly unimportant it is — this is how we build culture.
That is why today, for my talk to you, I wanted to make some coffee cake and put flowers on our tables. Our breakfast, here at Madonna House is simple, but by adding a few little touches to it, I wanted to emphasize how we make culture. It is so simple.
Our Christian faith is built on the reality that God became a human person. Everything we do can shine as a reflection of him, the Light of the World.
Our Madonna House Little Mandate calls us to “Preach the Gospel with our lives.” Let’s have confidence that through our daily life, lived with the vitality of our faith, the Lord will aid us in creating a magnificent Christian culture.
You are the light of the world. A city built on a hill cannot be hidden. Nor do people light a lamp and put it under a basket, but put it on a stand and it gives light to all in the house. In the same way let your light shine before others so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven” (Mt 5:14-16 ESV).
* Documents of Vatican II, Lumen Gentium Chapter IV # 33 and 34.
[Photo: Pretzel making 2023. Photo by ©Joanne Slugocki, MH]
