Carmel Lights

 

By Sister Timothy Marie

Remember Angelus (L’Angelus) the wonderful oil painting by the French painter Jean-François Millet, completed in 1859? The painting shows two peasants bowing their heads in prayer while working in their field to pray the Angelus prayer. For centuries, three times daily the Angelus bell tolls from nearby churches, convents, and monasteries at 6 a.m., 12 Noon, and 6 p.m. This custom of ringing the Angelus bell alerts all those nearby that it is time to pray and the prayer is always the same for hundreds of years. Beginning in the 1400s Catholic would stop whatever they were doing and pray the Angelus. This is what the painting depicts.

At Sacred Heart Retreat House, we experience another very unique summoning to prayer as a daily occurrence. If you live in the San Gabriel Valley of Southern California you will recognize what I am describing right away. It is the predictable flying overhead of the wild parrots. Many stories circulate about how and when they began their progeny in this area. A pet store burned down and they got loose and inevitably increased and multiplied, or they escaped from the nearby arboretum, and the stories go on and on.

These magnificent wild parrots fly over our Sacred Heart Retreat House more or less in early morning and early evening about the time of the Angelus every single day. They are a call to me to pray, to stop whatever I’m doing and think of God. It is impossible not to hear them. Now don’t be thinking that there are only a few of them. There are literally hundreds of them. They love our beautiful trees and we can hear them flying near them, through them and sitting for several minutes on them. While they are conversing, one can hear nothing else. They are LOUD. St. Francis of Assisi would affirm that they are praising God with all their being through their squawking vocals.

So, I have learned to stop and pray when I hear these birds. We can use regular daily occurrences as reminders to pray. I still remember Sr. Regina Marie’s example of when the digital watch has 3 identical numbers (2:22) it is a reminder of God (who is Trinity—3 in one) saying I love you! I still remember that. In the same way, when I hear the amazing sounds of these beautiful, wild parrots, I use them as a reminder to stop whatever I’m doing for a few moments and pray.

And now that it is the Christmas season once again, I would like to introduce to those who may not yet know it to the Angelus prayer by which Catholics all over the world keep alive through prayer, when the Angel Gabriel was sent to the town of Nazareth to the Virgin Mary and that incredible moment when God became one of us in Jesus Christ.

V. The Angel of the Lord declared unto Mary.
R. And she conceived of the Holy Spirit.

Hail Mary, full of grace,
The Lord is with Thee;
Blessed art thou among women,
And blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus.
Holy Mary, Mother of God,
Pray for us sinners,
Now and at the hour of our death. Amen

V. Behold the handmaid of the Lord.
R. Be it done unto me according to thy word.

Hail Mary, etc.

V. And the Word was made Flesh.
R. And dwelt among us.

Hail Mary, etc.

V. Pray for us, O holy Mother of God.
R. That we may be made worthy of the promises of Christ.

LET US PRAY
Pour forth, we beseech Thee, O Lord, Thy grace into our hearts, that we to whom the Incarnation of Christ Thy Son was made known by the message of an angel, may by His Passion and Cross be brought to the glory of His Resurrection. Through the same Christ Our Lord. Amen.

A Blessed and Holy Christmas to each of you and for those who live nearby, we have our traditional Evening of Thanksgiving on December 31st beginning and 8:00p.m. (spiritual conferences, Confession, Holy Hour and a candlelight rosary procession to St. Therese Church just a block away. Join us in beginning 2014 with Midnight Mass at St. Therese Church.