Letter from Cardinal Marc Ouellet, Prefect of the Congregation for Bishops, to Mother Clare Agnese Acquadro, Abbess of the Protomonastery of the Poor Clares of Assisi.
Dear Mother Agnes, you phoned me about the coronavirus pandemic. It was the time when Pope Francis asked families in involuntary isolation that their hearts go beyond the home. Cor ad cor loquitur. We helped each other to respond in faith and you begged me to write a few words to your nuns.
I do this willingly out of friendship, but above all in the name of Jesus who one day called you to voluntary isolation out of love. Are you not blessed because you walk with Him to the heart of the pilgrim Church, opening your soul more and more to the secrets of His Heart? It is sometimes thought that you have fled the world to rejoice peacefully in God’s friendship. Current events free us from this partial vision. In fact, at a time when, despite the heroism of men and women working in health care, so many families suffer the illness and death of their loved ones in solitude, without being able to accompany them or give them the final farewell, you, contemplatives of the Crucified One, are at their bedside, you to whom the Spirit enlarges the heart to the most hidden frontiers of suffering humanity.
Dear Mother Agnes, the pandemic which confines us in our house is your hour, the hour of contemplative life which brings humanity and the Church back to God, to the essentials of faith, prayer and communion in the Spirit. You, brides of the immolated Lamb, bow maternally over those dying during the day and those struggling with despair during the night, and invoke on every pain and every death the consolation of Hope which does not disappoint. Your discreet and widespread presence, carried by the Breath of the Risen One and the fragrance of His nuptial Love, is a balm of tenderness and peace on the wounds of all brothers and sisters in humanity.
How is this possible? This question is asked by a generation paralyzed by the globalization of indifference and blinded by the cult of Mammon. Yet, in the great test of today, each conscience is questioned by this planetary arrest which resembles a universal Lent. The fear of uncontrollable contagion, the collapse of financial stock exchanges and social paralysis force us to open ourselves to more essential questions. One day, the Virgin of Nazareth, astonished by the Angel’s Annunciation, asked a question that was vital for the whole of humanity: How will this happen, since I know not man? The divine answer, unheard of, came down from heaven: The Holy Spirit will descend upon you and the power of the Most High will cover you with his shadow. This response inaugurates the last stage of God’s plan, his marriage to his creature in Jesus Christ, He who raises his created bride to the highest peaks of Love.
This dream was that of divine Wisdom at the origins of creation, when the Spirit hovered over the primordial waters, preparing the Garden of Eden for the happiness of the human family. The Lord created me as the beginning of his activity, before all his work, at the origin. When the abysses did not exist, I was generated (Pr 8:22,24). Wisdom was not at all upset by the madness of humanity, she was able to lead it back from its bewilderment with the madness of Jesus’ Love until death on the Cross. For this reason, God exalted him and gave him the name which is above all names, so that in his Name we too might share in the prerogatives of his creative and redeeming love.
Dear nuns and contemplative souls who guard the hope of our threatened land, the Love of the Redeemer who married you, this Love without frontiers and without limits in the freedom of the Spirit, allows you to fly high and far like messenger doves of Peace and Hope. The Love that has been charged with our sorrows and our errors, that was made sin in our favor (2 Cor 5:21) and that has overcome evil, death and Hell with its obedience, this immolated and victorious Love leads you with it in its race towards the most suffering victims of its mystical body.
Saint Teresa Benedicta of the Cross (Edith Stein), destined for the hell of Auschwitz, one day expressed it this way: Do you hear the moans of the wounded on the battlefields? Do you hear the rales of dying people’s agony? Do the moaning, thirst and pain of men move your heart? Do you wish to be near them, to help them, to comfort them and to heal their deepest wounds?
Embrace Christ. If you are united to him with the nuptial bond, his blood will flow in your veins, his blood that heals, redeems, sanctifies and saves. Joined to him you will be present in all places of pain and hope”. (Ave Crux, Spes unica, September 14, 1939).
In the days of that horrible tribulation, Etty Hillesum, another sacrificed Jew, in ecstasy by a joy wholly Christian because of a fascinating intimate discovery, tenderly held her God to help Him, because she felt Him wounded by an unspeakable hatred.
It is true that we are not all chosen souls, the weight of error weighs down our wings of compassion, but is not our contemplative life wrapped up in Mary’s immaculate offering, indissolubly united to the Easter sacrifice of her divine Son? What is the point, then, of mourning heavily for our sins? Let us forget our misery and have eyes only for this infinitely fruitful Covenant of which we bear joyful witness to the world. Because of the voluntary isolation of our souls hidden in the cracks of the rock, are we not the Church-Bride dedicated to the worship of the Bridegroom God, representing the whole of humanity, ardently awaiting his return like the sentinels of dawn?
Dear contemplatives of the Lord’s Passion, you find in this suffering of Love all humanity and all divinity united in one flesh. You are lovingly present to God and in God to all creation which He carries in His sovereign hand. In love, you move the stars, you move the mountains, you irrigate the earth with subterranean and purifying living waters, you turn the hearts of Angels and men towards peace in history, you embellish the Church with flowers and tasty fruits, in short, you cheer the Heart of the Holy Trinity with your resonant praise to the Glory of his Love.
Since you are in the front line of the Church in all the battles of the Spirit, we, priests and laity grappling with the urgent needs of the field hospital, lift our eyes to the light that shines on the Tabor of your cloisters. We stand in the plain supported by your listening to Jesus and your arms raised to heaven. Your life illuminates our life and makes us more alive from this divine Life to be given to the beggars of this world. Be blessed and thanked by Him whose intimacy fills every desire and even more so. Take care of us in your prayer, together with the Successor of Peter who implores you to assist him always and above all in this hour of the pandemic.
Dear Mother Agnes, in this unprecedented time of Lent and hope, I remain united and grateful to you for your call, glad of this deeper communion which rekindles our hope in the Risen Christ. Glory to God, Thanks be to you, Peace on this Earth in the midst of its tribulation!
