Wednesday, June 15, 2011
What Does Pepe Say to His Sisters?
By Richard R. Mickley, Ph.D., a 21st century Rizal admirer
We are all preparing to observe and celebrate Rizal’s 150th birth anniversary.
I have viewed favorably the advance stories published in the Inquirer.
Because my ministry for the last 20 years (since Rizal’s 130th birth anniversary in 1991) is an affirming ministry to gays and lesbians and all LGBT people, I began thinking again about that overworked and meaningless question, “Was Rizal Gay?”
That question is really irrelevant. I have written about it; Neil Garcia has written about it, others have. The most important thing is that Jose P. Rizal embodied so many sterling qualities of intellect, character, and talent that would make a perfect LGBT person, or, in his case, a perfect gay man.
Rather than revisit that question, I began to ask myself a new one, “What does Jose P. Rizal say to LGBT people today 150 years after his birth?
Every Sunday we hear in the sermon, “the Bible tells us… [today in the 21st century]…” The Bible written 2000 years ago — still speaking to us today.
So I began to ponder, “What does Rizal say to us today?” Then I looked at all the volumes of Rizal correspondence and other writings on my book shelves. It’s longer than 10 Bibles. So I got the idea for writing ten books, but not today. Today I will just take a look at what brother Pepe has to say to his sisters.
Actually I am an addict when I pick up Rizal’s writings, especially his correspondence. I want to look up something, but my addiction takes over and keeps me reading and reading and reading and pondering and pondering. He has so much to say.
I am glad they have “Rizal Excellence” programs in the schools. There should be more of them. His excellence is inexhaustible and more of his excellence would make his “patria” more excellent. The most recent seems to have been when 400 students gathered at Teacher’s Camp in Baguio in May for the 49th National Leadership Institute Conference aimed at making the youth become pro-active agents of change through Rizal’s example.
What does Rizal say to LGBT people today?
It seems to me the most obvious message is his most pronounced stance against the abuses of the Friars and the Spanish government of the time. What were the abuses of the Friars? In general we could today group them under the heading of sex-negative theology in preaching and disregard in the lives of those who were like Fr. Damaso. And, of course, my theme sex-positive theology.
He was against oppression, injustice and, yes, hypocrisy. To make a long story short, if our national hero was vehemently against injustice, would he not also be against injustice to LGBT people. As we shall see in a letter below he had no tolerance for that very thing. “I have glimpsed a little light, and I believe it is my duty to teach it to the people of my country,” he writes in an oft-quoted passage. Surely he would include us in the people of his country.
Quotations
The first book I picked up today from my “Rizal Shelves” was Quotations from Rizal’s Writings, from the National Historical Institute (1992) (and the Jose Rizal National Centennial Commission, 1961).
What is more appropriate than the advice he gives to his sister Soledad (and his other sisters), “You are no longer a child… nor are you uneducated. I speak o you as my sisters and I repeat to you… You have many nieces; give them good example and be worthy of yourselves.”
As soon as I saw that word “worthy,” I thought of what the homosexual Roman centurion said to Jesus, “Lord, I am not worthy that you should come [to my house].” The (Catholic) church makes those words speak to us by putting them in every Mass.
When Pepe says to Soledad and his other sisters, “Give good example and be worthy of yourselves,” he says to us, “Don’t let society devalue you; don’t devalue yourselves. You are adults now. Take responsibility for your lives and your behavior. Give good example, but don’t be a slave and victim to everything Fr. Damaso says. You are no longer a child. Think. Decide. Give good example.”
I am sure each of us could think long and hard about how that applies to our life. One person said to me that he was glad I was teaching sex-positive theology, so now he can do “whatever he wants.” My advice and Rizal’s advice: “You are an adult. Think. Behave appropriately. Give good example.”
To Soledad, he also writes, “If you have a sweetheart, behave towards him nobly and with dignity… rather than resort to secret meetings… Value more, esteem more, your honor, and you will be more esteemed and valued.”
What Pepe was saying to that sister with so much personal caring and love, he says to us as a rule of life. He did not shake his finger at her about having sex. What he says to us is “Don’t use people. Don’t be used. The key to honorable behavior is respecting the other person.”
In another letter to Trinidad, he seemed to admire women who are “somewhat masculine.” I present it here and let it speak for itself. “If our sister Maria had been educated in Germany, she would have been notable, because German women are active and somewhat masculine. They are not afraid of men. They are more concerned with the substance than with appearances…”
Quiet, not very lively, fine and affectionate
In our country, many a gay boy is subjected to and victimized by ridicule, bullying, harsh treatment and all too often physical abuse because of having “refined qualities.” Pepe seemed not to look down upon these qualities in his sister’s son, Alfredo Hidalgo. “Alfredo’s letter,” he wrote, “brought me great joy… He seems to be a lad of clear intelligence, quiet, not very lively, fine and, with time, he will be reserved and will know how to keep secrets, his own and other people’s… He will be pensive, a thinker, polite and considerate… He is besides affectionate.”
Never-wavering faith
In closing, as a priest-admirer of Rizal, I want to comment on his faith and spirituality. I teach that a well-rounded person must have a well-rounded, balanced life with health in one’s intellectual, physical, spiritual, and emotional components. The more one reads Rizal’s correspondence, the more it is abundantly obvious that his was a wholistically constituted life with all components in balance and harmony. But most of all I am stricken by his strong faith and spiritual basis, shown in letter after letter. In one, he gives, probably unknowingly, a perfect definition for “spirituality” — a person needs to believe and to love, needs a goal towards which to steer one’s actions, to formulate for oneself a purpose, to see something more beyond matter and noise; in short, one needs an objective worthy of one’s being and facilities.”
I see now it is an impossible venture to capture even the faintest glimpse of the greatness of Rizal in one essay. I opened one book, made a few quotes, and there is still the whole book before me, and volume after volume of Rizal’s wisdom on the shelves.
Light reading
I will just add one little light-reading moment. There is no evidence, that I can find, of any love-letters of Rizal to other boys when he was a boy or to men anytime in his life. But I found a cute love poem to him from one of his classmates at the Ateneo, who seemingly had a crush on Jose when Jose was about 16. A few lines of it are:
“Dedicated to Rizal by his classmate Ricado Aguado: to my dearest Friend, Jose Rizal, on his saint’s day, 19 March, 1877.”
“Your pleasing image alone,
in my soft heart always engraved,
now removes from me the fraud
the star from sailor forlorn
as in an agitated sea.
For you’re, sweet friend of mine,
the only joy of my soul,
and always to be with you
is my incessant desire
in this sad, unfortunate land.
But since luck denies
me such happiness this day
my Muse with tenderness
its affection doth send to you
at this pleasant hour of joy.
When Ricardo gave this love poem to Jose, he added a little personal note in prose, “Don’t show these verses to anybody…” Of course, they already had closets in 1877. [Note: I read these lines from the projective reading of a gay man of the 21st century. I will let you know if some learned straight professor informs me that this poem was indeed an allegorical writing and had nothing to do with gay love.]
Anyway, Rizal saved it, and that itself says a lot about his understanding, to say the least, and it has come down to us in the National Historical Institute’s Miscellaneous Correspondence of Dr. Jose Rizal.
Let’s say this all comes from one page of thousands of pages of Rizal wisdom, in word and action. Can you imagine what is in store in reading all the correspondence and works by Jose P. Rizal? May I recommend that you take a look for yourself as one way of celebrating his memory on his 150th birth anniversary?
Happy 150th birthday, Pepe, Big Brother, (no matter how short you were), our Kuya forever! Many of us who are not poets have a great love for you, too.
Tuesday, May 31, 2011
Condoms, Divorce and Congratulations
Congratulations! Mabuhay ang Pilipinas!
It finally has happened!
So far, in the very first press account, three law makers have shown themselves to be brave, courageous, independent, and full of integrity!
For years, the Philippines and the Catholic island of Malta have been the only countries in the world which do not give residents the right to divorce.
Now Malta is on the verge of granting divorce rights to its people. That leaves only the Philippines (and the Vatican), the last standout refusing to give this right.
Until now lawmakers of the Philippines have cringed in fear of the power of the hierarchy at the next election and have not dared speak the word “divorce” in the halls of congress.
Now three, at least, in the first press mention of the possibility of divorce here, three at least have boldly expressed approval of the idea.
Why divorce? Do all the nations of the earth have divorce to defy the Catholic bishops? Do they have divorce to destroy the family? Do they have it because it is bad? Is it not logical that they have it because there is a human need for it? Some couples simply find themselves incompatible. Well, it’s not so simple when children are involved. Does it save the children? Does it save the family to force incompatible people to stay together? Does this unpleasant situation help the children?
Our hats are off to the first three names mentioned in the Inquirer article today, “After Malta vote, House body tackles divorce bill.” It takes guts, and they got it.
Gabriela Rep. Luz Ilagan
Speaker Sonny Belmonte
Senator Pia Cayetano
Why is this “heterosexual” issue important to us? It is important because it is a big blister on the landscape caused by sex-negative theology promoted primarily by one hierarchy and imposed upon the whole nation, people of every religion and non-religion. And to think, it still is not clear to them that there is a human need for it demonstrated by the fact that every nation on the face of the earth recognizes the need except the Catholic hierarchy of the Philippines who will fight tooth and nail to keep it that way.
There was a time when that world-wide hierarchy prevented every nation on earth from recognizing the love and relationship of same-sex couples. Now a growing number of countries, including Catholic Spain, with a courageous legislature, have granted their people equal marriage and more have granted recognition of same-sex relationships.
Meanwhile, the battle of the condoms continues in the Philippine Congress — and the shame and guilt of no condoms, no masturbation, no premarital sex, and no same-sex love, and, and, and… no, no, no… And how nice it was to see a word on this in the same newspaper today from our long time friend, the reclusive Margie Holmes.
Time bishops learned from the poor
Philippine Daily Inquirer
11:19 pm | Monday, May 30th, 2011
THIS is in reference to the comment of Archbishop Ramon Arguelles, “Will you be calm if you are held at gunpoint?” (“Cool it? Bishop says Malacañang provoked Church,” Inquirer, 5/17/ 11)
Perhaps the good Archbishop should reflect on the fact that the Roman Catholic Church has held the poor of this country at gunpoint for decades over the issue of contraception, and learn from the poor’s long-suffering calmness in the face of adversity.—MARGARITA HOLMES and JEREMY BAER, Quezon City
Yes, it is true that 3 million Frenchmen or Maltese or Filipinos cannot vote to make wrong right. It don’t work that way. What’s bad is bad, and rape and child abuse will always be wrong. But if every nation on earth sees a need for divorce, it’s time to look at it from a different angle — starting with common sense.
Remember the three steps of forming conscience are:
Step one: Listen to the teaching voice of your church.
Step two: Listen to God’s truth in human nature and in the situation.
Step three: Make a JUDGMENT of what’s right.
And that is a basic human right which apparently Speaker Belmonte, Senator Cayetano and Rep. Ilagan are exercising. Congratulations!
Surely, surely we will hear more about this. Surely there are more than three!
After Malta vote, House body tackles divorce bill
Philippine Daily Inquirer
3:16 am | Tuesday, May 31st, 2011
MANILA, Philippines—Overwhelmingly Roman Catholic Malta has voted to legalize divorce, Prime Minister Lawrence Gonzi announced on Sunday after a referendum, leaving the Philippines as the only country where it is banned.
The vote in Malta spurred moves in the House of Representatives to legalize divorce amid an already widening split between the influential Catholic hierarchy and the administration of bachelor President Benigno Aquino III over a population control measure.
Gonzi, who campaigned against the introduction of divorce ahead of Saturday’s nonbinding referendum, said it was now up to the Mediterranean archipelago’s parliament to legalize the dissolution of marriage.
“This is not the result that I wished for, but the will of the people has to be respected and parliament should enact a law for the introduction of divorce,” said the conservative prime minister.
The divorce measure was passed by a majority of 53.2 percent of those who cast ballots, although nearly a quarter of eligible voters did not bother to go to the polls, election officials said.
Apart from the Vatican city-state, Malta is one of only two countries in the world—the Philippines is the other—that bans divorce. Chile was the last country to legalize divorce in 2004 after overwhelming public pressure.
Saturday’s nonbinding referendum asked the country’s 306,000 mainly Catholic voters whether parliament should introduce a new law that would allow couples to obtain a divorce after four years of separation.
Separation widespread
Legal separation is widespread in the European Union’s smallest member state, but there are many legal obstacles to re-marrying.
The Church, which looms large over the archipelago where 95 percent of the population claim the faith, did not campaign officially in the referendum.
However, Valletta’s Archbishop Paul Cremona had warned churchgoers in a letter they faced a choice between building and destroying family values.
“By this vote, the citizen will either build or destroy. A choice in favor of permanent marriage is an act of faith in the family, built upon a bond of love which cannot be severed,” said the letter, which was read out at Masses.
In addition, priests have reportedly threatened to refuse communion to those who vote “yes” in the referendum.
Philippine moves
Following the vote in Malta, the Philippine House committee on revision of laws announced it would begin on Wednesday discussions on a bill seeking to legalize divorce.
“Let us not keep our country in the dark ages,” said Gabriela Rep. Luz Ilagan. “I appeal to my colleagues in Congress to let the legislative mill run its course on the divorce bill without further delay and give Filipino couples in irreparable and unhappy marriages this option.”
Speaker Feliciano Belmonte, a widower, told reporters that he favored the move. “It is very difficult to let two people who cannot live together continue to live together.”
Expand annulment
Sen. Pia Cayetano, chair of the Senate committee on youth, women and family relations, said it was time to expand the definition of annulment of marriage granted under Philippine law on grounds of psychological incapacity.
“Call it divorce, call it another animal (but) there has to be some change because the reality is, it is one of the discriminatory practices we have (against women),” she said.
But Senate Majority Leader Vicente Sotto III is adamant: “Let’s not get into the habit of copying what other countries are doing.”
Not a question of votes
The Philippine Catholic hierarchy, echoing the position of the Church in Malta, announced that it would oppose any attempt to introduce divorce in the country through a referendum as the Mediterranean country did.
“Referendums are merely a political, not a moral exercise,” said Archbishop Ramon Arguelles, head of the bishops’ Episcopal Commission on Family and Life.
“What is right or wrong is not dependent on how many voted for it,” said Archbishop Emeritus Oscar Cruz, judicial vicar of the National Appellate Matrimonial Tribunal. “What is moral or not moral is not a question of popular vote.”
Cruz is happy that the Philippines remains to be the only country without divorce.
“It means that the Filipino cultural values are still solid, that we are profamily, which is a wonder because you cannot find that anywhere else in the world,” he said. With reports from AFP, Cynthia D. Balana, Gil C. Cabacungan Jr., Christian V. Esguerra and Jocelyn R. Uy
It finally has happened!
So far, in the very first press account, three law makers have shown themselves to be brave, courageous, independent, and full of integrity!
For years, the Philippines and the Catholic island of Malta have been the only countries in the world which do not give residents the right to divorce.
Now Malta is on the verge of granting divorce rights to its people. That leaves only the Philippines (and the Vatican), the last standout refusing to give this right.
Until now lawmakers of the Philippines have cringed in fear of the power of the hierarchy at the next election and have not dared speak the word “divorce” in the halls of congress.
Now three, at least, in the first press mention of the possibility of divorce here, three at least have boldly expressed approval of the idea.
Why divorce? Do all the nations of the earth have divorce to defy the Catholic bishops? Do they have divorce to destroy the family? Do they have it because it is bad? Is it not logical that they have it because there is a human need for it? Some couples simply find themselves incompatible. Well, it’s not so simple when children are involved. Does it save the children? Does it save the family to force incompatible people to stay together? Does this unpleasant situation help the children?
Our hats are off to the first three names mentioned in the Inquirer article today, “After Malta vote, House body tackles divorce bill.” It takes guts, and they got it.
Gabriela Rep. Luz Ilagan
Speaker Sonny Belmonte
Senator Pia Cayetano
Why is this “heterosexual” issue important to us? It is important because it is a big blister on the landscape caused by sex-negative theology promoted primarily by one hierarchy and imposed upon the whole nation, people of every religion and non-religion. And to think, it still is not clear to them that there is a human need for it demonstrated by the fact that every nation on the face of the earth recognizes the need except the Catholic hierarchy of the Philippines who will fight tooth and nail to keep it that way.
There was a time when that world-wide hierarchy prevented every nation on earth from recognizing the love and relationship of same-sex couples. Now a growing number of countries, including Catholic Spain, with a courageous legislature, have granted their people equal marriage and more have granted recognition of same-sex relationships.
Meanwhile, the battle of the condoms continues in the Philippine Congress — and the shame and guilt of no condoms, no masturbation, no premarital sex, and no same-sex love, and, and, and… no, no, no… And how nice it was to see a word on this in the same newspaper today from our long time friend, the reclusive Margie Holmes.
Time bishops learned from the poor
Philippine Daily Inquirer
11:19 pm | Monday, May 30th, 2011
THIS is in reference to the comment of Archbishop Ramon Arguelles, “Will you be calm if you are held at gunpoint?” (“Cool it? Bishop says Malacañang provoked Church,” Inquirer, 5/17/ 11)
Perhaps the good Archbishop should reflect on the fact that the Roman Catholic Church has held the poor of this country at gunpoint for decades over the issue of contraception, and learn from the poor’s long-suffering calmness in the face of adversity.—MARGARITA HOLMES and JEREMY BAER, Quezon City
Yes, it is true that 3 million Frenchmen or Maltese or Filipinos cannot vote to make wrong right. It don’t work that way. What’s bad is bad, and rape and child abuse will always be wrong. But if every nation on earth sees a need for divorce, it’s time to look at it from a different angle — starting with common sense.
Remember the three steps of forming conscience are:
Step one: Listen to the teaching voice of your church.
Step two: Listen to God’s truth in human nature and in the situation.
Step three: Make a JUDGMENT of what’s right.
And that is a basic human right which apparently Speaker Belmonte, Senator Cayetano and Rep. Ilagan are exercising. Congratulations!
Surely, surely we will hear more about this. Surely there are more than three!
After Malta vote, House body tackles divorce bill
Philippine Daily Inquirer
3:16 am | Tuesday, May 31st, 2011
MANILA, Philippines—Overwhelmingly Roman Catholic Malta has voted to legalize divorce, Prime Minister Lawrence Gonzi announced on Sunday after a referendum, leaving the Philippines as the only country where it is banned.
The vote in Malta spurred moves in the House of Representatives to legalize divorce amid an already widening split between the influential Catholic hierarchy and the administration of bachelor President Benigno Aquino III over a population control measure.
Gonzi, who campaigned against the introduction of divorce ahead of Saturday’s nonbinding referendum, said it was now up to the Mediterranean archipelago’s parliament to legalize the dissolution of marriage.
“This is not the result that I wished for, but the will of the people has to be respected and parliament should enact a law for the introduction of divorce,” said the conservative prime minister.
The divorce measure was passed by a majority of 53.2 percent of those who cast ballots, although nearly a quarter of eligible voters did not bother to go to the polls, election officials said.
Apart from the Vatican city-state, Malta is one of only two countries in the world—the Philippines is the other—that bans divorce. Chile was the last country to legalize divorce in 2004 after overwhelming public pressure.
Saturday’s nonbinding referendum asked the country’s 306,000 mainly Catholic voters whether parliament should introduce a new law that would allow couples to obtain a divorce after four years of separation.
Separation widespread
Legal separation is widespread in the European Union’s smallest member state, but there are many legal obstacles to re-marrying.
The Church, which looms large over the archipelago where 95 percent of the population claim the faith, did not campaign officially in the referendum.
However, Valletta’s Archbishop Paul Cremona had warned churchgoers in a letter they faced a choice between building and destroying family values.
“By this vote, the citizen will either build or destroy. A choice in favor of permanent marriage is an act of faith in the family, built upon a bond of love which cannot be severed,” said the letter, which was read out at Masses.
In addition, priests have reportedly threatened to refuse communion to those who vote “yes” in the referendum.
Philippine moves
Following the vote in Malta, the Philippine House committee on revision of laws announced it would begin on Wednesday discussions on a bill seeking to legalize divorce.
“Let us not keep our country in the dark ages,” said Gabriela Rep. Luz Ilagan. “I appeal to my colleagues in Congress to let the legislative mill run its course on the divorce bill without further delay and give Filipino couples in irreparable and unhappy marriages this option.”
Speaker Feliciano Belmonte, a widower, told reporters that he favored the move. “It is very difficult to let two people who cannot live together continue to live together.”
Expand annulment
Sen. Pia Cayetano, chair of the Senate committee on youth, women and family relations, said it was time to expand the definition of annulment of marriage granted under Philippine law on grounds of psychological incapacity.
“Call it divorce, call it another animal (but) there has to be some change because the reality is, it is one of the discriminatory practices we have (against women),” she said.
But Senate Majority Leader Vicente Sotto III is adamant: “Let’s not get into the habit of copying what other countries are doing.”
Not a question of votes
The Philippine Catholic hierarchy, echoing the position of the Church in Malta, announced that it would oppose any attempt to introduce divorce in the country through a referendum as the Mediterranean country did.
“Referendums are merely a political, not a moral exercise,” said Archbishop Ramon Arguelles, head of the bishops’ Episcopal Commission on Family and Life.
“What is right or wrong is not dependent on how many voted for it,” said Archbishop Emeritus Oscar Cruz, judicial vicar of the National Appellate Matrimonial Tribunal. “What is moral or not moral is not a question of popular vote.”
Cruz is happy that the Philippines remains to be the only country without divorce.
“It means that the Filipino cultural values are still solid, that we are profamily, which is a wonder because you cannot find that anywhere else in the world,” he said. With reports from AFP, Cynthia D. Balana, Gil C. Cabacungan Jr., Christian V. Esguerra and Jocelyn R. Uy
Tuesday, March 8, 2011
Mother Mary John Mananzan in “Top 100 Inspiring People” in the world
Our congratulations to Mother Mary John Mananzan, OSB on the occasion of her being named one of the “Top 100 Inspiring People” in the world.
That’s really great. That is mind-blowing. Why? For many reasons – she’s a woman, a feminist, a nun, a nun in the Philippines, a nun in influential positions in Roman Catholic leadership.
Mother Mary John Mananzan is as gracious as she is talented and effective for feminist rights. On those occasions when I have been privileged to appear on the same speaking panel with her, she was gracious to me personally.
At a time when a Roman Catholic priest releases a (more of the same repression) book calling for “conversion therapy” for gays and lesbians, it is indeed refreshing to rejoice in the honor Mother Mary John Mananzan has received in recognition of her accomplishments in behalf of the rights of women.
I urge you, my friend, not to miss the significance that this honor has for sex-positive theology. Human rights for women is a significant aspect of sex-positive theology.
Quick review. It all goes back to the Greek dualism which considered the body bad (and the soul good) and women doubly bad. St. Augustine picked it up and turned it into Catholic theology – and too much of it has survived the centuries in the patriarchal church.
That is why I place so much emphasis on teaching free cyber seminars (by email) on sex-positive theology. Enrollment is free: saintaelred@gmail.com
Mother Mary John Mananzan has made a gigantic contribution to women’s rights and to sex-positive theology.
A nice article in today’s Inquirer does a good job of describing the work of Mother Mary John Mananzan and the honor she has received as one of the “Top 100 Inspiring People” in the world.
**********
Nun’s feminist activism cited
By Jeannette Andrade
Philippine Daily Inquirer
March 07, 2011
MANILA, Philippines—When Sister Mary John Mananzan first received an e-mail informing her that she had been named one of the top 100 inspiring people in the world, she thought that it was another spam message.
Mananzan, executive director of the Institute of Women’s Studies of St. Scholastica’s College, told the Philippine Daily Inquirer that she was overwhelmed when she discovered how prestigious was the Women Deliver 100 list that included US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.
“I got so many of those (spam) before on my e-mail account, where the message would say I had been chosen to be among the recipients of some award but then I would have to pay for something,” she said with a laugh.
Mananzan said she was not able to read the e-mail, which she received from the New York-based Women Deliver last week, but she learned of the list’s prestige from other people who congratulated her during one of her religious missions in Tacloban City.
“I did not realize what the e-mail from Women Deliver was real. I did not know how prestigious it was. But when I realized it was authentic and to be on a list including Hillary Clinton, I was so overwhelmed,” she said.
Mananzan was cited for being instrumental in developing a feminist Third World theology within the Catholic Church and introducing feminist activism into the country’s Catholic faith.
She said she was just part of the Ecumenical Association of Third World Theologians which saw the dominance of patriarchy in the Church and sought the establishment of a theology from the perspective of Third World women. “Religion is both liberating and oppressive. Here, we sought to deconstruct the oppressive and construct the liberating aspect,” she said.
Her group analyzes the teachings in the Bible, a lot of passages of which are misinterpreted and are used for oppression, she said.
Mananzan cited an abused woman in the care of the Benedictine Sisters, who claimed that her husband would cite a biblical passage in which Eve had been taken from Adam’s ribs to justify that he should be in full control and could do whatever he wanted.
“God will not sanction the oppression of anybody … We have to make women understand that in the eyes of God, they are on the same level as men. They have the same dignity. They have the same opportunity,” the Benedictine nun said.
She said the empowerment of a woman could not be complete without the spiritual aspect. “In empowering a woman spiritually, she must develop self-esteem in the sense that she is created in the image and likeness of God.”
Mananzan holds the distinction of being the first woman to graduate summa cum laude from the Pontifical Gregorian University in Rome, earning a doctorate in Philosophy, majoring in Linguistics Analysis.
Upon her return to the country in 1973, she was entrusted with a number of positions, including the deanship and subsequently the presidency of St. Scholastica’s College, and the leadership of the Association of Major Religious Superiors of the Philippines.
Mananzan also held positions in the Ecumenical Association of Third-World Theologians and in Gabriela, an organization promoting women’s rights which she cofounded. She subsequently founded the women studies program in St. Scholastica’s College.
She said that when she first joined the Benedictine order at 19 years old, all she thought was she could not participate in social work for the poor unless she was a nun. “I was so young at 19. I always say, ‘Do not ask me why I entered. Ask me why I am staying,’” she said with a smile. “It is because I found more reasons to stay.”
The first time she told her mother of her decision to enter the Benedictine order, after finishing her tertiary education at St. Scholastica’s College, her mother was speechless. “The next day, she told me ‘It was OK if I really wanted to be a nun.’ She was very proud of me,” Mananzan said, beaming.
Despite the gains in the pursuit of women empowerment, she said there was still a long way to go. She said there were 350 men who had completed the women studies seminars, which basically teach them that they can remain “macho” even if they show tenderness, warmth and love toward their partners.
She noted that more women-friendly laws were being passed even if she found their implementation wanting.
Many priests are understanding the perspective of women in theology although the Church hierarchy as a whole remains patriarchic, Mananzan said. “In a matter of consciousness, we have achieved a lot. But we still have a long way to go. We have, after all, a population of 90 million … We have to reach out to mothers who are not conscious of these things so they would not continue to pass on gender-based subservience to their daughters,” she said.
That’s really great. That is mind-blowing. Why? For many reasons – she’s a woman, a feminist, a nun, a nun in the Philippines, a nun in influential positions in Roman Catholic leadership.
Mother Mary John Mananzan is as gracious as she is talented and effective for feminist rights. On those occasions when I have been privileged to appear on the same speaking panel with her, she was gracious to me personally.
At a time when a Roman Catholic priest releases a (more of the same repression) book calling for “conversion therapy” for gays and lesbians, it is indeed refreshing to rejoice in the honor Mother Mary John Mananzan has received in recognition of her accomplishments in behalf of the rights of women.
I urge you, my friend, not to miss the significance that this honor has for sex-positive theology. Human rights for women is a significant aspect of sex-positive theology.
Quick review. It all goes back to the Greek dualism which considered the body bad (and the soul good) and women doubly bad. St. Augustine picked it up and turned it into Catholic theology – and too much of it has survived the centuries in the patriarchal church.
That is why I place so much emphasis on teaching free cyber seminars (by email) on sex-positive theology. Enrollment is free: saintaelred@gmail.com
Mother Mary John Mananzan has made a gigantic contribution to women’s rights and to sex-positive theology.
A nice article in today’s Inquirer does a good job of describing the work of Mother Mary John Mananzan and the honor she has received as one of the “Top 100 Inspiring People” in the world.
**********
Nun’s feminist activism cited
By Jeannette Andrade
Philippine Daily Inquirer
March 07, 2011
MANILA, Philippines—When Sister Mary John Mananzan first received an e-mail informing her that she had been named one of the top 100 inspiring people in the world, she thought that it was another spam message.
“I got so many of those (spam) before on my e-mail account, where the message would say I had been chosen to be among the recipients of some award but then I would have to pay for something,” she said with a laugh.
Mananzan said she was not able to read the e-mail, which she received from the New York-based Women Deliver last week, but she learned of the list’s prestige from other people who congratulated her during one of her religious missions in Tacloban City.
“I did not realize what the e-mail from Women Deliver was real. I did not know how prestigious it was. But when I realized it was authentic and to be on a list including Hillary Clinton, I was so overwhelmed,” she said.
Mananzan was cited for being instrumental in developing a feminist Third World theology within the Catholic Church and introducing feminist activism into the country’s Catholic faith.
She said she was just part of the Ecumenical Association of Third World Theologians which saw the dominance of patriarchy in the Church and sought the establishment of a theology from the perspective of Third World women. “Religion is both liberating and oppressive. Here, we sought to deconstruct the oppressive and construct the liberating aspect,” she said.
Her group analyzes the teachings in the Bible, a lot of passages of which are misinterpreted and are used for oppression, she said.
Mananzan cited an abused woman in the care of the Benedictine Sisters, who claimed that her husband would cite a biblical passage in which Eve had been taken from Adam’s ribs to justify that he should be in full control and could do whatever he wanted.
“God will not sanction the oppression of anybody … We have to make women understand that in the eyes of God, they are on the same level as men. They have the same dignity. They have the same opportunity,” the Benedictine nun said.
She said the empowerment of a woman could not be complete without the spiritual aspect. “In empowering a woman spiritually, she must develop self-esteem in the sense that she is created in the image and likeness of God.”
Mananzan holds the distinction of being the first woman to graduate summa cum laude from the Pontifical Gregorian University in Rome, earning a doctorate in Philosophy, majoring in Linguistics Analysis.
Upon her return to the country in 1973, she was entrusted with a number of positions, including the deanship and subsequently the presidency of St. Scholastica’s College, and the leadership of the Association of Major Religious Superiors of the Philippines.
Mananzan also held positions in the Ecumenical Association of Third-World Theologians and in Gabriela, an organization promoting women’s rights which she cofounded. She subsequently founded the women studies program in St. Scholastica’s College.
She said that when she first joined the Benedictine order at 19 years old, all she thought was she could not participate in social work for the poor unless she was a nun. “I was so young at 19. I always say, ‘Do not ask me why I entered. Ask me why I am staying,’” she said with a smile. “It is because I found more reasons to stay.”
The first time she told her mother of her decision to enter the Benedictine order, after finishing her tertiary education at St. Scholastica’s College, her mother was speechless. “The next day, she told me ‘It was OK if I really wanted to be a nun.’ She was very proud of me,” Mananzan said, beaming.
Despite the gains in the pursuit of women empowerment, she said there was still a long way to go. She said there were 350 men who had completed the women studies seminars, which basically teach them that they can remain “macho” even if they show tenderness, warmth and love toward their partners.
She noted that more women-friendly laws were being passed even if she found their implementation wanting.
Many priests are understanding the perspective of women in theology although the Church hierarchy as a whole remains patriarchic, Mananzan said. “In a matter of consciousness, we have achieved a lot. But we still have a long way to go. We have, after all, a population of 90 million … We have to reach out to mothers who are not conscious of these things so they would not continue to pass on gender-based subservience to their daughters,” she said.
Novena for Feast of St. Aelred 2011
Annual Commemoration of St. Aelred
The Year 2011 marks the 901st anniversary of the coming of St. Aelred into this world with his refreshing message of love and friendship. He tells the message with explicit references to his own loves and friendships.
Some years ago I did a lot of research into the life and writings and sex-positive theology of St. Aelred.
Sadly I admit that in recent times I am so involved with teaching and interacting with people in the free cyber seminar in Sex Positive Theology that I have not been able to advance my (Ateneo) library research and communication with Aelred scholars around the world who used to send me their own research and publications about St. Aelred.
As is pointed out in the Novena, St. Aelred was not a “gay activist” like we have among us here in the Philippines today (in the whole LGBT community).
He was an early Christian humanist who saw the Incarnation (becoming flesh) of Jesus and the very human loves and friendships of Jesus (the beloved disciple and others) as a clear indication that human love and human friendships are very much in conformity with the life of Jesus and the Good News.
As a young “gay” lad of about 15, his father, the “hereditary” Roman Catholic pastor of the parish in his hometown in northern England near the territory we know as Scotland, sent him to study, learn, and work as an aide to the king in the court of King David of Scotland. He tells us in graphic language, not “bakla ako,” but “my greatest delight was in loving and being loved.” And his loves were the sons of the king and other young men in the court.
Comparing him to the thousands of gays and lesbians I have known, lived with, counseled over the last forty-some years, I see us all pretty much in the same love boat, with him as our champion.
To make a long story short, he can be celebrated as the Patron Saint of Friendship.
Each year we remember his “pioneering” or “liminal” work in breaking away from St. Augustine’s “body is bad” teachings and proclaiming the truth of God’s approval of human love and friendship.
In celebration of his annual “feast day” we pray the St. Aelred Novena for nine days culminating on the day of his “feast,” March 3.
St. Aelred: Gay Saint of Friendship
St. Aelred of Rievaulx
By Brother Robert Lentz, OFM. ©1992
Courtesy of http://www.trinitystores.com/
(800.699.4482)
Collection of the Living Circle, Chicago, IL
Saint Aelred (1109-1167) is considered one of the most lovable saints, the patron saint of friendship and also, some say, gay. His feast day is January 12.
Aelred was the abbot of the Cistercian abbey of Rievaulx in England. His treatise “On Spiritual Friendship” is still one of the best theological statements on the connection between human and spiritual love. “God is friendship… Those who abide in friendship abide in God, and God in them.. he wrote, paraphrasing 1 John 4:16.
Aelred’s own deep friendships with men are described in “Christianity, Social Tolerance, and Homosexuality ” by Yale history professor John Boswell. “There can be little question that Aelred was gay and that his erotic attraction to men was a dominant force in his life,” Boswell wrote.
Boswell’s account inspired the members of the LGBT Episcopal group Integrity to name Aelred as their patron saint. Visit IntegrityUSA.org for the full story on how they won recognition for their gay saint.
Aelred certainly advocated chastity, but his passions are clear in his writing. He describes friendship with eloquence in this often-quoted passage:
“It is no small consolation in this life to have someone you can unite with you in an intimate affection and the embrace of a holy love, someone in whom your spirit can rest, to whom you can pour out your soul, to whose pleasant exchanges, as to soothing songs, you can fly in sorrow... with whose spiritual kisses, as with remedial salves, you may draw out all the weariness of your restless anxieties. One who can shed tears with you in your worries, be happy with you when things go well, search out with you the answers to your problems, whom with the ties of charity you can lead into the depths of your heart; . . . where the sweetness of the Spirit flows between you, where you so join yourself and cleave to one another that soul mingles with soul and two become one.”
The icon of Saint Aelred was painted by Robert Lentz, a Franciscan friar and world-class iconographer known for his innovative icons. It includes a banner with Aelred’s words, “Friend cleaving to friend in the spirit of Christ.”
_________
This post is part of the GLBT Saints series at the Jesus in Love Blog. Saints and holy people of special interest to gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender (GLBT) people and our allies are covered on appropriate dates throughout the year.
***************
Novena to St. Aelred of Rievaulx
Recommended: Feast of St. Aelred March 3
Anytime during the year
The Feast of St. Aelred, March 3, is usually the ninth day of the Novena in honor of St. Aelred. Of course, the beginning day and the final day can be adjusted. In many places the anniversary date of St. Aelred’s birthday in heaven, January 12, is also observed as St. Aelred Day.
Here’s how the Novena works. Each day of the nine day novena, read the novena commemoration of St. Aelred and the St. Aelred novena prayer.
Day 1. We remember Aelred as a youth
Aelred was born in Hexam in northern England in the year 1110 . His father was “pastor” of the Roman Catholic Church at Hexam.
For priests to marry was officially not permitted, but it was so common that it was not a scandal, even some popes were sons of priests. The other thing that is quite different from our time is that his grandfather and his great grandfather also were “pastors” of that church as it was a “hereditary” pastorate (a medieval “thing”).
Hexam was a parish which had many relics (tombs, bones, bodies of famous English saints). Aelred acquired his father’s devotion to these saints and later wrote about them.
Many years later, in Aelred’s lifetime, his father gave up the “parish” and entered a monastery for the remainder of his life on earth.
At the age of 15 or thereabouts, Aelred’s father sent him to live in the court of King David I of Scotland. He spent 10 years there and became a trusted aide of the King, who also was later proclaimed a saint of the church.
At the court Aelred got a good education, but his greatest delight, he tells us, “was to love and be loved.” He had loves and friends, but he also had a broken heart many times. In the intrigues of the court, True Friendship of the type Aelred yearned for, was virtually unknown.
Novena Prayer
O most kind and loving St. Aelred,
in union with you
I come into the presence of our beloved Jesus.
I pray that you will obtain God’s favor for me
as I imitate your life of holiness
and follow your teachings
of love and friendship,
through Christ Jesus, our friend
whose sweet name was always on your lips.
St. Aelred, pray for me.
St. Aelred, pray for us.
Day 2. Aelred enters novitiate
and takes up “religious life”
At age 25 in the year 1135, Aelred abruptly left the court and entered a new monastery, which was named Rievaulx, in northern England which St. Bernard, the abbot of Clairvaux in France, had sent twelve monks to establish just two years before.
It was a hard life and the weather was cold and severe (which may account for the mere 57 years of Aelred’s earthly life). The monks “camped” in temporary huts on the river banks in the valley of the beautiful, but often ice and snow covered, River Rye, while they and the workers constructed the monastery that eventually became the largest in all England.
While trying to adjust to this life so different from the court, Aelred began to yearn again for True Friendship, and to see the possibility of attaining True Friendship in a community centered on Christ. Slowly he began to explore what True Friendship could be.
Within eight years he was named novice master, with the heavy responsibility of guiding the spiritual formation of the new monks who were already entering the monastery in increasing numbers.
Novena Prayer
O most kind and loving St. Aelred,
in union with you
I come into the presence of our beloved Jesus.
I pray that you will obtain God’s favor for me
as I imitate your life of holiness
and follow your teachings
of love and friendship,
through Christ Jesus, our friend
whose sweet name was always on your lips.
St. Aelred, pray for me.
St. Aelred, pray for us.
Day 3. Abbot of Revesby
The Abbey of Rievaulx decided to establish a new abbey at Revesby, further to the east, but still in northern England. This was the first of the five daughter houses of Rievaulx, and Aelred was selected to be the first abbot of the new Abbey.
So he left whatever small comforts had been built into Rievaulx in those first ten years and went to Revesby and started all over again, with cold temporary huts, and much manual labor, back-breaking work that he flung himself into for the next two years from 1145-to 1147.
Novena Prayer
O most kind and loving St. Aelred,
in union with you
I come into the presence of our beloved Jesus.
I pray that you will obtain God’s favor for me
as I imitate your life of holiness
and follow your teachings
of love and friendship,
through Christ Jesus, our friend
whose sweet name was always on your lips.
St. Aelred, pray for me.
St. Aelred, pray for us.
Added Comment
Saint Aelred of Rievaulx
By Paul Zalonski
The charity of God is poured forth in our hearts by the Holy Spirit who dwells within us.
My soul, give thanks to the Lord, all my being, bless his holy name (Rom 5:5; Ps 102:1).
O God, who gave the blessed Abbot Aelred the grace of being all things to all men, grant that, following his example, we may so spend ourselves in the service of one another, as to preserve the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.
The New Advent bio
Saint Aelred authored several influential books on spirituality, among them The Mirror of Charity and Spiritual Friendship. He also wrote seven works of history, addressing two of them to King Henry II of England advising him how to be a good king. The twentieth century has seen a greater interest in Saint Aelred as a spiritual writer than in former times when he was known to be a historian.
This year we honor the 900th anniversary of Saint Aelred's birth, though some the anniversary in AD 2010.
Day 4. Abbot of Rievaulx
In 1147 the first abbot of Rievaulx died and Aelred was elected to return from Revesby and become the Abbot of the “Motherhouse,” Rievaulx.
It is located in a scenic valley, dubbed the “valley of light,” ever massaged with the sound of water running through the monastery grounds in the stream of the River Rye. (This, by the way, is the inspiration of our own fountain of bubbling water.)
For the next 20 years St. Aelred was distinguished as a capable, gentle, and caring administrator of an ever-growing abbey, an abbot who never expelled a monk in 20 years.
The abbey reached a peak of 500 priests, brothers, and workers, and even today the massive shells of chapels, chapter rooms, dining halls, and dormitories are still a tourist attraction in northern England.
Archbishop Sentamu and St Aelred's anniversary photos
Source: http://www.google.com/search?q=Archbishop+Sentamu+and+St+Aelred%27s+anniversary+photos&rls=com.microsoft:en-us&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&startIndex=&startPage=1
Novena Prayer
O most kind and loving St. Aelred,
in union with you
I come into the presence of our beloved Jesus.
I pray that you will obtain God’s favor for me
as I imitate your life of holiness
and follow your teachings
of love and friendship,
through Christ Jesus, our friend
whose sweet name was always on your lips.
St. Aelred, pray for me.
St. Aelred, pray for us.
Day 5. Holy Abbot
In addition to his administration of the Abbey, St. Aelred began to work on the writings which have earned him enduring recognition as one of the “late fathers of the church,” a vast array of writings on saints, history, love, friendship, religious life, and uncounted sermons and spiritual works.
Slowly in the monasteries of today his works are being translated from the original Latin into today’s English. (A few years ago I asked a Trappist monk from Boston if he “ever heard” of St. Aelred. He informed me that he was the one who is translating St. Aelred’s sermons.)
St. Aelred wrote the lives of several English saints, and became a sought-after preacher for special occasions. He delivered the funeral oration when King St. David died in 1153. He began writing his two best-known works, The Mirror of Love, and Spiritual Friendship.
Novena Prayer
O most kind and loving St. Aelred,
in union with you
I come into the presence of our beloved Jesus.
I pray that you will obtain God’s favor for me
as I imitate your life of holiness
and follow your teachings
of love and friendship,
through Christ Jesus, our friend
whose sweet name was always on your lips.
St. Aelred, pray for me.
St. Aelred, pray for us.
Day 6. St. Aelred, Apostle of Friendship
In Spiritual Friendship St. Aelred gives us his classic definition of “Friendship.” He says “Friendship is oneness of heart, mind and spirit, in things human and divine, with mutual esteem, and kindly feelings of approval and support.”
In Mirror of Love he departs from generalities and gets down to the nitty gritty of what a True Friend is and does.
“A True Friend is one with whom I am deeply united in bonds of love, can find rest, pour out my heart, have sweet conversation, find a harbor of calm, lay bare my secrets, receive a comforting kiss, cry with and rejoice with, talk with for advice, feel togetherness “even when we are far apart, and with heart and mind together we are bound in the closest ties of love.”
There can be no doubt what Aelred means by True Friendship. And that is his lifelong gospel. It is not that he deviates from the Gospel of Jesus or the teachings of John. He theologizes that if God is love as St. John teaches, then God is Friendship.
“St. Aelred is known as a Christocentric twelfth-century monastic humanist. His most famous work, Spiritual Friendship, which explores the relationship between spiritual and human friendship in a monastic context, reveals his own conscious homosexual orientation and gives love between persons of the same gender its most profound expression in Christian theology.” (Dictionary of the Middle Ages, Vol. 4, American Council of Learned Societies)
Added Comment
Saint Aelred of Rievaulx
By Paul Zalonski
Pour into our hearts, O God, the Holy Spirit's gift of love, that we, clasping each the other's hand, may share the joy of friendship, human and divine, and with Your servant Aelred draw many to Your communion of love; through Jesus Christ the Righteous, who lives and reigns with You in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever.
On friendship
There are four qualities which characterize a friend: loyalty, right intention, discretion and patience. Right intention seeks for nothing other than God and natural good. Discretion brings understanding of what is done on a friend's behalf, and ability when to know when to correct faults. Patience enables one to be justly rebuked, or to bear adversity on another's behalf. Loyalty guards and protects friendship, in good or bitter times.
Novena Prayer
O most kind and loving St. Aelred,
in union with you
I come into the presence of our beloved Jesus.
I pray that you will obtain God’s favor for me
as I imitate your life of holiness
and follow your teachings
of love and friendship,
through Christ Jesus, our friend
whose sweet name was always on your lips.
St. Aelred, pray for me.
St. Aelred, pray for us.
Archbishop Sentamu and St Aelred's anniversary photos
Source: http://www.google.com/search?q=Archbishop+Sentamu+and+St+Aelred%27s+anniversary+photos&rls=com.microsoft:en-us&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&startIndex=&startPage=1
Day 7. Lover, Friend, Christian Humanist
St. Aelred was very personal and honest in his writings about love and friendship. St. Anselm and some of Aelred’s other contemporaries wrote about love and friendship, but in a much more clinical way, even though they were also “gay,” as we would say.
Aelred, Abbot of Rievaulx, on the other hand, in his self-revealing style, wrote about his teenage loves, about his “true” loves in the monastery, about his own yearnings and experiences.
In asserting the need for friendship and love, Aelred legitimized the physical and spiritual embrace of other human beings – and in the context of a religious community. In this context, all loves are reconciled in Jesus, and all are at peace in the love of the community.
Honored as a medieval Christian humanist, Aelred had a great optimism about the capability of human beings to love each other in good communities centered on Jesus. When he entered the monastery, he did not leave the world made by God or the exercise of love which gives harmony to every day life.
Therefore, obviously, if love and friendship were “good” within the hallowed monastery walls, how much more true is it “good” for all God’s children (who happen to be given the gift of attraction to persons of the same gender).
St. Aelred found his answer to the meaning of life in its human dimension in the love of the brothers at Rievaulx – brother to all in community life, lover to some in his True Friendships. He found the love of God made real and physical by experiencing together love of God and individual human beings.
St. Aelred unabashedly insisted on the need for human loves, and in his “Mirror of Love” he pours his heart out in lament over the death of the monk Simon, with whom he felt a True Friendship.
“St. Aelred deserves to be the patron saint of gays and lesbians because he was true to himself – never covering up his sexuality which was same-sex attraction, and he was not pulled fully into the prevailing sex-negative anti-body dualistic philosophy of St. Augustine,” writes one attendee at the conclusion of a seminar on the life and works of St. Aelred.
Novena Prayer
O most kind and loving St. Aelred,
in union with you
I come into the presence of our beloved Jesus.
I pray that you will obtain God’s favor for me
as I imitate your life of holiness
and follow your teachings
of love and friendship,
through Christ Jesus, our friend
whose sweet name was always on your lips.
St. Aelred, pray for me.
St. Aelred, pray for us.
Day 8. Suffered from arthritis
We all identify with Jesus who took on all the weakness and limitations of humanity to be one with us and died for love of us in the agonizing suffering of the passion and Cross.
St. Aelred especially identified with the sufferings of Jesus for us. The last ten years of his life on earth he was wracked with excruciating pain of arthritis.
His sufferings were intensified with the unbearable pangs of kidney stones. Sometimes when he had to stay in a little room near the infirmary, his friends would gather around his bed to cheer him up. (One’s imagination runs wild if gays gathered around his bed were as cheerful then as they are now in the Philippines.)
Novena Prayer
O most kind and loving St. Aelred,
in union with you
I come into the presence of our beloved Jesus.
I pray that you will obtain God’s favor for me
as I imitate your life of holiness
and follow your teachings
of love and friendship,
through Christ Jesus, our friend
whose sweet name was always on your lips.
St. Aelred, pray for me.
St. Aelred, pray for us.
Day 9. Patron of Sex Positive Theology
Patron of responsible sexuality
Many scholars have turned their attention to St. Aelred studies. Worldwide today there is an elite corps of “St. Aelred Scholars.” They are somewhat divided between those who speak frankly and openly of his same-sex orientation and those who would prefer, if they could, to sweep it under the rug. There are rumors that the Trappists don’t allow the monks to read Aelred’s works without permission. But Thomas Merton, a great world-renowned Trappist writer, wrote a biography of St. Aelred.
The Trappists and Benedictines and other orders are fearful that the monks will follow St. Aelred’s teachings of love and friendship in the monastery. Because of homophobia they are trying to be on guard against “special friendships.”
Our reason for joining the world-wide acclamation of St. Aelred as GLBT patron is primarily because of the holiness of his life and his inspiration for us to give our all for Jesus. The name of Jesus was always on his lips and the love of Jesus was always in his heart, but he felt that his love of Jesus could be strengthened by following the teachings of St. John that love of neighbor translates into love of God. “Those who live in love, live in God, and God lives in them.”
St. Aelred was not a modern day gay activist. There is no doubt that he sincerely embraced the celibate life as his vocation. He was a product of his times and caught up in the sex-negative theology of St. Augustine, but he was liminal, way ahead of his times, in his honesty about love and his loves. He is not a role model of gay activism, but a role model of holiness, and honesty, and coming out as appropriate in one’s state of life.
“St. Aelred deserves to be the patron saint of gays and lesbians because his philosophy of the unity of the flesh and spirit does not follow the hateful language of homophobic official literature, and he led a life of honest openness about loving people of the same sex physically,” wrote Oscar Atadero at the conclusion of a seminar on St. Aelred.
We celebrate the feast of St. Aelred because our understanding of life and love is enhanced by this great saint whom we have chosen as our patron.
Novena Prayer
O most kind and loving St. Aelred,
in union with you
I come into the presence of our beloved Jesus.
I pray that you will obtain God’s favor for me
as I imitate your life of holiness
and follow your teachings
of love and friendship,
through Christ Jesus, our friend
whose sweet name was always on your lips.
St. Aelred, pray for me.
St. Aelred, pray for us.
A History of Rievaulx Abbey
Source: http://cistercians.shef.ac.uk/rievaulx/history
'Everywhere peace, everywhere serenity, and a marvellous freedom from the tumult of the world.' Written over eight centuries ago by the monastery's third abbot, St Aelred, these words still apply to Rievaulx today.
Words are not the only links to Rievaulx's medieval monks. Over the past few years, the site has become something of an archaeological treasure, with unexpected discoveries shedding new light on the lives of the monks, and the extensive renewal and rebuilding of their abbey church in the Early English Gothic style.
Archaeologists continue to study the landscape around Rievaulx, revealing the remarkable extent of the abbey's influence and industry. Their discoveries are showcased in the on-site museum.
The abbey was founded by St Bernard of Clairvaux, as part of the missionary effort to reform Christianity in western Europe. Twelve Clairvaux monks came to Rievaulx in 1132.
From these modest beginnings grew one of the wealthiest monasteries of medieval England and the first northern Cistercian monastery.
Rievaulx also enjoyed the protection of Walter Espec of nearby Helmsley Castle, who provided much of the abbey's land. The monks of neighbouring Byland Abbey initially disputed land ownership with Rievaulx, but subsequently moved to their present location and relinquished the disputed land, thus allowing the major expansion of Rievaulx Abbey. You can still see traces of the channels dug by the Rievaulx monks.
A steady flow of monks came to Rievaulx, attracted by the prestige of Abbot Aelred, author and preacher, who was regarded then and later as a wise and saintly man. Following his death in 1167, the monks of Rievaulx sought canonisation for their former leader, and in the 1220s they rebuilt the east part of their church in a much more elaborate style to house his tomb.
Most of this 13th-century 'presbytery' still stands to virtually its full impressive height, a reminder of Rievaulx's original splendour.
Rievaulx was still a vibrant community when Henry VIII dissolved it in 1538. Its new owner, Thomas Manners, first Earl of Rutland, swiftly instigated the systematic destruction of the buildings.
However, the substantial remains constitute one of the most eloquent of all monastic sites, free 'from the tumult of the world.'
Source: http://www.nunraw.blogspot.com
The Year 2011 marks the 901st anniversary of the coming of St. Aelred into this world with his refreshing message of love and friendship. He tells the message with explicit references to his own loves and friendships.
Some years ago I did a lot of research into the life and writings and sex-positive theology of St. Aelred.
Sadly I admit that in recent times I am so involved with teaching and interacting with people in the free cyber seminar in Sex Positive Theology that I have not been able to advance my (Ateneo) library research and communication with Aelred scholars around the world who used to send me their own research and publications about St. Aelred.
As is pointed out in the Novena, St. Aelred was not a “gay activist” like we have among us here in the Philippines today (in the whole LGBT community).
He was an early Christian humanist who saw the Incarnation (becoming flesh) of Jesus and the very human loves and friendships of Jesus (the beloved disciple and others) as a clear indication that human love and human friendships are very much in conformity with the life of Jesus and the Good News.
As a young “gay” lad of about 15, his father, the “hereditary” Roman Catholic pastor of the parish in his hometown in northern England near the territory we know as Scotland, sent him to study, learn, and work as an aide to the king in the court of King David of Scotland. He tells us in graphic language, not “bakla ako,” but “my greatest delight was in loving and being loved.” And his loves were the sons of the king and other young men in the court.
Comparing him to the thousands of gays and lesbians I have known, lived with, counseled over the last forty-some years, I see us all pretty much in the same love boat, with him as our champion.
To make a long story short, he can be celebrated as the Patron Saint of Friendship.
Each year we remember his “pioneering” or “liminal” work in breaking away from St. Augustine’s “body is bad” teachings and proclaiming the truth of God’s approval of human love and friendship.
In celebration of his annual “feast day” we pray the St. Aelred Novena for nine days culminating on the day of his “feast,” March 3.
St. Aelred: Gay Saint of Friendship
By Brother Robert Lentz, OFM. ©1992
Courtesy of http://www.trinitystores.com/
(800.699.4482)
Collection of the Living Circle, Chicago, IL
Saint Aelred (1109-1167) is considered one of the most lovable saints, the patron saint of friendship and also, some say, gay. His feast day is January 12.
Aelred was the abbot of the Cistercian abbey of Rievaulx in England. His treatise “On Spiritual Friendship” is still one of the best theological statements on the connection between human and spiritual love. “God is friendship… Those who abide in friendship abide in God, and God in them.. he wrote, paraphrasing 1 John 4:16.
Aelred’s own deep friendships with men are described in “Christianity, Social Tolerance, and Homosexuality ” by Yale history professor John Boswell. “There can be little question that Aelred was gay and that his erotic attraction to men was a dominant force in his life,” Boswell wrote.
Boswell’s account inspired the members of the LGBT Episcopal group Integrity to name Aelred as their patron saint. Visit IntegrityUSA.org for the full story on how they won recognition for their gay saint.
Aelred certainly advocated chastity, but his passions are clear in his writing. He describes friendship with eloquence in this often-quoted passage:
“It is no small consolation in this life to have someone you can unite with you in an intimate affection and the embrace of a holy love, someone in whom your spirit can rest, to whom you can pour out your soul, to whose pleasant exchanges, as to soothing songs, you can fly in sorrow... with whose spiritual kisses, as with remedial salves, you may draw out all the weariness of your restless anxieties. One who can shed tears with you in your worries, be happy with you when things go well, search out with you the answers to your problems, whom with the ties of charity you can lead into the depths of your heart; . . . where the sweetness of the Spirit flows between you, where you so join yourself and cleave to one another that soul mingles with soul and two become one.”
The icon of Saint Aelred was painted by Robert Lentz, a Franciscan friar and world-class iconographer known for his innovative icons. It includes a banner with Aelred’s words, “Friend cleaving to friend in the spirit of Christ.”
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This post is part of the GLBT Saints series at the Jesus in Love Blog. Saints and holy people of special interest to gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender (GLBT) people and our allies are covered on appropriate dates throughout the year.
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Novena to St. Aelred of Rievaulx
Recommended: Feast of St. Aelred March 3
Anytime during the year
The Feast of St. Aelred, March 3, is usually the ninth day of the Novena in honor of St. Aelred. Of course, the beginning day and the final day can be adjusted. In many places the anniversary date of St. Aelred’s birthday in heaven, January 12, is also observed as St. Aelred Day.
Here’s how the Novena works. Each day of the nine day novena, read the novena commemoration of St. Aelred and the St. Aelred novena prayer.
Day 1. We remember Aelred as a youth
Aelred was born in Hexam in northern England in the year 1110 . His father was “pastor” of the Roman Catholic Church at Hexam.
For priests to marry was officially not permitted, but it was so common that it was not a scandal, even some popes were sons of priests. The other thing that is quite different from our time is that his grandfather and his great grandfather also were “pastors” of that church as it was a “hereditary” pastorate (a medieval “thing”).
Hexam was a parish which had many relics (tombs, bones, bodies of famous English saints). Aelred acquired his father’s devotion to these saints and later wrote about them.
Many years later, in Aelred’s lifetime, his father gave up the “parish” and entered a monastery for the remainder of his life on earth.
At the age of 15 or thereabouts, Aelred’s father sent him to live in the court of King David I of Scotland. He spent 10 years there and became a trusted aide of the King, who also was later proclaimed a saint of the church.
At the court Aelred got a good education, but his greatest delight, he tells us, “was to love and be loved.” He had loves and friends, but he also had a broken heart many times. In the intrigues of the court, True Friendship of the type Aelred yearned for, was virtually unknown.
Novena Prayer
O most kind and loving St. Aelred,
in union with you
I come into the presence of our beloved Jesus.
I pray that you will obtain God’s favor for me
as I imitate your life of holiness
and follow your teachings
of love and friendship,
through Christ Jesus, our friend
whose sweet name was always on your lips.
St. Aelred, pray for me.
St. Aelred, pray for us.
Day 2. Aelred enters novitiate
and takes up “religious life”
At age 25 in the year 1135, Aelred abruptly left the court and entered a new monastery, which was named Rievaulx, in northern England which St. Bernard, the abbot of Clairvaux in France, had sent twelve monks to establish just two years before.
It was a hard life and the weather was cold and severe (which may account for the mere 57 years of Aelred’s earthly life). The monks “camped” in temporary huts on the river banks in the valley of the beautiful, but often ice and snow covered, River Rye, while they and the workers constructed the monastery that eventually became the largest in all England.
While trying to adjust to this life so different from the court, Aelred began to yearn again for True Friendship, and to see the possibility of attaining True Friendship in a community centered on Christ. Slowly he began to explore what True Friendship could be.
Within eight years he was named novice master, with the heavy responsibility of guiding the spiritual formation of the new monks who were already entering the monastery in increasing numbers.
Novena Prayer
O most kind and loving St. Aelred,
in union with you
I come into the presence of our beloved Jesus.
I pray that you will obtain God’s favor for me
as I imitate your life of holiness
and follow your teachings
of love and friendship,
through Christ Jesus, our friend
whose sweet name was always on your lips.
St. Aelred, pray for me.
St. Aelred, pray for us.
Day 3. Abbot of Revesby
The Abbey of Rievaulx decided to establish a new abbey at Revesby, further to the east, but still in northern England. This was the first of the five daughter houses of Rievaulx, and Aelred was selected to be the first abbot of the new Abbey.
So he left whatever small comforts had been built into Rievaulx in those first ten years and went to Revesby and started all over again, with cold temporary huts, and much manual labor, back-breaking work that he flung himself into for the next two years from 1145-to 1147.
Novena Prayer
O most kind and loving St. Aelred,
in union with you
I come into the presence of our beloved Jesus.
I pray that you will obtain God’s favor for me
as I imitate your life of holiness
and follow your teachings
of love and friendship,
through Christ Jesus, our friend
whose sweet name was always on your lips.
St. Aelred, pray for me.
St. Aelred, pray for us.
Added Comment
Saint Aelred of Rievaulx
By Paul Zalonski
The charity of God is poured forth in our hearts by the Holy Spirit who dwells within us.
My soul, give thanks to the Lord, all my being, bless his holy name (Rom 5:5; Ps 102:1).
O God, who gave the blessed Abbot Aelred the grace of being all things to all men, grant that, following his example, we may so spend ourselves in the service of one another, as to preserve the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.
The New Advent bio
Saint Aelred authored several influential books on spirituality, among them The Mirror of Charity and Spiritual Friendship. He also wrote seven works of history, addressing two of them to King Henry II of England advising him how to be a good king. The twentieth century has seen a greater interest in Saint Aelred as a spiritual writer than in former times when he was known to be a historian.
This year we honor the 900th anniversary of Saint Aelred's birth, though some the anniversary in AD 2010.
Day 4. Abbot of Rievaulx
In 1147 the first abbot of Rievaulx died and Aelred was elected to return from Revesby and become the Abbot of the “Motherhouse,” Rievaulx.
It is located in a scenic valley, dubbed the “valley of light,” ever massaged with the sound of water running through the monastery grounds in the stream of the River Rye. (This, by the way, is the inspiration of our own fountain of bubbling water.)
For the next 20 years St. Aelred was distinguished as a capable, gentle, and caring administrator of an ever-growing abbey, an abbot who never expelled a monk in 20 years.
The abbey reached a peak of 500 priests, brothers, and workers, and even today the massive shells of chapels, chapter rooms, dining halls, and dormitories are still a tourist attraction in northern England.
Archbishop Sentamu and St Aelred's anniversary photos
Source: http://www.google.com/search?q=Archbishop+Sentamu+and+St+Aelred%27s+anniversary+photos&rls=com.microsoft:en-us&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&startIndex=&startPage=1
Novena Prayer
O most kind and loving St. Aelred,
in union with you
I come into the presence of our beloved Jesus.
I pray that you will obtain God’s favor for me
as I imitate your life of holiness
and follow your teachings
of love and friendship,
through Christ Jesus, our friend
whose sweet name was always on your lips.
St. Aelred, pray for me.
St. Aelred, pray for us.
Day 5. Holy Abbot
In addition to his administration of the Abbey, St. Aelred began to work on the writings which have earned him enduring recognition as one of the “late fathers of the church,” a vast array of writings on saints, history, love, friendship, religious life, and uncounted sermons and spiritual works.
Slowly in the monasteries of today his works are being translated from the original Latin into today’s English. (A few years ago I asked a Trappist monk from Boston if he “ever heard” of St. Aelred. He informed me that he was the one who is translating St. Aelred’s sermons.)
St. Aelred wrote the lives of several English saints, and became a sought-after preacher for special occasions. He delivered the funeral oration when King St. David died in 1153. He began writing his two best-known works, The Mirror of Love, and Spiritual Friendship.
Novena Prayer
O most kind and loving St. Aelred,
in union with you
I come into the presence of our beloved Jesus.
I pray that you will obtain God’s favor for me
as I imitate your life of holiness
and follow your teachings
of love and friendship,
through Christ Jesus, our friend
whose sweet name was always on your lips.
St. Aelred, pray for me.
St. Aelred, pray for us.
Day 6. St. Aelred, Apostle of Friendship
In Spiritual Friendship St. Aelred gives us his classic definition of “Friendship.” He says “Friendship is oneness of heart, mind and spirit, in things human and divine, with mutual esteem, and kindly feelings of approval and support.”
In Mirror of Love he departs from generalities and gets down to the nitty gritty of what a True Friend is and does.
“A True Friend is one with whom I am deeply united in bonds of love, can find rest, pour out my heart, have sweet conversation, find a harbor of calm, lay bare my secrets, receive a comforting kiss, cry with and rejoice with, talk with for advice, feel togetherness “even when we are far apart, and with heart and mind together we are bound in the closest ties of love.”
There can be no doubt what Aelred means by True Friendship. And that is his lifelong gospel. It is not that he deviates from the Gospel of Jesus or the teachings of John. He theologizes that if God is love as St. John teaches, then God is Friendship.
“St. Aelred is known as a Christocentric twelfth-century monastic humanist. His most famous work, Spiritual Friendship, which explores the relationship between spiritual and human friendship in a monastic context, reveals his own conscious homosexual orientation and gives love between persons of the same gender its most profound expression in Christian theology.” (Dictionary of the Middle Ages, Vol. 4, American Council of Learned Societies)
Added Comment
Saint Aelred of Rievaulx
By Paul Zalonski
Pour into our hearts, O God, the Holy Spirit's gift of love, that we, clasping each the other's hand, may share the joy of friendship, human and divine, and with Your servant Aelred draw many to Your communion of love; through Jesus Christ the Righteous, who lives and reigns with You in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever.
On friendship
There are four qualities which characterize a friend: loyalty, right intention, discretion and patience. Right intention seeks for nothing other than God and natural good. Discretion brings understanding of what is done on a friend's behalf, and ability when to know when to correct faults. Patience enables one to be justly rebuked, or to bear adversity on another's behalf. Loyalty guards and protects friendship, in good or bitter times.
Novena Prayer
O most kind and loving St. Aelred,
in union with you
I come into the presence of our beloved Jesus.
I pray that you will obtain God’s favor for me
as I imitate your life of holiness
and follow your teachings
of love and friendship,
through Christ Jesus, our friend
whose sweet name was always on your lips.
St. Aelred, pray for me.
St. Aelred, pray for us.
Archbishop Sentamu and St Aelred's anniversary photos
Source: http://www.google.com/search?q=Archbishop+Sentamu+and+St+Aelred%27s+anniversary+photos&rls=com.microsoft:en-us&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&startIndex=&startPage=1
Day 7. Lover, Friend, Christian Humanist
St. Aelred was very personal and honest in his writings about love and friendship. St. Anselm and some of Aelred’s other contemporaries wrote about love and friendship, but in a much more clinical way, even though they were also “gay,” as we would say.
Aelred, Abbot of Rievaulx, on the other hand, in his self-revealing style, wrote about his teenage loves, about his “true” loves in the monastery, about his own yearnings and experiences.
In asserting the need for friendship and love, Aelred legitimized the physical and spiritual embrace of other human beings – and in the context of a religious community. In this context, all loves are reconciled in Jesus, and all are at peace in the love of the community.
Honored as a medieval Christian humanist, Aelred had a great optimism about the capability of human beings to love each other in good communities centered on Jesus. When he entered the monastery, he did not leave the world made by God or the exercise of love which gives harmony to every day life.
Therefore, obviously, if love and friendship were “good” within the hallowed monastery walls, how much more true is it “good” for all God’s children (who happen to be given the gift of attraction to persons of the same gender).
St. Aelred found his answer to the meaning of life in its human dimension in the love of the brothers at Rievaulx – brother to all in community life, lover to some in his True Friendships. He found the love of God made real and physical by experiencing together love of God and individual human beings.
St. Aelred unabashedly insisted on the need for human loves, and in his “Mirror of Love” he pours his heart out in lament over the death of the monk Simon, with whom he felt a True Friendship.
“St. Aelred deserves to be the patron saint of gays and lesbians because he was true to himself – never covering up his sexuality which was same-sex attraction, and he was not pulled fully into the prevailing sex-negative anti-body dualistic philosophy of St. Augustine,” writes one attendee at the conclusion of a seminar on the life and works of St. Aelred.
Novena Prayer
O most kind and loving St. Aelred,
in union with you
I come into the presence of our beloved Jesus.
I pray that you will obtain God’s favor for me
as I imitate your life of holiness
and follow your teachings
of love and friendship,
through Christ Jesus, our friend
whose sweet name was always on your lips.
St. Aelred, pray for me.
St. Aelred, pray for us.
Day 8. Suffered from arthritis
We all identify with Jesus who took on all the weakness and limitations of humanity to be one with us and died for love of us in the agonizing suffering of the passion and Cross.
St. Aelred especially identified with the sufferings of Jesus for us. The last ten years of his life on earth he was wracked with excruciating pain of arthritis.
His sufferings were intensified with the unbearable pangs of kidney stones. Sometimes when he had to stay in a little room near the infirmary, his friends would gather around his bed to cheer him up. (One’s imagination runs wild if gays gathered around his bed were as cheerful then as they are now in the Philippines.)
Novena Prayer
O most kind and loving St. Aelred,
in union with you
I come into the presence of our beloved Jesus.
I pray that you will obtain God’s favor for me
as I imitate your life of holiness
and follow your teachings
of love and friendship,
through Christ Jesus, our friend
whose sweet name was always on your lips.
St. Aelred, pray for me.
St. Aelred, pray for us.
Day 9. Patron of Sex Positive Theology
Patron of responsible sexuality
Many scholars have turned their attention to St. Aelred studies. Worldwide today there is an elite corps of “St. Aelred Scholars.” They are somewhat divided between those who speak frankly and openly of his same-sex orientation and those who would prefer, if they could, to sweep it under the rug. There are rumors that the Trappists don’t allow the monks to read Aelred’s works without permission. But Thomas Merton, a great world-renowned Trappist writer, wrote a biography of St. Aelred.
The Trappists and Benedictines and other orders are fearful that the monks will follow St. Aelred’s teachings of love and friendship in the monastery. Because of homophobia they are trying to be on guard against “special friendships.”
Our reason for joining the world-wide acclamation of St. Aelred as GLBT patron is primarily because of the holiness of his life and his inspiration for us to give our all for Jesus. The name of Jesus was always on his lips and the love of Jesus was always in his heart, but he felt that his love of Jesus could be strengthened by following the teachings of St. John that love of neighbor translates into love of God. “Those who live in love, live in God, and God lives in them.”
St. Aelred was not a modern day gay activist. There is no doubt that he sincerely embraced the celibate life as his vocation. He was a product of his times and caught up in the sex-negative theology of St. Augustine, but he was liminal, way ahead of his times, in his honesty about love and his loves. He is not a role model of gay activism, but a role model of holiness, and honesty, and coming out as appropriate in one’s state of life.
“St. Aelred deserves to be the patron saint of gays and lesbians because his philosophy of the unity of the flesh and spirit does not follow the hateful language of homophobic official literature, and he led a life of honest openness about loving people of the same sex physically,” wrote Oscar Atadero at the conclusion of a seminar on St. Aelred.
We celebrate the feast of St. Aelred because our understanding of life and love is enhanced by this great saint whom we have chosen as our patron.
Novena Prayer
O most kind and loving St. Aelred,
in union with you
I come into the presence of our beloved Jesus.
I pray that you will obtain God’s favor for me
as I imitate your life of holiness
and follow your teachings
of love and friendship,
through Christ Jesus, our friend
whose sweet name was always on your lips.
St. Aelred, pray for me.
St. Aelred, pray for us.
A History of Rievaulx Abbey
Source: http://cistercians.shef.ac.uk/rievaulx/history
'Everywhere peace, everywhere serenity, and a marvellous freedom from the tumult of the world.' Written over eight centuries ago by the monastery's third abbot, St Aelred, these words still apply to Rievaulx today.
Words are not the only links to Rievaulx's medieval monks. Over the past few years, the site has become something of an archaeological treasure, with unexpected discoveries shedding new light on the lives of the monks, and the extensive renewal and rebuilding of their abbey church in the Early English Gothic style.
Archaeologists continue to study the landscape around Rievaulx, revealing the remarkable extent of the abbey's influence and industry. Their discoveries are showcased in the on-site museum.
The abbey was founded by St Bernard of Clairvaux, as part of the missionary effort to reform Christianity in western Europe. Twelve Clairvaux monks came to Rievaulx in 1132.
From these modest beginnings grew one of the wealthiest monasteries of medieval England and the first northern Cistercian monastery.
Rievaulx also enjoyed the protection of Walter Espec of nearby Helmsley Castle, who provided much of the abbey's land. The monks of neighbouring Byland Abbey initially disputed land ownership with Rievaulx, but subsequently moved to their present location and relinquished the disputed land, thus allowing the major expansion of Rievaulx Abbey. You can still see traces of the channels dug by the Rievaulx monks.
A steady flow of monks came to Rievaulx, attracted by the prestige of Abbot Aelred, author and preacher, who was regarded then and later as a wise and saintly man. Following his death in 1167, the monks of Rievaulx sought canonisation for their former leader, and in the 1220s they rebuilt the east part of their church in a much more elaborate style to house his tomb.
Most of this 13th-century 'presbytery' still stands to virtually its full impressive height, a reminder of Rievaulx's original splendour.
Rievaulx was still a vibrant community when Henry VIII dissolved it in 1538. Its new owner, Thomas Manners, first Earl of Rutland, swiftly instigated the systematic destruction of the buildings.
However, the substantial remains constitute one of the most eloquent of all monastic sites, free 'from the tumult of the world.'
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