Author: Sr. Dorcee, beloved

I am the one whom Jesus loves.

It’s Lent, but I feel incapable of praying

Sr. Dorcee, beloved1 Comment

In her usual beautiful prose, Sarah Clarkson writes about her struggle, her incapacity to pray.

THE NIGHT BURNS BRIGHT and dark in my memory, a contrast of moods and scenes like a Caravaggio painting. The cathedral; bright, honeyed stone and gold instruments glinting on the altar. The kindness of my friend and his saving of an excellent seat for me as I skidded in, breathless, the sweet furor of bedtime rituals with my four children still an echo in my brain, a slight wildness in my eye. And the music, a many-layered brightness of harmony and word, hued like a crimson sunset to my synesthetic mind as a small choir sang a selection of ancient Orthodox chants and prayers.

I let myself breathe deeply as the music surged forward, let my eyes rove the warm, dappled space of the medieval church that summer night. But the longer I looked, the more darkness I saw. The shadows like dirty flocks of ravens in the high corners, the vivid stained glass windows I loved so well in the daytime obscured by night, the pain at the back of so many prayers I heard chanted, pleas for God to put an end to despair and death. And the darkness of my own weary heart when the concert had ended and I sat outdoors at a nearby pub and confessed to my long-time mentor and friend, a priest, that I found myself almost unable to pray.

You can read the rest here.

When you are empty

Sr. Dorcee, beloved2 Comments

I haven’t posted a Sunday poem in awhile because I was ill in December and ended up in the hospital followed by surgery. Here we go again with a poem by Meister Eckhart.

When you are empty

When you are empty,
feeling bereft,
or not feeling much at all,
hesitate before trying
to fix your situation,
because this happens
to be just what
you are: a vessel
awaiting the fill
of heavenly
fullness beyond any
this-worldly feeling. 

Josef Pieper on why our incompleteness means hope

Sr. Dorcee, belovedLeave a comment

A great read.

lone car on winding road

Marco Ritzki | Shutterstock

Fr. Michael Rennier – published on 02/16/25

Acknowledging that we haven’t yet reached our destination can be frustrating but should also be a source of hope in our lives.

Back in the halcyon days of my childhood, each summer our family would pile into our baby-blue minivan and drive to Florida. During the entirety of the 12-hour drive, my brothers and I would go wild, arguing over who got to sit in which seat, quibbling over who was invading the sovereign territorial space already claimed by a brother, and begging our parents for gas station snacks.

This was in the days before laptops and DVD players, so our only entertainment was the books we brought, travel versions of board games, and whatever music we could listen to before the batteries in the Walkman died. The trip felt like an eternity.

I’m sure my parents felt the dilation of time into infinity at least as acutely as we did. One year, my dad got so desperate that he picked us up out of our beds and piled us into the car at 3 a.m. so we would sleep through the first half of the drive and leave him alone. He may have been starting his vacation sleep deprived but at least we weren’t driving him crazy.

“Are we there yet?”

You can read the rest here.

While All the Earth in Darkness Sleeps

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“This hymn was commissioned by the Benedict XVI Institute under the patronage of James Hudon. Part of the text was set to music by the composer Frank La Rocca. The sources of the hymn are fourfold: the main verses borrow from Christina Rossetti’s stanza in the classic “In the Bleak Midwinter” and draw on the nativity narratives of Matthew and Luke’s Gospels; the poem as a whole is shaped according to the Eastern Orthodox Akathist Hymn tradition, particularly its practice of offering seven praises after a chanted prose reading; and, finally, the third chorus of praises draws on the Western litany tradition and paraphrases the Litany of the Blessed Virgin.“

You can read this beautiful hymn here.