*Abbey of Gethsemani (Trappist, KY)

Images of a recent trip I took to Tom Merton's old place, The Abbey of Gethsemani.

I just heard that one of his old pals, Fr. Matthew Kelty, passed away yesterday.

Fr. Matthew was the guest chaplain for a number of years for Gethsemani retreats, and I was fortunate enough to hear him give a number of nightly talks where he included art, poetry and literature references in discussing the human endeavor and interaction with the divine. He also used to do an early morning 4am Mass. He was brief and direct saying this Mass and it would last all of 20 minutes.

Here is Fr. Matthew reciting (nearly) everyone's favorite Merton prayer (and then my pics below that...)

 

81. Our Lady of the Scapular & St. Stephen (CLOSED)

NOTE: In 2015 this church closed down and was merged into the Church of Our Savior and the Chapel of the Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary as part of the Archdiocese of New York's great closings & mergers of 2015. Only Our Savior and the Sacred Hearts Chapel will remain open for regular Masses and other events. This combined parish is now called the Parish of Our Saviour, Saint Stephen and Our Lady of the Scapular, and the Chapel of the Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary.

(church info last updated 03/31/2016)
Address: 151 E. 28th St.
Church Constructed: 1866

Links:
Chapel of the Sacred Hearts of Jesus & Mary (associated Chapel)
About the Organ
NYC Architecture
Sacred Places
Holy Art to God
Will It Ever Be A Landmark? (Gotham Gazette)

FIRST SUNDAY OF ADVENT

This church is deceiving, appearing fairly small from the outside, but upon entering you realize it's big, going on and on beyond the altar which is set more towards the middle of the church. Beyond the altar are a few small chapels, statues and shrines. Good, small quiet places for prayer. The church is well lit, dramatically so, and the many art, paintings and sculpture around the building are highlighted.

"The Church of Our Lady of the Scapular of Mount Carmel was founded in 1889, and was located in a Country Gothic building at 341 East 28th Street. Our Lady of the Scapular was merged into St. Stephen's Church in the 1980s, and the original building was razed. In January 2007, the Archdiocese of New York announced that the Church of the Sacred Hearts of Mary and Jesus, located at 307 East 33rd Street, would be merged into Our Lady of the Scapular-St. Stephen Church." (From nycago.org's NYC Organ Project webpages)

The Gospel this week was simple and to the point (Luke, 21:25-28, 34-36):

"Jesus said to his disciples:
“There will be signs in the sun, the moon, and the stars,
and on earth nations will be in dismay,
perplexed by the roaring of the sea and the waves.
People will die of fright
in anticipation of what is coming upon the world,
for the powers of the heavens will be shaken.
And then they will see the Son of Man
coming in a cloud with power and great glory.
But when these signs begin to happen,
stand erect and raise your heads
because your redemption is at hand.”

“Beware that your hearts do not become drowsy
from carousing and drunkenness
and the anxieties of daily life,
and that day catch you by surprise like a trap.
For that day will assault everyone
who lives on the face of the earth.
Be vigilant at all times
and pray that you have the strength
to escape the tribulations that are imminent
and to stand before the Son of Man.”

I need to quiet my own carousing and drunkeness and to prepare for what is to coming.

A friend invited me to one of those expensive midtown bars last night, pricey cocktails, atmosphere, possible celebrities. Couldn't wear jeans, jacket a must. I didn't go. I don't want to dress up anymore. I want to stay uptown, hide up here, grow a beard, pray.

I've been taking great long walks in the mornings and going to daily Mass at a few of the uptown churches. It's a good way for me to begin each day. It calms me. Come 9am, though, it's all very anticlimactic, the world is grim again and there's nothing to look forward to save my job, that lately I dislike so much. I've been looking into career changes, but there is nothing immediate. I realize I am in a position and an industry in which I truly do not belong. I'm a feeling person in a cold pointless position, working, performing tasks that ultimately enable other cold pointless industries to thrive and go on to enable other industries, and so on. For me, its a path to and of nothingness. And I want out. But truly, I'm at a loss, not knowing what to do next.

Still reading The Life You Save May Be Your Own; some of the adventures of those four Catholic pilgrims I relate to so directly:

Merton, in Rome...
"By day he went to churches, over and over. 'And thus without knowing anything about it I became a pilgrim. I was unconsciously and unintentionally visiting the great shrines of Rome, and seeking out their sanctuaries with some of the avidity and desire of a true pilgrim, though not quite for the right reason.'" (33)

Day, in Manhattan...
"She had rented rooms from some friends on Fourteenth Street so as to be near the Church of Our Lady of Guadalupe, where she liked to worship-a small Mexican church between Seventh and Eight avenues, no wider or grander than an old railroad flat." (63)

Merton, in Manhattan...
"His hell was Cambridge, but his Sodom is New York. For him as for Day, Manhattan will be, first of all, a rebel's paradise, a place of sin and temptation, against which he will rebel in turn by becoming religious. And yet for him, as for her, the firsthand experience of New York, of its legendary excesses and waywardness, will lend authority to his renunciation of it. Because he seems to relish the lost life as he describes it, his conversion seems authentic. (73-74)

He went to Sunday Mass at Corpus Christi, a small, bright church off upper Broadway past the Columbia campus...He was surprised by what he saw. The church was full of people, which amazed him. A few pews ahead, a beautiful girl knelt and prayed, oblivious of all else, and her beauty and piety put together amazed him, too...The priest gave the sermon, and it was convincing. It sounded like the word of God. 'For behind those words you felt the full force not only of Scripture but of centuries of a unified and continuous and consistent tradition.' (90-91)

He began a regimen of round-the-clock religious devotion: Sunday Mass at St. Joseph's on Sixth Avenue, weekday Mass at St. Francis of Assisi near Penn Station or Our Lady of Guadalupe on Fourteenth Street, a few hours' reading in the Summa in the Columbia library, followed by the Stations of the Cross at Corpus Christi Church or the Church of Notre Dame on Morningside Drive... (98)

In 1937, the Metropolitan Museum of Art opened a museum of medieval art. The Cloisters, as it is called, was like no other museum in America: an odd and remote outpost compounded from the ruins of several disused European monasteries-chapels, cloisters, stained-glass windows-which had been taken apart stone by stone, shipped across the ocean, and put together on a bluff in uptown Manhattan as a New World meta-monastery.

Thomas Merton went to the Cloisters on a date one Sunday the summer after it opened, then returned by himself later in the year. Looking back, he described those visits as the happiest days he spent in New York -happier it seems, than the days he spent in actual churches." (95-96)

Things with my girlfriend are good, despite those fears I experienced out west. There is a strong connection and potential for so much love. She's thinking of moving here next year - a possibility I'm excited for. Not a Catholic, and very much against organized religion (can't much disagree with her there, based on all the very stupid, hypocritical and detrimental acts so many religions are responsible for,) she has a lot of different ideas and thoughts on God than I do. For starters, she doesn't necessarily believe in God, but does admit to believing that there is something greater than us. My first reactive thought is that people are pompous who say they "do not believe in God." Putting more thought into it, and reading Merton's experience, my thought changes to, how pompous of any of us down here to think they know the idea and concept of God so fully.

"In the book [The Spirit of Medieval Philosophy], by his own account, he found a conception of God that he thought plausible and appealing. This God was not a Jehovah or a divine lawgiver, not a plague-sending potentate or a scourge of prophets, not the heavenly Father of Jesus Christ or the stern Judge waiting just past the gate at the end of time, but the vital animating principle of reality - "pure act," being itself or per se, existence in perfection, outside space and time, transcending all human imagery, calmly, steadily, eternally being. 'What a relief it was for me, now,' he recalled, 'to discover not only that no idea of ours, let alone any image, could adequately represent God, but also that we should not allow ourselves to be satisfied with any such knowledge of Him.'" (80-81)

80. Chapel of the Sacred Hearts of Jesus & Mary (Now the Parish of Our Saviour, Saint Stephen and Our Lady of the Scapular, and the Chapel of the Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary)

NOTE: In 2015 this church merged with two churches: Our Lady of the Scapular & St. Stephen Church and the Church of Our Saviour as part of the Archdiocese of New York's great closings & mergers of 2015. Only this chapel and Our Savior will remain open for regular Masses and other events. This combined parish is now called the Parish of Our Saviour, Saint Stephen and Our Lady of the Scapular, and the Chapel of the Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary. 

(mass times & church info last updated 03/31/2016)
Address: 325 E. 33rd St.
Phone: 212.213.6027
Weekend Mass Times: 
Sun: 12:45pm, 5:30pm (both English)
Weekday Mass Times: 
Mon-Fri: 12:15pm (English)
Confession:
Sun: 5pm-5:15pm
Church Constructed: 2009? (forgive me if I'm mistaken)
Links:
Official Website
Chapel History

Church of Our Lady of the Scapular & St. Stephen (associated Church)
Congegration of the Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary

This chapel is so far on the east side, why does anyone live all the way over there?

My thought, as I headed down 33rd this evening towards the Chapel of the Sacred Hearts of Jesus & Mary, and, finally arriving, I looked inside the chapel through it's great south windows, walking closer, peering inside, I witnessed a great congregation gathering for the Sunday 5:30pm Mass. It must happen every Sunday, and it was nice to see a mixed crowd, all ages, various types, lots of different people.

The priest gave a good sermon about living in the moment, living within and being inside each breath you take to be present in the Lord's graces and be in the moment, ready for God. It was direct and to the (and such a good) point. Ironically, I felt very out of the moment this evening. Why are things so off sometimes?

more...

Additionally, there was a special announcement at the end of Mass, and an insert in the bulletin, about the U.S. Catholic Bishop's response to the Heath Care reform that had just passed the House. There are some fundamental sacredness of life issues presently in the bill that conflict with standard Catholic teachings concerning public funding for abortion, and care for the poor and immigrants. As United States Catholics, the Bishops urge us to speak out to our senators, politicians, lawmakers who are also our fellow human beings.

One can go here: www.usccb.org/action to lodge an automatic online request to your senators.

more...

Recently I was in a cafe with a good friend, 0ne of my closest, a fellow Christian who's a protestant. We were speaking about sin and repentance and forgiveness (pretty light, huh?) They told me that even though through their faith they know that when their sins are forgiven by God, they still feel a need to admit aloud what they have done and that they wish their church had something similar to confession as the Catholic church has.

I was struck suddenly by the sweetness of the Church's seven sacraments (specifically Reconciliation) and what it means for Catholics. These are gifts we have as Catholics that simply do not exist in other branches and sects of Christianity, and we (and I mean I here, but perhaps you feel the same) should cease taking these things for granted. We all sin down here, there is no way around - but the fact we are able to walk into the confessional and admit to God's servant our wrongdoings, and be blessed and absolved in person in a very real way, materializes for us the wondrous abstraction that is God's constant and eternal forgiveness of our very real sins.

It has given me a new realization of my Catholic faith and I now, very soon, I gots to get me to a confessional.

I've begun reading Paul Elie's book, The Life You Save May Be Your Own, which focuses on the spiritual pilgrimages of Thomas Merton, Dorothy Day, Flannery O'Connor and Walker Percy. Thus far I am especially connecting with Dorothy Day's journey, in New York, and her visits to Manhattan churches. This may begin happening in the next few following posts, my sharing excerpts about Day's thoughts on NYC from Elie's book:

"Mornings she would set out on the streets of lower Manhattan...'In all that great city of seven millions, I found no friends, I had no work; I was separated from my fellows. Silence in the midst of city noises oppressed me. My own silence, the feeling that I had no one to talk to overwhelmed me so that my very throat was constricted; my heart was heavy with unuttered thoughts; I wanted to weep my loneliness away...
So it was at dawn, going home, she found herself stopping at St. Joseph's Church on Sixth Avenue, not far from Hell Hole, thinking it inevitable that 'sooner or later I would have to pause in the mad rush of living and remember my first beginning and my last end...'St. Joseph's is the oldest Catholic church in Manhattan, low and square, with fieldstone walls, high white pillars, and a portico topped by a cross that stands out starkly against the sky. It is a kind of house blend of old and new, of city and country, of Catholic Europe and leatherstocking America...
All her life she had been haunted by God. God was behind her. God loomed before her. Now she felt hounded toward Him, as though toward home; now she longed for an end to the wavering life in which she was caught...
For the time being, she began to pray...'God, be merciful to me, a sinner.'"

(pages 16, 28-29)

27. Corpus Christi Church

(mass times & church info last updated 03/08/2016) 

Address: 529 W. 121st St. (Near Columbia)
Phone: 212.666.9350

Weekend Mass Times:
Sat: 5pm (English)
Sunday: 8:30am (English), 10am (Spanish), 11:15am (English/choir)
1pm Family Mass (Labor Day thru June 30)
5pm (at St. Paul's Chapel at Columbia when class is in session)

Weekday Mass Times:

Mon-Sat: 8am (English)
Mon-Fri: 12:10pm (at St. Paul's Chapel at Columbia when class is in session, otherwise at the church)
Sat: 11am (Spanish)

Confession: 

Sat: 4:15-4:45pm (in the church)
Mon-Fri: 1pm-2pm (in 100 Earl Hall at Columbia except summer & university vacations)

Adoration: 

Mon-Fri: 8:30am-9:30am (when Columbia is in session)
Mon-Wed, Fri: 4pm-5pm (when Columbia is in session)
Thursday: 8pm-9pm Holy Hour (when Columbia is in session)
Saturday: After 8am Mass until 11am
Links:

Official Website
Music Concerts at the Church
About the Organ
Feast of Corpus Christi

From Yahoo Travel:

This Roman Catholic church was founded in 1906, and the present building was designed and built in 1935. It is best known for its music programs, as well as a vast collection of historic, religious, architectural and contemporary art. The medieval design will enchant you, as will the world-renowned choir and the heavenly sound of the Holtkamp Organ that was installed in the 1950s. Every Sunday the church performs the Gregorian Chant, the Renaissance polyphony, and Baroque and early classical choral music.

In my brief research (basically of this church's very great website) I discovered that this is the church where Thomas Merton was baptized.

Of Corpus Christi, Merton later wrote:

"The words, songs, ceremonies, signs, movements of worship are all designed to open the mind and heart of the participant to this experience of oneness in Christ. One reason why I am a Catholic, a monk and a priest today is that I first went to Mass, and kept going to Mass, in a Church where these things were realized. . . . There was nothing new or revolutionary about it; only that everything was well done, not out of aestheticism or rubrical obsessiveness, but out of love for God and His truth. It would certainly be ingratitude of me of I did not remember the atmosphere of joy, light, and at least relative openness and spontaneity that filled Corpus Christi at solemn High Mass."

(Seasons of Celebration, p. 237)

And what of my time there this morning?

I did attend the 11:15 Choral Mass - and it was everything as described above.

To be in a holy place and surrounded with such music; to be in the presence of those so beautiful because they truly want to be there and are thus truly there - it's all enough to fill one with more emotion than one can handle on a drab day such as today.

2. St. Francis Xavier Church

NOTE: In 2015 this church was part of a list of churches in danger of merging with other churches or closing altogether as part of the Archdiocese of New York's great closings & mergers of 2015. This doesn't seem to have happened and this church remains open for regular Masses and other events. If you have any news about this merger or lack thereof please feel free to write in the comments section at the bottom of this post.

(mass times & church info last updated 04/04/2016)
Address: 46 W. 16th St. (Between 5th and 6th)
Phone: 212.627.2100
Email: StFrancisXavier@sfxavier.org
Weekend Mass Times:
Sat: 5pm (English)
Sun: 9am (Family Mass), 11:30am, 5pm (all English)
Weekday Mass Times:
Mon-Fri: 7:45am, 12:05pm (English, in the Mary Chapel)
Sat: 12:05pm (English)
Confession: Sat: 1pm-2pm
Links:
Official Website
Architectural Images
New York Times article on the church
Catholic Encyclopedia article on St. Francis Xavier
Wikipedia article on St. Francis Xavier

This church (as in the building) has been around since 1882. It is big; the pews have this great polished old quality about them; the entire structure strikes me as solid - a kind of firm cornerstone or foundation of faith for this neighborhood. The acoustics are good, the music sounds great within it and it's just all around comfortable and classic all at the same time. There are many decorations around; statues of various saints look down upon you from so high above you cannot tell who they signify. Large fresco paintings of the stations of the cross line the perimeter of the church. It really was quite a nice experience. I attended the 5pm Sunday service this evening and there was a nice diverse mix of people in attendance. It seems to be a parish that has a lot of community outreach programs as well as programs including focus on the gay and lesbian community, as one may expect from a church in the center of Chelsea.

I slept in this morning - I had actually meant to attend a church other than Xavier but due to a late night yesterday I decided to accept a friend's offer and go to this later Sunday evening mass. It was a good idea too - not sure if it's because the weather is getting a little colder or because the past couple weeks and this weekend have been rough and it was nice to be in the company of friends inside the sanctuary, but there was such a warm feeling I had just being there.

I've felt exhuasted and lost during the past few weeks. This evening in church (as happens often after a long weekend followed with attending a Sunday night time church service before the week rolls into gear again) I felt the emotion of the singing and the desperateness in the air of our America these days and the desperateness in me. I am in such a same state as I have been in the last few years. I am still so full of questions, and doubt; fear, and good intent; laughter, and sin.

Early this past Friday morning I woke up and found myself in our bathtub. Are you surprised? I didn't know what I was doing there either. The last thing I remembered was splashing water on my face in the sink just a foot away - so I surmise I rinsed my face and then just climbed right in the tub, like John in Norwegian Wood. The other thing I remember from that night was a beautiful bartender whose name I was told and then straightaway let slip my mind. When I asked her again, she wouldn't tell me and was quite upset. That was the end of that. I stuck around in that bar to see if I could change her mind and I ended up becoming quite sloshed. Somehow I made it home and into the bath, fully clothed - yet a despicable site nonetheless I'm sure. What am I doing approaching my thirties and acting like a college kid? Or is it behavior more befitting an alcoholic?

Three of my favorite things include girls, drinking and going to Mass. Not necessarily in that order. This is the source of so much questionable behavior in my life. You see, over the past 5 or so years I have spent a lot of time wondering if I should head towards a vocation of priesthood. In my volunteer time in Africa - where I spent near two years alone - I realized that this could never be - I simply knew that I wanted to be married one day. I knew a life without a woman couldn't be for me. It was a kind of two year discernment where at the end I hadn't realized what I wanted to do but rather what I didn't want to do. But the thought still plagues me. My intense joy in attending Mass is one of the things that convinces me I should look into the priesthood. My intense desire to be with girls is what advises me otherwise. The drinking often leads to poor choices concerning girls and this behavior subsequently leads me to entertain the idea of the priesthood once again. And this troubles me so I go back to the drink, back to the girls, back to the church - a bizarre cycle for sure. But one I'm fairly certain will resolve itself before too long.

Reading into a little bit about St. Francis Xavier Church I read that Thomas Merton, while attending Benediction at this church, realized his vocation and that his path lay in the monastery. The other day I attended a Benediction at another church, yet all I could think about was the girl sitting behind me and if I should ask her out for coffee. The Merton tidbit got me to remembering a prayer that he had written that I read over and over again when I was in Africa and which always delivers to me such peace and calm -

"My Lord God, I have no idea where I am going. I do not see the road ahead of me. I cannot know for certain where it will end. Nor do I really know myself, and the fact that I think that I am following your will does not mean that I am actually doing so. But I believe that the desire to please you does in fact please you. And I hope I have that desire in all that I am doing. I hope that I will never do anything apart from that desire. And I know that if I do this you will lead me by the right road though I may know nothing about it. Therefore will I trust you always though I may seem to be lost and in the shadow of death. I will not fear, for you are ever with me, and you will never leave me to face my peril's alone." - THOUGHTS IN SOLITUDE


*Apologies again for the poor quality photos.

(09/20/2010)
additional photos...
**Note: I came here today for the 7:45am weekday Mass and found the main church empty.  I began walking around quietly taking photos, enjoying the newly renovated space and beauty of this gorgeous place.  As I approached the back I could hear a voice.  I made my way toward the sound and discovered a small chapel behind the altar. The voice was that of a priest, and he was celebrating Mass with about ten folks gathered together.  I assume this is where the weekday Masses are probably always celebrated. It was a nice little space with 2 large windows overlooking the neighborhood and some trees.