OUR LADY IN THE USA

Daniel Thomas Paulos

Sister Mary Jean Dorcy

There are not many examples of the theme of Our Lady of the Rosary in American art (USA), but here are some of my favorites. 

In May of 2014, I did two Blogs of the art of silhouettes by Sister Mary Jean Dorcy  and Daniel Thomas Paulos. Sister Mary Jean died in 1988, but her artwork has inspired many other artists, including Dan Paulos, who collaborated with her on her last book, “Spring Comes to the Hill Country” (1989).

Our dear friend, Brother Arturo Olivas, OFS, who died November 2017  (see Blog 11/21/17)  did several retablos of our Lady of the Rosary. Arturo was not only an accomplished retablo artist, but he was a Third Order Franciscan, an elementary school teacher, and a gardener, who left a remarkable legacy of loving, learning, teaching, faith and art.

Ellen Chavez de Leitner lives in Chimayo, NM, where she and her family have been producing traditional Hispanic art since 1986, continuing the tradition of their ancestors. She uses traditional materials – hand carved pinewood, homemade gesso, and water based paints made with natural pigments and dyes, and piñon sap varnish. Her main influence is the simple devotional expressiveness of the master santeros of the 18th and 19th centuries, but she also finds inspiration in 11th - 12th century Romanesque art, illuminated manuscripts, and Baroque and Renaissance religious art. 

The Museum of New Mexico and the Spanish Colonial Arts Society, as well as private collectors worldwide have collected works by Ellen and each of her six children.

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Our brethren who are freed from this world by the Lord’s summons are not to be lamented, since we know that they are not lost, but sent before; that, departing from us, they precede us as travelers, as navigators are accustomed to do; that they should be desired, but not bewailed; that the black garments should not be taken upon us here, when they have already taken upon them the white raiment there. –St. Cyprian of Carthage

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LOCAL SAVIOR OF RAPTORS

This past  Saturday was Global Big Day, a worldwide bird checklist program used by millions of birders. It allows scientists to compile everyone’s sightings into a single massive list, while at the same time collecting the data to help scientists better understand birds.  Our Oblate Gigi and her husband accompanied me as we rode around Shaw Island doing our count, waving to anyone we saw, still in quarantine.  

This made me think of an article in April on NPR  about a local man, I have been in contact with, but never met. Fascinating story!

Robyn Kruse- Skaget Valley

Bud Anderson is well known in the Skagit Valley (about ½ hour away from where our ferry comes in on the mainland) for his “raptor walks”, which he has been doing for many years.  If one wants to see raptors, just drive along the highways and byways of this rich valley and watch up close as the great birds line the telephone wires.  Raptors are birds of prey that primarily hunt vertebrates, including other birds. 
Their talons and beaks tend to be relatively large, powerful and adapted for tearing and/or piercing flesh. 

But there is more to Bud than local walks!

Traveling home after a flight into Seattle-Tacoma airport, you might share a ride on the shuttle with a Red-tailed Hawk. That’s because to protect passengers, planes, and birds, airport biologists Steve Osmek and Bud Anderson capture raptors and relocate them away from the airport.

In 2013, the biologists moved 86 hawks and falcons, including 23 red-tails and 41 Cooper’s Hawks. Every time the biologists catch a bird, they move it far enough away that it won’t come back. But with Seattle’s famous traffic, especially during rush hour, each journey can take four to six hours. That’s a lot of driving, particularly when you're catching three or four birds of prey a week.

That’s where Bellair Charters of Bellingham, Washington, comes in.  Each bird gets a seat on a van with other travelers. This process means a bird can be relocated within a matter of hours, minimizing crate time and stress. The airporter carries the birds, at no charge, secured in covered animal carriers, north, to safer foraging grounds near Bud’s home in the Skagit Valley.

After weighing, measuring, banding, and tagging the bird's wings, Bud releases them in wide-open country. “It’s a flat farmland area. It’s loaded with voles. It’s loaded with shorebirds, with starlings, with ducks. And so it supports a high number of raptors. Also, there aren’t too many people and certainly no low-flying jets, so they’re much safer. We take ‘em to what we call a better restaurant.” It is paradise for the birds!

Bud is director of the Falcon Research Group of Bow,  which he founded in 1985. The Falcon Research Group is primarily a volunteer-driven organization with around 1,000 members, the majority of whom are from western Washington.

It is committed to the conservation of birds of prey. Bud believes that “education is the best way to achieve their survival in the rapidly changing future.”

The Falcon Research Group provides a “portal” for the average person to engage with raptors in an up close and personal manner.

The group conducts several long-term field research projects that focus on a variety of birds of prey.  They are also involved in raptor breeding, migration, wintering and genetics studies both locally and internationally. Other programs include hawk-watching classes in cities throughout western Washington.

 But back to Sea-Tac. The hundreds of acres of fields surrounding the airport have become the perfect habitat for the field vole, a small rodent, which is a food source for the raptors.  But as we know  bird strikes can damage or even bring down a plane.

Biologists use a wide array of deterrents to keep raptors away, including pyrotechnics and other scare tactics. While some resident raptors have learned to steer clear of the flight path, for young birds, the lure of the vole can be too much, so workers will try to relocate them.

The process begins with a series of raptor traps set up around the perimeter of the airport. When one is tripped, a satellite transponder sends a text message to a team of biologists. The birds are then examined, put in a pet crate, and shipped 80 miles north to the Skagit Valley.

"We want to know where they go. We want to know where they show up. We especially want to know if they come back to the airport or not," said Anderson, who has been working with birds for half a century. “If they come back, then that tells us that maybe we need to move them further."

In the 13 years of the program, more than 686 birds have been relocated. Only seven have returned to the airport.  Pretty successful work!

MOTHER'S DAY- OUR LADY IN PERU

On this Mother’s Day we present more art depicting Our Lady of the Rosary.

Many of the most beautiful paintings depicting Our Lady of the Rosary are from South America, mainly PERU.

The practice of praying with a rosary began in twelfth century Europe, when it was said that the Virgin Mary herself had given the first rosary beads to St Dominic of Guzmán with instructions to offer prayers to her. In this painting, St Dominic is identified not only by this event and by the black and white habit of the order he founded, but by the presence of the dog below. According to the Golden Legend, Dominic’s mother, while pregnant with him, had a dream that she would give birth to a dog with a torch in its mouth that would “burn the world.” This dream forecasted Dominic’s founding of an order, the Dominicans, that would preach throughout the world.

In a number of paintings, both European and Spanish Colonial, Dominic is accompanied by St Catherine of Siena, who is identified by the stigmata on her hands received during one of her visionary experiences of God. The object below her in the painting Our Lady of the Rosary with Sts Dominic and Catherine most likely represents a book referencing her writings, including The Dialogue of Divine Providence and many letters and prayers.

This small painting on copper would have been used for private devotions, and can be stylistically dated to the early seventeenth century, reflecting a new use of a plate originally intended for printing. Our Lady of the Rosary with Saints Dominic and Catherine of Siena was painted on an unused plate. The fine and quite small facial features point to the influence of the Mannerist style on artists in the early years of the Viceroyalty of PERU. The painting was originally without the gold embellishment that was added in the eighteenth century, reflecting a change in taste as well as a wish to enhance the value of the work.

We have written in past Blogs about the art from the Cuzco school, the group of European and indigenous painters active in Cuzco, Peru, from the 16th through the 18th century. The term refers not to an easily identifiable style from a single period of history but instead to the artists of multiple ethnicities who worked in various styles throughout the history of the Viceroyalty of Peru in and around Cuzco.

Situated high in the Andes, Cuzco had been the capital of the Inca empire and had become the headquarters for each of the religious orders in the viceroyalty. European artists began working in Cuzco shortly after Spanish colonization of the city in the 1530s. 

They introduced the styles they had learned in their native countries to indigenous artists who had traditionally painted ceramics and murals in a geometrically abstract style.  While much of the art remains, the artists themselves are lost to us.

OUR LADY of the ROSARY- AROUND THE WORLD

Our Lady of the Rosary of CHIQUINQUIRA is a Marian title of the Blessed Virgin Mary associated with a venerated image in the northern ANDES region.

Under this venerated title, the image is the Patroness of Colombia, the Venezuelan state of Zulia, and the town of Caraz in Peru. The image, painted on a cotton support, is kept in the Basílica of Our Lady of the Rosary in Chiquinquirá, where her date of Pontifical coronation is July 9.

In 1560, a Spanish painter named Alonso de Narváez painted a portrait of the Virgin of the Rosary on a homespun piece of cotton woven by the Indians. Painting in tempera, he used mineral and organic pigments taken from the soil and from herb and flower juices of the region.

The Virgin of the Rosary in the center of the painting is approximately three feet high. She looks towards her left as if to call attention to the nearly naked Child in her arms. The image has a calm countenance with a delicate smile. Both her face and the Child's are pale. The Child has a little brightly colored bird tied to his thumb and a rosary hangs from his left hand. Our Lady is supported by a crescent moon in a position suggesting the woman of the Apocalypse. A white veil covers her hair and her rose-colored robe is covered by a sky blue cape. With the little finger of her left hand she holds a rosary which hangs in front of her, and in her right hand she has a scepter. On her right stands the figure of St. Anthony of Padua, and on her left that of the Apostle St. Andrew. These were the patron saints respectively of Antonio de Santana, the Spanish colonist who had commissioned the painting, and the Dominican friar, Andres Jadaque, who had arranged for de Narváez to paint it.

Modern sculpture by Maria Lea Cerda, Venezuela

On 9 January 1910, Pope Pius X authorized the Canonical Coronation to the image which was not carried out until 9 July 1919 due to the political turmoil prevalent at the time. On July 3, 1986, Pope John Paul II visited the sanctuary and prayed for peace in Colombia at the feet of the Virgin Mary's image. The title given to the Virgin is from the city of Chiquinquirá, where the first of the Virgin's miraculous manifestations occurred, and where the original image from the sixteenth century is kept.

WINNIE AND BELLA UPDATES

Before haircut

My wonderful big sister

Bella had first  haircut

One bed- 2 bodies

After dinner naps

CONSECRATION PRAYER

With the love of a Mother and Handmaid, embrace us as we renew our consecration to you, together with our brothers and sisters in Christ. In a special way we commend to you those particularly in need of your maternal care.

Mother of Mercy

 Mary, Health of the Sick, sign of health, of healing, and of divine hope for the sick, we entrust to you all who are infected with the coronavirus.

Mary, Mother of Consolation, who console with a mother’s love all who turn to you, we entrust to you all those who have lost loved ones in the pandemic.

Mary, Help of Christians, who come to our rescue in every trial, we entrust to your loving protection all caregivers.

Mary, Queen and Mother of Mercy, who embrace all those who call upon your help in their distress, we entrust to you all who are suffering in any way from the pandemic.

Mary, Seat of Wisdom, who were so wonderfully filled with the light of truth, we entrust to you all who are working to find a cure to this pandemic.

Mary, Mother of Good Counsel, who gave yourself wholeheartedly to God’s plan for the renewing of all things in Christ, we entrust to you all leaders and policymakers.

Accept with the benevolence of a Mother the act of consecration that we make today with confidence, and help us to be your Son’s instruments for the healing and salvation of our country and the world.

 

Mother of Mercy- Bro. Mickey McGrath

Mary, Mother of the Church, you are enthroned as queen at your Son’s right hand: we ask your intercession for the needs of our country, that every desire for good may be blessed and strengthened, that faith may be revived and nourished, hope sustained and enlightened, charity awakened and animated; guide us, we pray, along the path of holiness.

Mary our Mother, bring everyone under your protection and entrust everyone to your beloved Son, Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.