Sudden Stop (# 1788)

1.This morning I was running between the computer and the basement trying to find a replacement battery for the communications system when I clicked into a Facebook post from the Plum Village where they were singing a beautiful Avalokitesvara chant accompanied by a group of monks playing stringed instruments. It was Thay’s Namo Valokiteshvaraya chant from Plum Village in France (https://www.peaceinmotion.info/docs/dansbeschrijvingen/Namo_Valokiteshvara.pdf). The chant is intended to make one mindful of suffering in oneself and in the world. The large group of monks was sitting so still and so peacefully while singing. So I stopped and listened and now, here I am.

2.Last week I took a sudden turn into a Christian exploration. I told the story at Play as Being this morning.

Adams Rubble: I have been on a different journey the past few days
Riddle Sideways listens
Adams Rubble: A few days ago, at a whim, I looked into the saint for the day. I had never ever done that before
Adams Rubble: It turned out to be St Agnes
Adams Rubble: When she was about 12 or 13 she the prefect’s son wanted her to be his wife
Adams Rubble: She refused saying she was betrothed to someone greater
Adams Rubble: (who was Christ)
Adams Rubble: the son went home sick
Adams Rubble: so the prefect came to visit Agnes and she told him the same thing
Adams Rubble: Agnes was given a choice of becoming a vestal virgin or being sent to a brothel
Riddle Sideways: choice?
Adams Rubble: she couldn’t go serve a pagan god
Adams Rubble: so the prefect stripped of her clothes and had her dragged to the brothel
Adams Rubble: on the way, the angels took pity and and her hair cover her body better than any garment
Adams Rubble: at the brothel an angel gave her her a robe of pure white and her room was bathed in light
Adams Rubble: Now the prefects son and his buddies decided to go to the brothel and have their way with her
Adams Rubble: the legend varies here but in one version the buddies went first and were struck dead
Adams Rubble: the prefect’s son went to see what had happened and he was struck dead
Adams Rubble: the prefect came and told Agnes if her God were so great he should raise his son from the dead
Adams Rubble: so Agnes prayed and the son was restored to life and became a Christian
Adams Rubble: in one version so did the prefect
Adams Rubble: in any case someone decided she should die
Adams Rubble: so the decided to burn her but the flames would not burn her and burned some of the spectators instead
Adams Rubble: so the ruler had her lanced in the neck and she died
Adams Rubble: her family carried her to their tomb and buried her. A few days later they were there and Agnes and a host of heavenly hosts appeared and Agnes told them she was happy where she was and they should be too
Adams Rubble: a group of non-Christians gathered and began to throw things at the group around the tomb
Adams Rubble: a storm appeared and many of them were slain
Adams Rubble: late Agnes’ foster sister was praying at the tomb and a crowd came and stoned her and she was buried with Agnes
Adams Rubble: this all took place around 300 in Rome
Adams Rubble: A church was built over her tomb now called Sant’Agnese fuori le mura
Adams Rubble: the daughter of Constantine got leprosy and went to the church to pray
Adams Rubble: she was cured
Adams Rubble: She had a large covered cemetery built at the site and eventually a mausoleum was built that is now the church of Santa Costanza
Adams Rubble: as I began to remind myself about the church, I discovered a book about the church by a Canadian woman Margaret Visser
–BELL–
Adams Rubble: her book raised questions and introduced new strange facts that did not seem right
Adams Rubble: I researched further and much of what Ms Visser said was true
Adams Rubble: Then continuing my research I found that around 1500 some Netherlandish paintings appeared showing the betrothal of Agnes to Christ
Adams Rubble: most art shows St. Catherine in that role
Adams Rubble: St. Catherine appears with Agnes in many of those paintings
Adams Rubble: plus other virgins
Adams Rubble: Mary is holding the infant Christ who is reaching out to put the ring on Agnes’ finger
Adams Rubble: In other paintings, Agnes already has the ring and it is being given to Catherine
Adams Rubble: The next question is why there and why then
Adams Rubble: It turns out there was a movement of laity to try to get back to the original teachings of Christ
Adams Rubble: one group was at the Mount of St. Agnes
Adams Rubble: the appointed leader of this group was Thomas a Kempis
Adams Rubble: he wrote a group of 30 sermons and two are on St Agnes
Adams Rubble: I am going to read them today
Adams Rubble: so I am back to Thomas a Kempis again 🙂
Adams Rubble: The end for now
Adams Rubble takes a deep breath
Riddle Sideways: wow. a full circle
Riddle Sideways: with so many stringers
Riddle Sideways: off-shootings
Adams Rubble: yes

The Thomas a Kempis book is Sermons to the Novices Regular. In Sermon 26 Thomas talks about three garments given to Agnes by her spouse. Reading it reminded me of a Tibetan Buddhist empowerment with the description of her appearance. Sermon 27 discusses the three garlands of flowers about her crown. (I did learn there were relics of St. Agnes at the Cathedral Church of St. Martin in Utrecht at that time – I wonder if they survived the iconoclast). Having finished those two sermons I am quite perplexed. I have wondered whether this side exploration has just been a present distraction. It has been exciting doing some research. I also felt something a little mystical examining the church. Maybe I will find something else in the sermons.

3.The chant is still with me a half day later.

4.The following goes for this blog as well:

“I freely offer to the pious and devout to read. But if haply an ill-chosen word offend any one, I pray that my littleness be forgiven: and that what seems outwardly to sound ridiculous, be changed to something better.”

Thomas a Kempis. Sermons to the Novices Regular (Illustrated) . Aeterna Press. Kindle Edition.