Our work begins
By Dena Bearl
As I write this, it is January 13, and I am at Virginia Theological Seminary for clergy continuing education. The regular semester classes have not yet started, so the seminary is rather quiet. The relatively few voices and glass clinks and chair scrapes echo in the large refectory during each meal. There’s no telling how things in Haiti will be by the time you read this at the beginning of February, but I wanted to share with you the events here.
When the news of the earthquake spread through the community on campus, it took most of the day for the magnitude of the disaster to sink in. A priest who is here for study could be heard on his cell phone calling home to try to find out about individuals from his parish who were in Haiti. Another priest comes from a parish that is very involved in Haiti. She had taught in a school in Port au Prince, and her face was hollow from the sure knowledge that many of her students were dead. There are three Haitian deacons here for study who are looking forward to returning home to be ordained as priests. One of them got the news that his brother had died.
By the middle of the day it was announced that there would be a memorial Eucharist in the evening. The dean of the seminary would preach; one of the Haitian deacons would read the gospel; and, another, the one whose brother died, would lead the prayers of the people. Though we have had maybe a dozen each day at worship, the chapel was full for this special service - students here for continuing education, faculty, local people who had heard there would be worship, and priests from Tanzania here on a study program. The national hymn of Haiti was sung gently by those who speak Haitian and French. The deacon who read the gospel had that lovely lilting Haitian accent. He read slowly. When he said Martha’s words from John’s gospel, “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died,” I wondered how those words settled over the deacon whose brother was killed in the earthquake.
I thought, Ouch. Then I thought, Jesus is where people die. Why in the world would we think that it is Jesus’ duty to keep everyone from death? Dying is an integral part of living. It’s like saying we should be able to breathe in but we shouldn’t have to breathe out.
The dean said that why is not the question to ask – because there is never an adequate answer to that question. I don’t remember much else of what he said, except that he noted that God’s grace was evident among us as we had all shown up with heavy hearts simply to pray. And that the same grace that was among us was also among the living and the dead in Haiti.
I took some cash to the chapel assuming there would be a collection to benefit Haiti. But, no collection was taken. When I asked why, the person beside me simply said, “Offering plates tonight will not carry what is needed at this altar. Tonight we have brought ourselves. Tomorrow our work begins.”
+ The Rev. Dena Bearl is rector of Grace-Calvary Episcopal Church, Clarkesville, Ga. She wrote this as a letter to her parish for the The Mustard Seed, a newsletter.
Gone with Haiti’s cathedral is much of country’s art heritage
By James D. Curtis
We will not learn from the secular news reports the significance of the Episcopal Church and especially our now-destroyed Cathedral of the Holy Trinity in Port au Prince. The cathedral's demise involves so much more than just a building.
In the mid-1940s an American, Dewitt Peters, discovered the surprising, colorful and spiritual art of a number of painters in Haiti. He had the vision of their painting murals of the life of Christ inside a grand building. The Haitian government said, "Not in our buildings." The Roman Catholic archbishop said, "Not in our cathedral." The Episcopal bishop, when approached by Peters, said "Yes, in our cathedral."
When completed, the murals were magnificent; there was nothing else in Haiti like them. Now they are destroyed and the artists are dead; they cannot be replaced.
Furthermore, located at the Cathedral of the Holy Trinity before the earthquake were an elementary school for 400 children; a trade school for 700 adults; the finest music school in Haiti; the country's only boys’ choir, which sang movingly in four languages; the gift shop and gallery from which several of our parishes acquired the items to sell here; and an Episcopal convent, the Sisters of St. Margaret, consisting of American and Haitian sisters.
Near the cathedral was the College St. Pierre, our secondary school; across the street was the Musee d'Art, containing paintings by Haiti's old masters, owned and preserved by the Episcopal Church.
With the destruction of the Cathedral of the Holy Trinity has come the destruction of all these facilities that offered so much to Haiti's people and to others who have been blessed by them. The Episcopal Church of Haiti has truly been the conservator of Haiti's great art. Nothing is left of that great legacy; and now, it lives only in the hearts and minds of the survivors of the earthquake.
The Rev. Dr. James D. Curtis of Atlanta is a retired priest of the Diocese of Atlanta and a member of the Artists Registry of the Episcopal Church and the Visual Arts http://www.ecva.org/. You may write to him at jcurtis3@bellsouth.net.
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