Creating the Beauty We’re Called To
Lisa Westfield credits the Benedictine Sisters with introducing her to the joy of creating when she was in high school.
“Sister Veronica Shunick introduced me to the love of ceramics,” Lisa Westfield, St. Mary’s Academy Class of 1976, says.
“I had no idea that this medium would speak to me! My love of singing was reinforced there, and I still sing in a choir. I also write poetry, which I started doing at Saint Mary’s.”
Whether we create through painting or song, we are all creators. We create our homes, memories, solutions. We create a love of beauty. We create our lives.
There are lots of evidence-backed reasons to embrace a creative life. It’s good for the health of our brains, for one thing. They thrive on new experiences, building strong neuronal connections in response.
A creative life also matters to our hearts. It allows us to reach our deaths free of such regrets as we never expressed our feelings, or we didn’t live our lives being true to ourselves (from The Top Five Regrets of the Dying by Bronnie Ware).
Creating matters to body, mind and spirit. It’s both a spiritual practice and a personal pursuit.
May the Benedictine Sisters’ musings on it encourage you to encounter this season of change, growth and renewal with a willing heart and ready hands!
Art is not only the ability to draw and paint, but the ability to recognize beauty. – Sister Mary Alexia Walters, OSB
Living a Creative Life
Sister Helen Carey, OSB
Creativity requires some inner freedom. Freedom to not be too tied to our schedules or to-do lists. Freedom to be flexible; to be open to new possibilities; to be open to the way the Holy Spirit moves us in the present.
It’s hard to define creative living, but it’s connected to newness, to not being rigid or stubborn. It’s becoming; renewing; growing. It’s especially connected to love.
Learning is the benefit of creativity. You do that by listening, which is at the heart of it. And the point is love.
Music is like incense. It lifts our prayers to God. - Therese Fleischman St. Ledger, St. Mary’s Academy Class of 1954
Plant the Seed, and Wait
Sister Mary Jane Wallace, OSB
Everybody has a gift, and everybody’s is different. Mine is music, although it has changed over time.
I used to be able to play difficult pieces on the piano. My hands are too arthritic now to play what I once did. I could be discouraged about it, but thinking about it makes me rejoice and smile. I used to be able to do it. Thank God!
Today, I play easier pieces that refresh my inner spirits. I’m happy that I can share my enthusiasm and knowledge with others.
Our society is push-button. We have no patience for learning, yet we need it to create.
Whether we are sculpting, painting, gardening or making a friend, we need to teach ourselves to be patient and gentle. Plant the seed, and wait.
The act or art of creating does expand our souls. - Lois Fister Steele, St. Mary’s Academy Class of 1957
The Gift of God’s Presence
Sister Margaret Murphy, OSB
By choosing to use our God-given gifts to create, we act and grow in the image of God. We are one with all creation.
Creativity is a way to grow in our ability to see as God sees. It allows us to grow in God’s likeness.
We can be creative as we go for walks. We can see mandalas everywhere, for instance, in spider webs, in a wind-formed whirl of leaves.
We can be creative as we take what’s already here and create with it. We can create new ways of doing things. We can create new things using recycled materials.
Even coloring in adult coloring books, which is so popular in the culture now, is creative.
There are many ways to create. Gardening, sketching, coloring, playing piano, writing.
It’s not the skill you have, it’s the creating you do. Spend a little time each day creating. It will nurture you and put you in touch with the Creator within.
Creating is a manifestation of God in us. – Sister Mary Alexia Walters, OSB
The Divine Working Within Us
Sister Marianne Burkhard, OSB
The Holy Spirit is always doing things within. Most of my writing is academic, but there comes a time when I have to figure out how it works together.
I have to sit and brood about it sometimes. Suddenly, I realize it should go this way! The Holy Spirit has worked in me. It is true for the short psalm reflections I do for our Facebook page, too.
It’s wonderful when something comes together, whether a sentence or a chapter.
For me, it’s much more the work of the Holy Spirit. It’s the Divine working within us.
What can we do that leaves us with the strongest sense of sailing true north and of peace, which is much of what gladness is? – Frederick Buechner
Creative versus Destructive
Sister Mary Core, OSB
The atomic bomb took a creative mind to come up with it. But its destructive purpose negated goodness. The intended purpose of what we create counts.
God is not part of what’s destructive. Intention is key.
We must ask ourselves if we can enter into this creating in a positive way, or if what we do diminishes creation – and ourselves – in the process.
Creating music connects me to a higher being. – Mary Beth Kapp Palmquist St. Mary’s Academy Class of 1966
Centering the Heart
Sister Stefanie MacDonald, OSB
Music has always centered me. If things are going sideways, music re-grounds me. It’s a wonderful emotional outlet.
When I play, the music goes beyond me and my skill. God is there, too.
Even in my worst moments, it keeps me in God’s presence, giving me peace and calming me. I love to share it in the hope it helps bring others closer to God, too.
Whether I play or listen, music is a graced moment, like connecting in the soul with God.
Poetry and art are not about answers to me; they are about questions. – Lucille Clifton
Creating a Response in Others
Sister Sheila McGrath, OSB
I enjoy working with clay. It’s a very focused activity, because attention must be given to it or it will not turn out well.
Working with clay, it’s unknown how it will turn out. There are always surprises. Each piece is unique.
That’s like God working in our lives. We don’t know what they – the clays or our lives – will look like. We are all made of the same stuff, but each of us will turn out unique. Surprises are part of the process.
Forming clay takes a constant, gentle touch. That’s another parallel, because God’s touch in our lives is always there, always gentle, always marking our lives.
Whatever we create continues to create, whether a piece of art, poetry, photograph, conversation or home. It creates response in others.
Art would not be important if life were not important, and life is important. – James Baldwin
Gratitude, the Creative Response
Sister Catherine Maloney, OSB
I enjoyed doing needlepoint. It helped me get in touch with my gift for making people happy. I never did a project without having some deeper reason for doing it.
I miss doing needlepoint. But I find as I get older that I can still be grateful for having been able to do it once. I’m grateful for the friendships they helped create.
I also realize more and more how people rely on my praying for them. Someone called the other day and said, “Sister, your prayers were answered.” To realize that God is working in me does something for me, too. It keeps me less self-centered and more appreciative.
I also appreciate the gift of memory. Memories help keep creativity in life going. I could reflect on the negative – everyone has negatives in life – but the positive memories keep one growing.
My younger gift of material creating – needlepoint – helped pave the way for today’s gift of gratitude. I’m grateful for the past and that I’m still able to share my gifts with others.
You can’t use up creativity. The more you use, the more you have. – Maya Angelou
Saying “Yes” to Life
The question, then, is how – not whether – we create. Do we create with intention and enthusiasm, or by default? Do we lean into our God-given nature as co-creators, or do we let life happen to us?
To embrace a creative life is to live fully, to say yes to life’s mystery and surprises. To pray, as ee cummings, i thank You God for most this amazing/day: for the leaping greenly spirits of trees/and a blue true dream of sky; and for everything/which is natural which is infinite which is yes.”