St. Joseph’s Chapel
Learning to make rosary beads was an accident.
*
Ten o’clock cast long shadows over a few college students, several Sisters, and elaborate Gothic angels. The space, even when silent, echoed of squeaky floorboards, reverberated the chanting organ, and rang deafening resonances of prayer. The Divine was tangible in the taste of dusky incense and felt in the pain of prayer on the knees. The still space was a place of motion, energy, and vitality masked in a veil of heavy vestments and locked without a physical key.
St. Joseph’s chapel is on the second floor. Or the third. Depending on from where you are coming or going. Even logistically it is between time and space. An elevator button situates the sanctuary at floor 2.5.
*
There was never a time i was not afraid of the chapel, but for years the chapel was home. The Gothic structure witnessed sleepless nights, facilitated hours of fellowship, and despite persistent fear, provided a space of belonging. If you brought the chapel to life, the chapel would bring you to life, too.
*
Most people used the sanctuary as a passage – a bridge from one building to the next without the threat of weather. The chapel was a passage for me too - a passage from teen to adult; from faithful to doubter; from questioning to Catholic and back again in a waltz that began in a stumble and ended in a ballroom.
*
Rosary was said every night in St. Joe’s chapel. A small group of students and a few Sisters of Charity would gather, pray the rosary, and wish each other good night, allowing the Sisters to make their way past the cemetery, down a path of winding trees, and through the gate on a journey back to their home. But the students would linger beginning our prayer behind the closing of the chapel door. Maybe their route home was as spiritual as ours, one they were also eager to begin. Maybe they disappeared aware of the vibrance to come in the chapel. Maybe it was late, and they were tired.
*
The rosary is a long prayer. It is an even longer prayer when spoken by a Sister who allows every word to pierce her heart, mind, and tongue. Sr. Ann spoke the rosary as slowly as it took her frail seventy-eight-year-old body to climb the grand staircase to the chapel. Slowly, but magically, overflowing with dignity and grace. i, though, could not find solace in her repetitive words because i knew a secret. i knew of the song that would soon leave the words - the prayer - far behind.
*
The chapel carpet was soft. It took three genuflections - onto the sanctuary, up to the altar, into the apse - to reach this untouchable carpet. i dared approach when only God could judge me for it. i knew that God put that carpet there just for my comfort, but that secret stayed with me. The ornate red rug with hills and valleys of color held my body as i rested on my back watching the stained-glass angel descend from the ceiling and join the rest of the sanctuary in pulsating movement. The carpet remained soft even when the dancing angel was held only in the back of my eyelids until it appeared untouched and unmoving with the light of dawn in the window above.
*
The hallway leading from the oratory to the narthex was cold and silent. No one passed through there without a skip in their step. The statues at either end of the hallway was always watching. You take the stairs to avoid the hallway alongside the chapel. Avoid the elevator too, built to accommodate a stretcher and a black bag from when the hall was used for dying sisters. Your hair will stand up on the back of your neck. Probably along your arms too. Your brain can’t help but wonder “If the chapel can dance, can this hallway live too?”
*
Entering the chapel, leaving our busy lives behind, came with a dip of our fingers into holy water and a collective, yet silent and individual prayer with the sign of the cross that i would be chosen to say the rosary that night. The 62 prayers and five mysteries flowed off my tongue in a way that would all but make an auctioneer jealous. Opaque, rote, repetitive prayer that served as a gateway, or a roadblock, to the brilliance that lie ahead.
*
Noonday mass served as a reminder that service is for all. As chapel bells tolled the beginning of mass it also told of the many students for whom the sanctuary would become a passage. Maybe the psalm, or a prayer, or the knowledge that this passage was a holy hallway lived in those who passed by. Maybe, it served only as a reminder to the three of us - the priest, the sister, and i – that we were not as alone in this place as it appeared. Many before had made this passage, and many more were to come. Maybe, the noonday light was the only time the sun wore at the edges of the darkness enough to allow the voyagers to dare and enter the fearful space.
*
Rosary beads begin to feel more familiar that one would think possible. Decade 2, bead 4, cracked. Decade 5, bead 1, bent. You know where you are without looking. Then again, does anyone in the chapel know where they are? For as well as you know your beads, they come and go, ebb and flow, and you are lost in the sound. There is a rhythm, and a melody, that sings an unforgettable tune. The rosary was merely an overture.
*
Lamps line the ceiling above the pews. Odd, hexagonal, lamps that both float on their own and are encumbered by large gold chain. Only one lamp is lit like the eternal flame. One dim shadow maker casting somehow greenish light.
*
The music in the chapel never ended. Voices would leave one by one. The organ would stop with a 9 second reverberation.
One.
Two.
Three.
Four.
Five.
Six.
Seven.
Eight.
Nine moments of sound no one was producing yet audible with ease. Hymnals would close but well-known choruses would continue. The walls would pick up where we left off. Spaces of God never sleep.
*
The hand carved wood pews brought an elegance to the chapel. They were smooth and worn, much like our rosaries. It’s a surprise that both held up as long as they did. As beads passed between my thumb and forefinger, Decade 2 bead 1, bead 2, bead 3, a sound filled the chapel, silent outside the hum of our prayer. Wood falling to wood. my rosary had broken. my prababcia’s rosary lay lifeless on the pew in front of me. The chatter of the rosary would continue but my prayer had halted.
*
The dark chapel would brighten, lit only by song. The organ spilled light the chapel walls could not contain, illuminating the rose windows and bringing characters of fragmented colored glass to animation. The piano brought the thousands of detailed feathers of the gothic angels to flight. Our voices lit every candle and lamp in one thunderous note. There is no darkness in a chapel enlivened by music.
*
Making a rosary is its own prayer. crucifix, loop, large bead, loop, small bead, small bead, small bead, loop. The words are identical, yet, life is created. Metal bends and dances as lengths of chain somehow appear in your hand. Only the indents of metal in your finger remind you that you are creating. It isn’t magic. But, i know it is, because while Sr. Ann slowly recites the familiar prayer, i can see the windows alive, i can hear melody erupt from the organ, and the one lit lamp feels a little brighter.
©puckmaren glass 2020
Learning to make rosary beads was an accident.
*
Ten o’clock cast long shadows over a few college students, several Sisters, and elaborate Gothic angels. The space, even when silent, echoed of squeaky floorboards, reverberated the chanting organ, and rang deafening resonances of prayer. The Divine was tangible in the taste of dusky incense and felt in the pain of prayer on the knees. The still space was a place of motion, energy, and vitality masked in a veil of heavy vestments and locked without a physical key.
St. Joseph’s chapel is on the second floor. Or the third. Depending on from where you are coming or going. Even logistically it is between time and space. An elevator button situates the sanctuary at floor 2.5.
*
There was never a time i was not afraid of the chapel, but for years the chapel was home. The Gothic structure witnessed sleepless nights, facilitated hours of fellowship, and despite persistent fear, provided a space of belonging. If you brought the chapel to life, the chapel would bring you to life, too.
*
Most people used the sanctuary as a passage – a bridge from one building to the next without the threat of weather. The chapel was a passage for me too - a passage from teen to adult; from faithful to doubter; from questioning to Catholic and back again in a waltz that began in a stumble and ended in a ballroom.
*
Rosary was said every night in St. Joe’s chapel. A small group of students and a few Sisters of Charity would gather, pray the rosary, and wish each other good night, allowing the Sisters to make their way past the cemetery, down a path of winding trees, and through the gate on a journey back to their home. But the students would linger beginning our prayer behind the closing of the chapel door. Maybe their route home was as spiritual as ours, one they were also eager to begin. Maybe they disappeared aware of the vibrance to come in the chapel. Maybe it was late, and they were tired.
*
The rosary is a long prayer. It is an even longer prayer when spoken by a Sister who allows every word to pierce her heart, mind, and tongue. Sr. Ann spoke the rosary as slowly as it took her frail seventy-eight-year-old body to climb the grand staircase to the chapel. Slowly, but magically, overflowing with dignity and grace. i, though, could not find solace in her repetitive words because i knew a secret. i knew of the song that would soon leave the words - the prayer - far behind.
*
The chapel carpet was soft. It took three genuflections - onto the sanctuary, up to the altar, into the apse - to reach this untouchable carpet. i dared approach when only God could judge me for it. i knew that God put that carpet there just for my comfort, but that secret stayed with me. The ornate red rug with hills and valleys of color held my body as i rested on my back watching the stained-glass angel descend from the ceiling and join the rest of the sanctuary in pulsating movement. The carpet remained soft even when the dancing angel was held only in the back of my eyelids until it appeared untouched and unmoving with the light of dawn in the window above.
*
The hallway leading from the oratory to the narthex was cold and silent. No one passed through there without a skip in their step. The statues at either end of the hallway was always watching. You take the stairs to avoid the hallway alongside the chapel. Avoid the elevator too, built to accommodate a stretcher and a black bag from when the hall was used for dying sisters. Your hair will stand up on the back of your neck. Probably along your arms too. Your brain can’t help but wonder “If the chapel can dance, can this hallway live too?”
*
Entering the chapel, leaving our busy lives behind, came with a dip of our fingers into holy water and a collective, yet silent and individual prayer with the sign of the cross that i would be chosen to say the rosary that night. The 62 prayers and five mysteries flowed off my tongue in a way that would all but make an auctioneer jealous. Opaque, rote, repetitive prayer that served as a gateway, or a roadblock, to the brilliance that lie ahead.
*
Noonday mass served as a reminder that service is for all. As chapel bells tolled the beginning of mass it also told of the many students for whom the sanctuary would become a passage. Maybe the psalm, or a prayer, or the knowledge that this passage was a holy hallway lived in those who passed by. Maybe, it served only as a reminder to the three of us - the priest, the sister, and i – that we were not as alone in this place as it appeared. Many before had made this passage, and many more were to come. Maybe, the noonday light was the only time the sun wore at the edges of the darkness enough to allow the voyagers to dare and enter the fearful space.
*
Rosary beads begin to feel more familiar that one would think possible. Decade 2, bead 4, cracked. Decade 5, bead 1, bent. You know where you are without looking. Then again, does anyone in the chapel know where they are? For as well as you know your beads, they come and go, ebb and flow, and you are lost in the sound. There is a rhythm, and a melody, that sings an unforgettable tune. The rosary was merely an overture.
*
Lamps line the ceiling above the pews. Odd, hexagonal, lamps that both float on their own and are encumbered by large gold chain. Only one lamp is lit like the eternal flame. One dim shadow maker casting somehow greenish light.
*
The music in the chapel never ended. Voices would leave one by one. The organ would stop with a 9 second reverberation.
One.
Two.
Three.
Four.
Five.
Six.
Seven.
Eight.
Nine moments of sound no one was producing yet audible with ease. Hymnals would close but well-known choruses would continue. The walls would pick up where we left off. Spaces of God never sleep.
*
The hand carved wood pews brought an elegance to the chapel. They were smooth and worn, much like our rosaries. It’s a surprise that both held up as long as they did. As beads passed between my thumb and forefinger, Decade 2 bead 1, bead 2, bead 3, a sound filled the chapel, silent outside the hum of our prayer. Wood falling to wood. my rosary had broken. my prababcia’s rosary lay lifeless on the pew in front of me. The chatter of the rosary would continue but my prayer had halted.
*
The dark chapel would brighten, lit only by song. The organ spilled light the chapel walls could not contain, illuminating the rose windows and bringing characters of fragmented colored glass to animation. The piano brought the thousands of detailed feathers of the gothic angels to flight. Our voices lit every candle and lamp in one thunderous note. There is no darkness in a chapel enlivened by music.
*
Making a rosary is its own prayer. crucifix, loop, large bead, loop, small bead, small bead, small bead, loop. The words are identical, yet, life is created. Metal bends and dances as lengths of chain somehow appear in your hand. Only the indents of metal in your finger remind you that you are creating. It isn’t magic. But, i know it is, because while Sr. Ann slowly recites the familiar prayer, i can see the windows alive, i can hear melody erupt from the organ, and the one lit lamp feels a little brighter.
©puckmaren glass 2020