Sanctus Ornamentum

          

 

            Sometimes I run across things when I’m cleaning or sorting my stuff. Virgin of Guadalupe cards; cards for St. Jude, St. Francis of Assisi. My rosary, tucked away in a jewelry box, lying silent in a soft leather purse. I hold it to the light. Deep red stones flow like drops of blood across my palm: stigmata.

Like most packrats, my house is a reliquary of broken shards and slivers. Most are secular, some are spiritual.  I hold a photo of myself, all dolled up; a tender 7-year-old bride of Christ. I rub my hand against gold-leafed picture frames and envision soaring dark spaces, quiet flickering flames of intention. I imagine that I touch the hem of Mary’s blue gown resting on her sandaled foot in the sacristy.

            I left the church long ago, for a marriage that eventually ended. The lessons etched into me by the catechism of Sacred Heart Catholic Church have been washed away over time, leaving a clean smooth place. They have been replaced by a catechism of my own making, one that has evolved over time, unlike the ancient and enduring mythos of the church. But I confess that I still have a bit of a connection left, still a tiny bit of religious umbilical cord. It’s triggered when I see a bit of gilt, or a votive bearing the image of a saint. I am drawn to it as surely as I was once drawn toward the altar, mouth open like a baby bird for the body of Christ.

I run across these items in lots of places, but none more than a local Catholic bookstore. Every so often when someone I know requires a holy medal or a christening gift, I browse a little. I am distracted and then angered by what I see as propaganda—brochures about abstinence that are patently shaming to women, booklets about “The American Holocaust” of abortion, which insults both the victims of the Jewish Holocaust and the women who struggle with this decision. But then my gaze finds something—a card or medal—and I touch it, handle it with tenderness and a quick intake of breath. The holiness is there, present in the simple beauty of the object.

I shuffle through the holy cards of the saints—those gracious and concerned helpers. Who wouldn’t feel affection for these everyday assistants?  St. Anthony’s my main man, keeping his eyes peeled for my car keys, a bracelet, a favorite book. I turn each totem this way and that, weighing its aesthetic appeal against my disputes with the Pope. Sometimes I buy, taking home a tiny piece of my childhood in a crinkly paper sack. These items are sanctus ornamentum; items I first associated with a state of grace.

My ornamentum is now much more diverse—trees, warm skin, flowing water, smooth stones, faint moonlight, pen and paper, rising bread, a furry black dog, the scream of a kestrel in the pasture outside of town. These things are my holy trappings now, and give me sustenance. But there remains a desire to create my own holy place, a place with just a hint of the Sacred Heart. In this place there can be no vaulted ceilings, no marble floors, and I miss them. But on the other hand, there are no hard wooden pews either. Just a humble corner filled with objects of everyday worship and a comfortable cushion upon which to sit. My confessional is a smooth white porcelain tub, where I make long-distance revelations to my sister or mother. (Or to myself.) Lying in the steamy water, I dissect my transgressions and triumphs—the latter, sadly, are ignored in the dark recesses of the church confessional. The priest behind the screen had no interest in my glories, only my sorrows, my sins. Here in my sacred space, both have equal import. I immerse myself, and then pull the plug, washing away my sins. And oh, the resurrection of the body! Naked, sinless, shining.

I once thought I left it all behind: the incense, the chanting, the myopic patriarchal dogma. But in these rituals, in these sacred and beautiful objects, I catch a glimpse of my childhood religion, and I am comforted. The black-and-white certainty of the priests and nuns has been replaced. But as I live in the messy gray area that is real life, I am on the lookout for that flash of gold. After all, there’s nothing like a little gilt to catch the eye of an old Catholic girl.