Читать книгу Blessed - Jerusha Matsen Neal - Страница 9

Author’s Note:

Space for God is a trilogy of monologues commissioned for a women’s conference on the relationship between art and faith. Women scholars, scientists, and artists gathered for a weekend retreat on making creative space for God in their lives and in the world. The final piece, the most sermon-like, was performed as part of the closing worship service.

These modern parables on the nature of our calling as women—and as human beings—use the biblical story of Mary as a conversation partner. In Christian tradition, Mary is the mother of the Word—a title derived from Christ’s designation as the Word of God (John 1:1). The pieces take this title seriously—reinterpreting Mary’s story to refer, not only to the experience of childbirth and mothering, but also to the very real labor of creative, scientific, word-driven work. What does Mary’s choice to make space for the Word in her body—and her literal struggle to find space to give birth in the crowded streets of Bethlehem—have to teach women who are pregnant with creative life? Women who face resistance and closed doors from their communities? Women who deal with that pain by filling their lives with busyness, rather than the work they know they were born to do?

Space for God is finally about the cost and joy of living into that calling. Medieval paintings often depict Mary as either reading a book or spinning thread when approached by the angel Gabriel. The thread that ties her words and witness to our own lies at the heart of this project.