Louis Massignon and Mariam Baouardy (Blessed Mary of Jesus Crucified) A Palestinian for Our Time

by Dorothy C. Buck In his letters to members of the Carmelite of ” and saw her future Badaliya prayer community Louis Massignon as a mission and means to (1883-1962) often mentions a young Melkite assuring the safety of Holy places. She was Carmelite known as “The Little Arab”. one of those compassionate holy women, often Sister Mary of Jesus Crucified lived from referred to as victim-souls who were called by 1846 to 1878. She died at the age of 33 in the God to substitute themselves for others by Carmelite Monastery in Bethlehem. On taking on their woundedness and pain that they November 13, 1983 she was beatified, the first may be protected. This litany of women, which step in the process of officially being named a included Joan of Arc, were Massignon’s saint by the Roman . saintly heroines for God. Born in the 19th The Badaliya prayer group was century, the little Arab was one of them. The established in 1934 in Cairo, Egypt and was word “badaliya” in Arabic means dedicated to praying and working toward what ‘substitution’ and Massignon was inviting its Massignon called “serene peace” between dedicated Christian members to offer Christians and Muslims. At the time there were themselves in this spirit as they found more violent conflicts in many parts of the world as and more ways to enter into compassionate there are today. The Badaliya was praying for relationship with their Muslim neighbors, peace in North Africa, specifically in Algeria coming to know them and their spiritual and Egypt, and Massignon was particularly tradition by sharing life with them. concerned about the religious and political Massignon’s appreciation for the little tensions in the . He was very much Arab Carmelite can be more clearly understood affected by Gandhi who was a witness to the in light of his own spiritual journey. From the effectiveness of non-violent resistance in the moment in Baghdad in 1908 that led to his struggle for independence in India. Massignon profound experience of religious conversion, believed with his whole heart in the efficacy of his first anguished prayer to God was in prayer, non-violence, mutual respect and Arabic. Although he returned to the Roman understanding as the means to “serene Catholic faith of his childhood, his many years peace”. His approach to life, and, therefore, to of association with the Arab world as an relationships between peoples, was first and Islamic Studies and Sociology professor at the foremost as a devout believer in God. It was Collège de France in Paris and as a member of that relationship that informed his vision of the Arab Academy in Cairo contributed to his fraternal love and respect for others. His was a greatest desire, which was to be able to worship mystical path leading to true reconciliation. in the Arabic language. Massignon spoke In his letters Massignon refers to privately to Pope Pius XII in 1949 in order to Mariam Baouardy as the “ little Arab inform the about the conflictual 1 situation in Palestine and the difficulties arising When Mariam entered religious life around the Holy places. In a gesture of she looked back on her childhood experiences solidarity with the Arab world and , and remembered playing in the garden with Massignon received permission from the pope some birds that were given to her in a cage. In to transfer to the Greek Melkite Rite. The her enthusiasm she tried to give them a bath liturgical language for the Mass used in this and they drowned. At the moment when she Rite is Arabic, like that used by all Muslims in was sadly preparing to bury them she heard a their worship. One year later Massignon was voice, “Everything finishes in this way, but if ordained as a Melkite priest in order to you will give me your heart I will be yours celebrate Mass privately every day in Arabic, forever”. From then on her religious call was uniting himself in spirit still further with both already being formed. By the time her uncle his Christian and Muslim brothers and sisters moved the family to , Egypt when in the Middle East. To him this spiritual unity she was 12 years old she had chosen to expressed the true spirit of the Badaliya identify with the Virgin Mary, for whom she movement. was named, and remain a virgin herself. Her Mariam Baouardy was born in a small heart belonged to Jesus. A year later when her village in , Palestine on January 5, 1846. uncle told her that he had arranged a marriage Although her parents were both born in for her as was the custom among Christians Palestine her ancestors came from Damascus and Muslims in Palestine and Egypt at the in Syria and were members of the Melkite time, Mariam refused. She wanted to remain a Greek Catholic Rite. Mariam’s mother gave virgin. Not even the Greek Melkite Bishop birth to 12 boys, none of whom survived past could persuade her to change her mind. Her infancy. In their sadness at their losses the uncle’s response was to punish her by treating couple went to Bethlehem and prayed to the her like hired help, giving her the heaviest Virgin Mary at the shrine at the Grotto of the work. Nativity of Jesus for a healthy girl child. When Several months later Mariam hoped to Mariam was born they named her after the find her brother who she had not seen since Virgin Mother in gratitude. Two years later their parents died so many years before. She Mariam’s brother, Boulos, or Paul, was born. had a letter written to Boulos asking him to When Mariam was not yet 3 years old both her come to Alexandria. On September 7, 1858 a parents died. Paul was taken to an aunt in former Muslim employee of her uncle’s was Tarshiha where his mother was raised and travelling to Galilee and she asked him to Mariam went to live with her father’s brother deliver the letter. Hearing about her painful in Ibillin, in the hills of Galilee. As was the experience with her family he became irate and custom at the time in Palestine, Arab girls were suggested that she become a Muslim to solve expected to learn about household tasks in her difficulties. Her firm refusal caused the preparation for being married by the age of 12, young man to feel rejected and his anger led so Mariam was not sent to school. She did not him to draw his sword and slash her neck. learn to read or write. Thinking he had killed her he threw her body

2 into an empty alley. Mariam was 13 years old "stigmata", wounds in their hands or feet or and the story of her survival was a miracle. She side like those of the suffering Christ during remembered a woman dressing her wounds the crucifixion. Mother Honorine realized that and caring for her in a grotto, then leaving her Mariam was an unusual for this with the Franciscan Friars at the Church of St. convent and protected her through Mariam's Catherine. Later in her life when she recalled vow of obedience by setting limits on her this incident she was convinced that it was the ecstatic experiences to avoid her obvious gifts Virgin Mary who saved her. being too noticeable to the other sisters. She Mariam was intent on finding her also wrote down all that Mariam told her of her brother and took a job as a domestic in a local childhood experiences which were filled with household until she found a way to take a boat signs of the Holy Spirit at work. to and then a boat bound for Haifa that When Mother Honorine became ill she landed in due to a storm. She continued was replaced as novice mistress by Mother to work as a domestic for 10 more months Veronica. Sr. Veronica had been a Sister of St. when she was hired by a Syrian family who Joseph for 18 years and was waiting for had immigrated to . She worked for permission to enter a contemplative Carmelite the Naggiar family in France for the next two Monastery at Pau. She too took the little Arab's years until she was 18. Mariam’s confessor experiences seriously but asked that the was the Vicar of St. Nicolas Church and he stigmata not be repeated. When the community suggested that she now enter religious life as a voted whether to accept Mariam into the postulant with the Sisters of St. Joseph of the novitiate after her 2 years as a postulant the Apparition, an active community of Sisters. sisters were divided. Some felt her spiritual There were other young women from Lebanon gifts were too extraordinary for an active and Palestine there which helped her to feel at Order. Such unique souls needed the home. It was during her two years as a protection of a less visible cloistered postulant that Mariam began to be called "the contemplative community. Mariam's case was little Arab". refused. However at this time, Mother Veronica Mother Honorine Piques was the received her permission from Rome to transfer mistress of novices when Mariam came to the to the Carmel at Pau. She wrote to the Prioress convent. During her postulancy Mariam had there to see if Mariam could go with her to significant spiritual experiences that were Carmel. called "ecstatic". Many have described these Mariam began her new life as a experiences as a mystical phenomenon in Carmelite lay sister and when she entered the which a person is so caught up in their novitiate was given the name, Sister Mary of experience of the divine that they fall into a Jesus Crucified. have a special state of ecstacy. Some, like the Italian Saint devotion to the ancient Jewish prophet Elijah as Francis in the 13th century and the 19th do the Muslims. When she was a child century German, Catherine Emmerich as well Mariam could see the famous Mount Carmel as the little Arab, Mariam, received the from her native village in Galilee. It was on

3 Mount Carmel that Elijah showed that the who was known as the Paraclete, was needed prophets of Baal were idolators thereby calling by the whole Church. She even sent a petition the people back to Israel's one God of to Pope Pius IX to adopt this devotion. No one Abraham. Mariam remembered the sounds and knows what the pope thought of this at the images of the villagers who were a vibrant mix time, but 20 years later Pope Leo XIII of Jews, Catholics, Muslims and even Druse as published an encyclical about devotion to the they gathered for joyous celebrations on the Paraclete. mountain. The tradition in Carmel of honoring We would like to understand these the prophet Elijah reminded Mariam of her extreme examples of mystical experience today beloved Galilee. She was now 21 years old. as explainable phenomena but they remain a Mariam continued to have ecstatic mystery that Mariam's short life leaves us as a experiences that she herself could hardly remarkable legacy. When a Carmelite explain and yet retained the charm and candor missionary proposed the establishment of a of a young child. One of the traditions in new Carmel in Mangalore, India, Mariam was Carmel is writing and reciting poems, psalms one of the first to offer to go there. The and hymns that were sometimes shared with journey turned out to be so difficult for them the community in evening recreation. Many of that some of the original nine sisters, including Mariam's poems came to her in the midst of the intended Prioress for the new foundation, ecstacies. They were expressions of love, a died en route. Eventually more sisters were profound and intense love for God. Moved by sent from Pau and the new Carmel of the Holy Spirit in her life experience, her Mangalore was established. devotion to the Spirit led her to heights of Mariam had been a "choir sister" in poetic expression. Pau which means that she did not do as much Mariam's religious call was to a hidden manual work as the "lay sisters". As a "choir life grounded in her sense of personal humility sister" she participated in the daily recitation of and a willingness to submit herself in total the Divine Office, prayers that were offered obedience to the Prioress of the Carmelite four times a day. Mariam preferred the role of community. Yet her extraordinary mystical the lay sisters, perhaps because the challenge gifts, that included the stigmata, ecstatic states, of learning to read was too difficult for her, prophetic visions, levitations and bilocations especially since her native language was Arabic can only be explained by her burning devotion and not French, but it is also possible that her to the Holy Spirit and her total submission to natural sense of humility caused her to feel her God. Mariam's devotion to the Holy Spirit more comfortable doing manual work even in was not common in her time. And yet her the extreme way that she once was made to do spiritual journey seemed to be guided by the by her uncle. In Mangalore she received her Spirit in unprecedented ways. Inspired by wish to return to being a lay sister. having received a special prayer to the Holy Shortly after making her vows in Spirit during one of her ecstatic experiences, Mangalore however, Mariam began to she was convinced that devotion to the Spirit, experience extreme spiritual trials and internal

4 struggles. The sisters tormented her and it Bethlehem and she knew that this was where seemed that she was meant to suffer as she they should build their house. Her revelations found herself struggling with the desire to run in prayer allowed her to draw the plans for the away and to be disobedient to her superiors, monastery in the form of the biblical tower of temptations that she understood as coming David, thus the Carmel in Bethlehem was built from Satan. Finally she was sent back to Pau in a circle, like the inside of a tower. Because in November of 1872. She was sure that "all she could speak Arabic Mariam oversaw the was willed by Jesus". In fact, it all seemed to workmen, who were a mix of Muslims and be related to another of her revelations. She Orthodox Christians, negotiating difficulties as was convinced that God wanted her to establish they arose. In 14 months the sisters moved into a Carmel in Bethlehem and this was the reason their new home in Bethlehem. The year was she had to return to France from India. 1877. No one supported her in this new However, Mariam had not yet adventure but Mariam persisted, which in itself completed her role as foundress of Carmelite was a sign that this was the authentic will of monasteries in the Holy Land. She convinced God. She had always been obedient to the will the Patriarch of that there should be of her superiors and a true example of another Carmel in and the property humility. Neither her superiors in the Carmelite for it was purchased overlooking the grotto of Order nor anyone in Rome wanted to approve the Annunciation. Mariam would not live to see the foundation of a Carmel in Bethlehem. its final completion in 1910 . In August of Through her spiritual advisor Mariam met a 1878 she broke her left arm when she fell wealthy young woman from an aristocratic while carrying water to the workmen in family in Pau named Berthe Dartigaux who Bethlehem. It was clear that her health had agreed to give her financial support. The two been compromised for quite some time and women became friends and Mariam thought of now her arm would not heal but rather swelled Berthe as a "little sister". In order to receive the with gangrene. She knew she was dying. permission from Rome for the new foundation Through her suffering she renewed her vow as the self-effacing child-like Mariam became an a victim for the Church and for her adopted extraordinary activist. She approached every country France. She went to her God on avenue to support her vision, from the bishops August 26, 1878 at the age of 33. to the Patriarch of Jerusalem. Just when it By the time Mariam returned to seemed that all of her efforts had failed, Palestine her reputation had preceded her. She approval was granted and in 1875 Mariam was known as an extraordinary mystic who finally returned to her beloved Palestine with had suffered the stigmata, had daily ecstatic Berthe and seven Carmelite sisters. experiences during which she often sang poetic Now the small group of Carmelites verses and received many gifts of prophecy, had to find a place to build their monastery. and as a simple Palestinian girl who God One day Mariam saw a flock of pigeons transformed into a foundress of monasteries descend onto a hillside to the west of and a future saint. Her thoughts and teachings

5 during these ecstatic experiences were full of for beatification in the Church in 1919. Louis practical advice and remarkably wise for a Massignon saw her as a witness of all the simple, illiterate young woman. Today in themes that formed the foundation of his own Marseilles, at the convent of the Sisters of St. spirituality: substitutionary love for others, Joseph of the Apparition, known as the compassion and hospitality. He wrote,“We Capelette, we can see her name listed as one of understand the other by mentally substituting many famous visitors. She had come there to ourselves for the other, by entering into the pray on her way back to Bethlehem. In place inhabited by the other, by mirroring the Alexandria, in the grotto where she was structure of thought of the other in ourselves”. brought to safety by 'a beautiful woman in As a Greek Melkite Arab Christian, Blessed blue', there is a crypt in her honor. In the small Mary of Jesus Crucified stands as a sign of Palestinian town of Ibillin, her birthplace, the God's blessing and hope for the people of the Mariam Baouardy Center was built with a Middle East that she represents so well. For kindergarten, library and gathering space. In Massignon, Mariam, the Little Arab, lived the this town she is called a saint. authentic spirit of his Badaliya prayer However, Mariam, the Little Arab, movement, as a sign of reconciliation and of Blessed Mary of Jesus Crucified, thought of peace between peoples of all spiritual herself as " nothing", "a little nobody", and traditions. desired only to suffer the pain of her intense Copyright 2004 Khaniqahi Nimatullahi love of God, which led her to see God's love ------everywhere. It also allowed her to suffer when Bibliography she realized with compassion how many tend ------to take the great gift of God's creation for 1. “Mariam,The Little Arab” pamphlet granted. Out of her prayer she taught the published by Carmel du l’Enfant sisters in her community that when they loved Jesus,Bethlehem, Israel. one another they were loving God and that 2. Neger, D. C.“The Little Arab” 2001.In when they served their neighbors they were Sophia, vol.31,#1 Jan.-Feb. serving God too. When asked about her 3. “Mariam the Little Arab” experiences of ecstacy she described them as www.katolik.nu/now/html/artcl-mariam.htm suddenly "falling asleep" in the midst of the 4. Brunot, Amédée, 1992 "Mariam, La Petite most common everyday tasks. She said, "I feel Arab" Salvator, Paris. as though my heart is open; as though there is 5. Buzy D. S.C.J. 1922 "Pensees de la a wound in it; and when I have certain ideas Bienheureuse Marie de Jesus Crucifié" and impressions of God which move me, it trans. Carmel of Bethlehem "Thoughts, feels like someone touched the wound in my Blessed Mary of jesus Crucified", 1997. heart, and I fall in weakness, I lose myself". Franciscan Printing Press, Jerusalem. (p.10 www.Katolik.nu) 6. Estrate,P. 1999 "Mariam, Sainte Palestinian, It is no wonder that the Patriarch of la vie de Marie de Jesus Crucifié, Tequi, Jerusalem felt so compelled to open her cause Paris.

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