A new year, a new name: Nazareth Anew
What's behind the new title?
In the heart of Nazareth, the Holy Family were bound in the sanctified toil, prayer and unity of each playing their critical role in salvation history, mysteriously cradled in the humble wonder and beauty of the family home. It was the Christ, the Contemplative and the Craftsman, hidden and sanctified, bound and beloved in what I’m seeking to honour in Nazareth Anew.
Nazareth Anew celebrates the pursuit of contemplative endeavour and creative discipline, ever and always united to God’s Holy Church, to scripture, tradition and to the wonder of God at work in our midst. In our humble disciplines, our prayer, and our creative expression, we unite ourselves in to God’s intent for our lives, bound and inseparable from our vocation in marriage and family.
The Holy family provide an unparalleled model of this union of humble prayer, toil, and purpose.
The Craftsman: St Joseph is unmatched as protector and provider; terror of demons attuned to the will and the word of God, no less powerful for his silence in Scripture, no less admirable from the nobility of his chastity, chosen and trusted by God to nurture and protect the Theotokos and the Christ Child.
The Contemplative: Our Lady, the Blessed Mother of God, pondering the mysteries of Christ in her heart, united to Him in suffering and unity with God’s will, interceding for us then, and now. There can be no better model of prayer, contemplation, grace and humility.
The Christ: Our Lord, God made man, who humbled himself to take the form of a servant, obedient, even unto death. We must understand all of our turmoil, all of our toil in the light of His sacrifice, in light of His grace, in light of His truth. The wonder of Divinity that saw fit to occupy and sanctify family life should inspire every husband, father, wife and mother to marvel at the enormity of all we have been entrusted with, and the faith, hope, virtue and love that it takes to honour our vocations.
Similarly, God has granted us creative capacities, insights, talents and graces that we must cherish, cultivate, and return to Him, for His greater glory. Nazareth Anew honours the work and the vocation of marriage, family, creative discipline and contemplative endeavour, with a personal insight into the reality that these are inseparable… that all of our works and all of our disciplines have a place in our salvation, and no less, the salvation and sanctification of the world around us. Lived out in humility and a silence that still astounds, the Craftsman, the Contemplative and the Christ bore untold fruit in a hidden life that made use of every grace God had given them - we must do no less.
Literature, art and music can be endowed with the wondrous presence of God’s work, and His will. All beauty, elegance, eloquence and truth draw us back to the Trinity. Nazareth Anew celebrates the creative act, particularly in the midst of family life, A challenge, no doubt, but an honourable one. If the work of art and culture is left to the secular realm, we can expect a little more than the crass, derivative dross that marks the barren culture around us.
I write this as a devout Catholic; a secular Discalced Carmelite seeking the face of God in everyday life. I am a husband to one wife, and a father to eleven children, whom I adore. We fled the madness of the modern urban realm to lay down roots in a growing Catholic community in Jindera, New South Wales, where many have come to seek peace, honest, earnest community, good liturgy and a fine Catholic education that honours the Magisterium and all of Holy Mother Church’s teachings.
We’ve built a life beyond the madness, and the busyness, and the noise, the modern malaise of consumerism, distraction and dissipation. On our humble five acres, we lay close to God’s creation and find his hand at work in all things, in all ways. This is Nazareth Anew, and I thank you for joining us.
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