La Sainte-Baume
Welcome to The House of New Bethany
Like the Mother of God and like St. John, Mary Magdalene will not finish her days by martyrdom. She will also live in the tranquil benediction of her love. She will live at the feet of the vanished Christ, as she lived in Bethany and in Calvary, a lover accustomed to the delights of contemplation, and having no other need but to look with her soul at the One whom she looked upon in other times through the transparent veil of mortal flesh. But what famous or obscure havens will have been prepared for her? Where will she hide the blessed remainder of her existence? Are they to be the deserts of the East, the river banks of the Jordan, Mt. Sion, the field after the harvest of Nazareth or of Bethlehem, which will be the last witnesses of her inaccessible charity? Jesus Christ bequeathed his Mother to Jerusalem, St. Peter to Rome, St. John to Asia --- to whom will he have bequeathed Mary Magdalene?
We know already, it is France who received from the hands of God this part of the Testament of His Son.
~ The Life of St. Mary Magdalene, Lacordaire.
Welcome to the House of New Bethany. For fifteen years I contemplated the French heroines, St. Joan of Arc and St. Thérèse of Lisieux. I wrote down my reflections and gathered the themes into a coherent whole, a map of meaning shimmering in the unfolding of their combined hearts. Appearing through the soft light on the horizon was the contour of a kingdom. Through this process, I developed a deep love for and consecration to that kingdom that I call “Mystical France” in the center of the Immaculate Heart of Mary. An essential characteristic of my consecration to the Virgin Mary in the spirit of Mystical France is a gleaming embodiment related ontologically to Catholic and Royal France in union with Our Lady and Jesus Christ at the foot of the Cross. This unfolding embodiment of the kingdom is St. Mary Magdalene. Magdalene’s mode of being in France forms the softly lighted pathway and the syntax of my own spiritual, intellectual, and philosophical constitution.
According to tradition, Mary Magdalene lived her last thirty years as a hermit in a cave at La Sainte-Baume in Provence. I desire to create my “cave of contemplation” in union with her through this journal. The journal is public and transparent for the benefit of others should anything I contemplate be worthy of another’s consideration.
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For the renaissance of Catholic and Royal France
