The Catholic Writers Guild

During my daily prayer walk, following the Rosary, I pray the Salve Regina and recite: “…to thee [Blessed Mother] do we send up our sighs, mourning and weeping in this vale of tears.” Some people use the word valley within this line, but vale is a fascinating, almost romantic word that has a special appeal to me. Praying as I walk solitary forested trails, the image of a Vale of Tears resonates with the rolling scenery or the occasional mournful fogs which I encounter. In my writer’s brain, the prayer and my beloved walk work in tandem as an inspiration for art and a study of its formation.

Not only does the vale signify a low, bowl-like area, I have been taught to think of the veil of tears when speaking the word. Mankind experiences both vales and veils in this mortal condition. We’ve all known the vales of low, crushing periods of life, as well as the veils of uncertainty and clouded minds. Our very existence is behind a veil until we may at last see God.

Just imagine a sunset. Doesn’t it always seem that there is something in the way of perfect vision? If it’s not a hill, it is a house, or a tree, or a vehicle, or any number of annoying, obstructive objects. Even when ground objects are out of the way, there is always a cloud over the best, brightest area of the sky. We must be content with broken, partial images. So it is with our knowledge and vision of our lives, eternal life in Paradise, and God Himself.

My contemplation of the vales and veils of life raises the question: what is the artist’s duty toward those low places and obstructions?

A real freedom exists in art that allows two responses to vales and veils. One response is to enter into every gritty, grimy aspect of the dark vales, and gaze studiously at the hazy veils. The other response is to leave both behind and bask in the ineffable light in a heavenly Promised Land. Great works of art in both fields convey truth and offer opportunity to know God, but is one better than the other? Is one the right, proper one for fallen, sinful man to write?

In the darkness God is present and active; His providence has been at work in the darkest hours of history. There is much to gain from reading and writing upon darker, mortal themes, and no man can live and die without knowing the monstrousness of our fallen nature. Yet, even the darkest tales do not capture and delight readers without some remembrance of saving grace. When darkness is central to a story, even the tiniest fragment of grace and light is an exquisite relief.

Without the dynamic between sin and grace, a story would offer a bland, weak portrayal of light in its entirety. Heaven with all of its brightness and unspeakable bliss is only caught in dim shadows and faint fragments. It must be impossible to write an entirely bright, happy story when even our knowledge of happiness is so shadowed. We know only that we sit in darkness, but we were made for light.

So it would appear that good stories cannot entirely focus on darkness or light. Amid darkness, there always breaks out a tiny touch of light. Amid light, we there is a sadness at the thought that we have not yet known happiness. As with virtue and a holy life, an artist is called to look at darkness and through darkness in the same instant. We must at least try.

This weekend is Divine Mercy Sunday. St. Thomas, in Sunday’s gospel, embodies the dual duty of an artist. He gazed upon the Risen, Eternal Son of God; he touched the glorious body. And yet, in his wonder at such beauty and grace, he chose to touch the marks which sin and death had put upon that Sacred Body. Thomas put his hand into the Risen Christ’s open side from whence sacrificial blood was poured.

Our Lord and God must drive our art with His glory and the pain which brought that glory to us.

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Copyright 2022 Maggie Rosario