Sister Carolyn Miguel
Sister Carolyn, upon entering the Monastery, was able to realize a life-long dream by having the time and a studio for being an artist. She repairs statues, saws wooden plaques and figurines, paint saints and other images on river rocks, etches glass, and more.
For her the creative process is an expression of leisure, and the greatest leisure is the ancient art of iconography. Iconography is the art of illustrating religious subjects. She has studied this art form for the past three summers at the Iconography Institute at Mt. Angel Abbey near Portland, OR. Now she often spends hours in this sacred practice.
"Writing an icon requires significant periods of unbroken time, silence, and study. It is a deep time. I sit and look at what I am painting, let it talk to me, and then move ahead with it. This process calls me to pray about what image to paint. My heart must be pure in order to allow the icon to be created with integrity. I ready the materials, contemplate the subject of the icon, study, visualize what I want to bring forth, draw the geometric sketch of it, and work and work on it. All this draws me to the deep place at the center of my being."
"I know it is God who puts the vision in my mind. I feel exhilaration as I come close to letting the vision take shape on my panel." Having raised three children before entering the monastery, she likens writing an icon to giving birth to a child. After my babies were born and when I finish an icon I say, "Ah, I did it. Thank you, God. It's over, and it's beautiful."
"Leisure means to be fully awake to the present moment, to the deepest realities in one's soul. Creating an icon is just that. I get lost in what I am doing, and emerge from sacred inner space both exhausted and jubilant."
The attention to detail, especially laying gold leaf, is an exacting and absorbing process. As the shapes start forming an image and then come together into a captivating picture, jubilation courses through. "I feel whole as I see how good the work is."
Christmas has become a special time to her because "I am so much more aware of Jesus as the Icon of God."