This experience begins with my love and study of iconography. I have attended an icon school yearly in the US with a very serious and devoted teacher. After 11 years and the disruption of Covid, my longing began to grow for something even more. I really did not know all of what this longing entailed, but I wanted to take this desire of my heart seriously.

I had heard of Russia Christiana near Seriate, near Bergamo, Italy, and began to look more closely at the web site with a new kind of openness. What I saw drew me in. The classes are held in a medieval villa, a permanent location for over 40 years with a history of many Russian teachers and students who have studied under them for decades. The teachers work together and collaborate in shows or displays of iconography delving into different themes within the Church and at the service of the Church. The icons shared were of a certain caliber of development that caught my attention. I longed for what I saw, but as I shared this with my daughter I complained with a sigh. She challenged me to follow my desire. Cost? Language? Can't decipher the details? These are not limits, but a challenge to grow, and to ask for the courage to look.

So, I asked our CL Fraternity Secretary to directly translate the Italian for me and to communicate with the school in Italy. I found a grant that made attending possible. I was contacted by a teacher from Seriate who helped by graciously translating and helping me coordinate the travel. I studied Italian for a year, alone. The study helped me open my ears to understanding and listening. After all, icons are also a language, there is a correlation. I went and then returned, attending the school now for two consecutive years.

The villa that houses the school was given to Fr. Scalfi by Betty Ambiveri, who hid Jewish people during WWII, and was sent to a prison camp in Germany when discovered by the Nazis. After meeting Fr. Scalfi, the villa was bequeathed to him as a refuge of immigrants, particularly those from Russia. Everything in the villa is beautiful and addressed with particular attention. The grounds are beautifully groomed and refreshing to wander about in. The meals are prepared with skill and devotion. We eat each meal together, preceded and concluded by sung grace. Many feasts and name days are celebrated together in the dining room with cakes and delights. Icons surround us everywhere from the dining room to the chapel.

The other students, teachers, and I sang morning prayer, evening prayer, and the Mass together from the Byzantine liturgy. There was a short talk about icons during the Mass and morning prayer each day. The sung liturgy, when experienced as one note sung by all, is such a profound sense of unity, of beauty. It is much like when all of the work and lines and colors of the icon come together at the end with the heavenly light penetrating through the person or figure of The Mother of God, something new, a very real presence. The icon atelier meets three times each day and is always preceded with the following prayer: "Oh Divine Master, fervent creator of all creation, illuminate the gaze of your servant, guard his heart, hold and govern his hand so that he can worthily and with perfection represent your image, for the glory, the joy and the beauty of your Holy Church. Amen" We followed the prayer by singing Non nobis Domine: To Him all glory!

The Divine Byzantine rite liturgy, sung by the local CL choir, was celebrated on the final day as a festival to bless the completed icons.

During the course of this week in July, beauty was opened up to us on many levels. There were about 50 students in five separate classes. Fr. Angelo Lanfranchi, general secretary of the Discalced Carmelites, from Rome was present and accompanied each of us, students and teachers alike, in the most profound and beautiful way. He brought the face of Christ essentially and very directly to each person.

How? I do not know. His talks and teachings on the icons were direct and profound, simple and essential. Fr. Angelo, before his Carmelite vocation, had been a student and teacher at Seriate, so he has a deep understanding of icons and what it takes to enter into this work. His singing led us with a strong and beautiful voice. Fr. Angelo reminded and guided us to remember to ask, "Who am I? That You lead me to cooperate in this work of creating icons, as co-creators, to be led into the wonder with the work of each day, writing the icons, to contemplate the wonderful material of humanity, the faces of the saints, including those around me now. We are united to Him, He who makes me now, He who writes me now.”

I found it a surprise and wonderful to perceive the faces around me change over the course of the week in our deep work and time together. People of all ages and backgrounds came to this class, and all were transfigured so to speak. In the class photo at the end of the blessing and Divine Liturgy of the last day, you can see we are all peaceful and happy.

"Let us continue," invited Fr. Angelo, "Continue this work of creation and recreation because He did not do things once and for all, because He is the One from Whom life springs! Beauty arises!"

So, next year I pray to return to find out more about what draws me here and within the icon!

Peggy, Lawrence KS