c. 2000 Religion News Service

CLEVELAND _ Her world was the galleries of New York, the Art Institute of Chicago and journeys to Mexico to paint themes of revolution and learn the style of Central American muralists.

Then, in the act of taking Communion at St. Peter’s in Rome, she discerned a different calling. And for the last 41 years, Sister Mary Thomas has worshipped the Blessed Sacrament within the cloistered walls of the monastery of the Poor Clares of Perpetual Adoration in downtown Cleveland.

In all those decades, she has not even been able to leave the old stone walls to visit the Cleveland Museum of Art. But still, Mary Thomas paints. And her creative spirit, following a millennium-old monastic tradition, has soared, she believes.

“I think it’s really deepened my creativity,” she said. “It’s centered my focus on eternal truths.”

In a makeshift studio above and behind the sanctuary of Conversion of St. Paul Catholic Church, she does finishing work on an oil painting of Mary and the baby Jesus.

Leaning against the wall is a large, modernistic painting of a crucified Jesus with Mary at his side. Soon that will be shipped to the Holy Cross order at the University of Notre Dame.

During a break, Mary Thomas talks animatedly with a visitor from behind a barrier separating her from the outside world. The barrier is a modest one, allowing her to reach over and shake hands with a visitor. There are “extern” nuns in her order to care for the shopping and other necessities of monastery life, but she and the other cloistered sisters will not leave Cleveland’s east side.

It was not a life she would have imagined as a girl growing up in Appleton, Wis. Her interest in art began in high school, and in 1951 she attended the Art Institute of Chicago. From there, she went to Mexico to study mural painting and did ambitious works on major social themes such as the Guatemalan revolution.

She traveled to New York City, where her work was shown in galleries, and she became a free-lance stained-glass artist and technical illustrator.

In 1958, she went to Italy, where she prepared work for a one-woman show and studied art history at the Dante Alighiere School in Rome. At the same time, she explored a growing sense of spiritual calling.

“I wanted to discern God’s will for me,” she said.

Throughout Lent that year, she made pilgrimages to various churches. At an Easter Vigil service at St. Peter’s Basilica, something extraordinary happened.

“I had this tremendous grace through receiving Holy Eucharist, through receiving Communion,” said Mary Thomas, a beatific smile spreading across her face under her habit. “It just seemed to be so real. It seemed to be so perfect.”

She went home to Wisconsin to further discern her vocation and was confirmed in her desire to spend the rest of her life giving thanks to God. She came to the Poor Clares monastery in 1959 and has been there ever since.

A typical day begins at 5:45 a.m., with a period of meditation and prayer that ends with Mass at 7:30 a.m. But the adoration of the Blessed Sacrament, the Host that Catholics believe is the real presence of the risen Christ, takes place 24 hours a day, seven days a week, with each sister taking a shift. There are other periods throughout the day for prayer, housework and community jobs.

Mary Thomas, now 67, is the treasurer of the order.

And when she has time, she works on her painting.

In addition to private collections, her work can be seen in churches and schools throughout Cleveland. She works on commission, with the proceeds going to her order.

Her prices are modest, however, and geared to the means of the parish or collector, she said.

“The real thing is to have people enjoy the work and draw closer to the Lord,” she said.

Her style is not the somber, brooding medieval art that is at home in some of the poorly lit museums of Europe. Her paintings are contemporary, soaring images of faith, where figures from Mary to Paul to Jesus to St. Ambrose dominate the canvas. They are powerful representations of individuals at peace with their beliefs.

In a painting at the Conversion of St. Paul Church, Paul is surrounded with images from his life, from his baptism to his commission to preach to the Gentiles to his walk toward eternity.

The technical expertise she developed early in life is combined with a spiritual creativity that flows from her contemplative life, she said.

“Being an artist in the monastic life, I think it’s really the perfect outgrowth of all I’ve done in New York and Chicago,” she said.

The vivid images of religious figures nurtured in constant prayer come to life on canvas.

“They seem to become real to me,” she said. “When I did St. Paul, he became real to me. … I just kind of felt I really wanted to live his life.”

As she contemplates her work today, Mary Thomas believes there is a divine hand guiding her.

“I feel my work is a gift from God,” she said.

KRE END BRIGGS