Uncertainty at the heart of a ritual in Lebanon 2011

Abstract

In Lebanon and Syria, a network of Christian female mystics has been forming since the early 1980s. Every year on Good Friday, all these women relive Christ’s sufferings more or less dramatically. Some, crippled with pain, tend to isolate themselves. In contrast, others show the wounds that appear on their bodies to crowds of devotees. This article will focus on the ritual of ‘crucifixion’ (insilâb). Based on a description of Catherine Fahmi’s insilâb, the author will show that stigmatization is both a paradigm and a process: even if it inscribes itself in a long imitatio Christi tradition, which has been formalized and theorized over the centuries, the ritual also contributes to deeply transforming the Passion myth. Uncertainty – along with its subsequent questions, concerns, and hesitations – is key to this process.

In Lebanon and Syria, two States with strong historical ties, a network of female mystics has been forming since the early 1980s. ¹ Composed of Christian women from large cities, including Beirut and Damascus, it is characterized by its denominational and social diversity. ² Some of these women – Maronite, Greek Orthodox, and Greek Catholic – come from poor families living in impoverished suburbs, while others are members of the upper-middle class. They belong to a common network, a ‘global Marian’ network, in which the internet plays a crucial role, especially for the circulation of images, messages, visions, and prayers. ³ They also share a common gest: All claim to have been ‘led by extraordinary ways’ since childhood. Most importantly, despite their alleged ‘elections’ and graces, none of them has taken holy orders or chosen to live in seclusion. Most of them are married and have children, living in tune with their societies as well as their political, social, and economic turmoil. ‘I’m just like any other woman, ordinary [‘adiyya]. I’ve a husband and children. I worry about my son, who comes home with tattoos, who hangs around after school … I’m an ordinary woman,’ one of them said. The emphasis on ordinariness is no doubt what characterizes these twenty-first-century ecstatic mystics. It sets them apart from many Catholic saints, who chose a radical seclusion from the world to better devote themselves to God (Albert, 1997).

Another common feature is that, derided and sometimes even persecuted in their early mystic careers, these women eventually become successful in times of political turmoil and collective angst. The oldest, Mathilde Riachi, from Lebanon, started her apostolate in 1960 but did not reach a wide audience until the war broke out, in 1975 (Noun, 2011); Myrna of Soufanieh drew an unequaled number of visitors in 1982 (Zahlaoui, 1991), during the Hama massacre; finally, Catherine of Nab’a publicly disclosed her ‘grace’ during the ‘elimination war’ between the two major Maronite leaders, Michel Aoun and Samir Geagea. Since then, all these women have ‘opened their houses’ (fatahât beithon). In common speech, ‘to open one’s house’ means ‘to enter politics’ or ‘to run for office.’ As used by the mystics, the phrase stresses the highly political nature of the ‘mission’ they claim to be entrusted with.

Finally, it should be noted that images are pivotal to these women’s careers. Representations of Christian saints and martyrs pervade their imaginations and postures, and most of their daily gestures, as well as the self-narratives they are so keen to share. Their homes display a multitude of differently sized two- or three-dimensional ‘Virgin(s)’, ‘Christ(s)’, ‘saint Rafqa(s) ⁴ ’, or ‘saint Charbel(s) ⁵ .’ These representations come with stories: People tell how one of them ‘cried’ or ‘bled’ on the eve of a certain event, how another oozed oil. They point to marks – reddish streaks, scratches, and water stains – as evidence of miracles. Usually, the manifestations occur during ecstasies: the representations attest to and ‘double’ – in both senses: duplicate and increase – what happens on and within the mystics’ bodies.

The faithful never speak of Catherine of Naba or Myrna of Soufanieh as ‘visionaries’ or ‘prophets.’ Although these women have visions and deliver prophetic messages during ecstasies, the historical and biblical overtones of these terms would hint at an outrageous claim to holiness and cult. In order to last, their functions, statuses, and qualities need to remain somewhat indeterminate. Incidentally, the very terms used to designate them are quite indeterminate: ‘little saint’ and ‘mother of all.’ While these affectionate terms convey a sense of modesty, availability, and closeness, they also emphasize these women’s prestigious holy lineage. Humbleness is indeed an essential virtue of Catholic sainthood. It is a proof of election especially associated with women (Dalarun, 2008). The adjective ‘little’ is attached to the names of many saints, in particular to Francis of Assisi (‘the Little Poor Man of Assisi’, ‘the Poverello’) and Clare of Assisi (‘the Little Flower of Assisi’). It is especially reminiscent of Saint Thérèse of Lisieux. Affectionately called ‘the Little Saint’ or ‘Little Thérèse,’ Saint Thérèse expressed through the idea of littleness her desire to live a hidden and discreet life. Finally, the phrase ‘mother of all’ stresses the motherly and welcoming nature of the mystics, as well as drawing a parallel between them and the Virgin, commonly referred to as such.

These women bear on their very bodies the ‘marks’ (stigmata) of their elections. Following a classic pattern, these marks come as unexplained pain (internal and invisible stigmata) or, quite literally, as the five wounds of Christ (external and visible stigmata) ⁶ . They may appear occasionally or, on the contrary, ‘settle’ for a long time. The Cross is ‘imprinted’ on Myrna of Soufianeh’s body during the Holy Week but only in the years when Orthodox Easter and Catholic Easter coincide. ⁷ These stigmata should be read as a form of criticism addressed to Christian Churches still unable to agree on a common liturgical calendar. Nevrik, meanwhile, bears on her forehead a cross-shaped scar, which opens up and bleeds every Thursday evening but heals up every Friday morning. Every year on Good Friday, all these women relive Christ’s sufferings more or less dramatically. Some, crippled with pain, tend to isolate themselves. In contrast, others show the wounds that appear on their bodies to crowds of devotees. This article will focus on the ritual of ‘crucifixion’ (insilâb). Based on a description of Catherine Fahmi’s insilâb, I will try to show that stigmatization is both ‘a paradigm and a process’ ⁸ : Although in keeping with a long imitatio Christi tradition, formalized and theorized over the centuries, the ritual contributes to deeply transforming the Passion myth.

As in the situations described in this volume by Agnès Clerc-Renaud and Anna Fedele, the stigmatization ritual and its central figures (the Virgin and Christ) are far from being established or definitive. Characterized by their ‘unfinishedness’/‘uncompletedness’ (Clerc-Renaud), they are part of a continuous social process. The narratives that revolve around them are in part composed of ‘empty’ and ‘neutral points’ (Clerc-Renaud). Hence they are constantly reformulated and reshaped according to the events (apparitions, miracles), debates (on their attributes, legitimacy, etc.), and narrators. Uncertainty – along with its subsequent questions, concerns, and hesitations – is key to this process.

Catherine of Naba

Catherine Fahmi is a Maronite native of Kesrouan, a district in the Mount Lebanon Governorate. Since 1990, she has been living in Naba, a poor neighborhood in the suburbs of Beirut. With her followers (priests, secretaries, believers), she has built up a ‘self-narrative’ that she willingly shares with her visitors. The narrative identifies founding events. It also organizes her destiny, calling, and choices into a discursive frame that states who she is, how, and why. It contributes to her individuation myth, while placing her in a long lineage of visionary saints and ‘certified’ mystics. Similarities with previous spiritual paths indicate an intimate knowledge of hagiographic literature, transmitted to her orally, in church, and at spiritual events organized in private homes ⁹ or in church halls, and above all through images representing saints in action. Catherine tirelessly speaks of the ‘grace’ (nima) God bestowed on her at an early age: Charbel, her ‘intercessor’ (chafî‘), and the Virgin regularly appear to her and deliver messages through her. For a long time, she kept this intimate relation with the saints secret. She went public after she moved to the Lebanese capital, during the 1990 inter-Christian war. Eight years later, once her third child was born, at Saint Charbel’s ‘request,’ she opened up her house. Since then, her apartment has become a ‘house/church,’ a highly social hybrid space – half public, half private; half sacred, half profane. Men and women come to see Catherine at all times of day, to attend her ecstasies, to read a revelation in the message register, to pray, or simply to socialize.

Mistrustful of Catherine, the Maronite Church keeps a certain distance. To watch her career and ensure her submission, the Church appointed a spiritual guide who was supposed to oversee and report on her activity. It also conducted an investigation, though this has never yielded any public conclusions. Priests, deacons, monks, and nuns visit her privately, thus enabling her to maintain a connection with the religious institution. The clerics’ actions, postures, and attitudes in Catherine’s house – a very special space indeed, a quasi-sanctuary – point out that the Maronite Church, an Eastern Church strongly attached to its history, tradition, and specificity in relation to Catholicism, is permeated with several trends: liberal, traditional, and charismatic. Priests from these various trends come to her house.

According to Catherine, the saints impose themselves on her as spiritual forces that ‘overtake’ her, invade her body and seize her person. However, their interventions follow a precise and ritualized pattern. Every Tuesday morning, after rosary recitations, hymns of praise, litanies, and invocations sung by many believers, she experiences an ecstasy: she is ‘caught up’ (tunkhatif) to heaven and ‘travels’ (tusâfir). Temporarily left behind, her corporeal body channels a ‘presence’ (hudûr, wujûd) of the Virgin or Saint Charbel, who deliver messages (rasâ’il) written down by a secretary. The Mother of God can be ‘recognized’ by her gentle ‘features,’ her quavering high-pitched voice, and her formal speech. Saint Charbel, the saint of the mountains, is identified by the sound of a stick hitting the ground, his stern look, his hoarse voice, and his Lebanese accent. Once the trance is over, Catherine regains consciousness and control over her body. The divine message – along with some of the saints’ gestures – is recounted to her. She in turn relates her journey and visions (ru’yât). It is noteworthy that Catherine is both ‘passive’ and ‘active’: She simultaneously experiences an unconscious possession and a conscious journey. ¹⁰ Every year on Good Friday, she sees and experiences the Way of the Cross. Like others before her ¹¹ , she can see the Savior throughout the various Stations of the Cross while she ‘receives’ the five stigmata.

The crucifixion as a ritual/theater

The crucifixion on Good Friday has become a kind of ritual drama, whose clearly delineated stage represents a mise en abyme: it takes place in the corner of a room, where an ‘altar’ has been set up. Catherine kneels before a multitude of images of the Virgin and Christ, who are at the same time ‘presentified’ by and through her body. At her side, Mariam, her secretary, pays attention to her smallest gestures. Armed with a notebook and a pencil, Mariam not only writes down the ‘divine’ messages but also carefully transcribes each one of Catherine’s facial expressions and postures. Composed of words, prayers, Gospel quotes, and enigmatic phrases, two kinds of messages can be distinguished: ‘general’ ones and ‘private’ ones. Some men protectively surround the two women, so as to hold back the crowd that fills the apartment and spills over into the stairwell. One of the men, the ‘coordinator/deacon,’ holds a microphone: He issues instructions on prayers and religious gestures. He also describes the Stations of the Cross for those too far from the scene to see or hear what is happening.

Year after year, the ritual follows a specific pattern. Since the priests, who sometimes attend the ecstasies on Tuesdays, are all busy officiating in their respective parishes, the Gospels are the sole authority in the absence of clerics: They are observed to the letter. The crucifixion starts around 9 AM and ends around 3 PM, according to the ‘schedule’ based on time indications provided in Mark 15. It also follows a specific sequence of events. Indeed, the ‘spear’ appears after the crucifixition, more specifically after Christ’s death, as described in John 19. However, ‘disorders’ do come up in this quite regulated ritual. By ‘disorders,’ I mean moments of disruption, uncertainty, indecision, ambiguity, and fragility. In the following section, I will describe the Good Friday of 2011, focusing on three such moments.

Good Friday 2011: The faithful have been gathering since dawn in the living-room/sanctuary. When Catherine enters the room, they have already started to recite the five Sorrowful Mysteries. The ‘Hail Mary’ and ‘Our Father’ prayers are said at an accelerating pace, louder and louder. Like all Virgin Mary statues, Catherine wears a black veil. She dons mourning clothes. Yet she keeps her tan canvas slippers on. After she has breathlessly invoked the saints and God for a while, the ecstasy begins. Catherine embodies the Virgin, whose usual ‘Dear children’ heralds her presence (Claverie, 2003). From now on, the protagonist is an indeterminate entity I will refer to as ‘the Virgin/Catherine’ and ‘she.’

The Virgin/Catherine bows in front of the altar, her head bent over a representation of Mary in tears. People jostle behind her and say: ‘Here we are! Here we are! “She” is crucified!’ After whispering ‘in the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit,’ she throws herself back into the crowd. No fewer than four men are needed to lift her up and lay her on the couch. ‘How heavy!’ one of them says. ‘She is like wood!’ another says. Someone brings a fitted sheet to cover up her body. Her slippers poke out. Her feet brace one another, as if they were nailed on an invisible cross. First disorder: the design of the sheet, which features brightly-colored trucks, clashing with the visual environment of the house, where black otherwise prevails, on this day of mourning.

The Virgin/Catherine screams: ‘My Son, no!’ A cross-shaped scar opens up on her forehead. The ritual’s coordinator announces through the microphone: ‘That’s it, she is crucified. Let’s pray to ease her pain.’ There follows a three-hour-long series of screams, prayers, chants, and whispers: The Virgin/Catherine delivers personal messages to most of those kneeling in front of her to kiss the crucifix in her hands. A weeping woman bends over her. Second disorder: The woman cannot help kissing the Virgin/Catherine’s cheek after hearing the message she has delivered to her. The bodyguards rush to prevent this, but it is too late. She apologizes, stands up, and leaves. During the many hours of the crucifixion, a Canadian businessman, who flew over especially to attend the ritual, takes care of the ‘crucified’ feet: He strokes them, covers them up, and uncovers them. Other believers examine and take pictures of the mystics’ palms, feet, and side in order to see and record the Passion’s instruments: the ‘nails’, the ‘spear’, black and white swellings. And then comes the infikâk, from the root ‘fa ka ka’, which means ‘to undo, loosen, untie’ in Arabic. Here it refers both to the outcome and Jesus’s descent from the Cross. ‘This crucifixion is coming to an end. Lift my Son’s head up to see the sacrifice [mashhad]. It’s time to undo this crucifixion. May God relieve your hearts of sufferings and sorrows, and may He protect you from wars and earthquakes,’ the Virgin/Catherine says.

Echoing these words, the coordinator declares: ‘My brothers, the crucifixion is over. The Virgin said … we couldn’t get the microphone close … but she saw Jesus being taken down from the Cross.’ Third and last disorder: Mariam, the secretary, adds: ‘Not only did she see … sometimes it was the Virgin and sometimes Jesus … “She” was crucified … He was crucified … then he came off the Cross. “She” came off. Jesus came off.’ All those nearby hear and sense her confusion. Who was crucified? And who came off the Cross? The Mother or the Son? These questions are raised by Mariam’s muddled statement.

‘Ask the Virgin, will you,’ a woman says. Mariam complies and asks the Virgin/Catherine: ‘O Mother of God, the crucifixion is over. It was Jesus on the Cross, wasn’t it?’ The answer is whispered into her ear. Mariam straightens up and says: ‘Jesus was indeed crucified. “She” said: “It was Jesus on the Cross. Tell them it was Jesus who was crucified and who came off the Cross.”’ The coordinator then goes back to what he was about to say before being cut off: ‘As I said, the crucifixion has come to an end. It was indeed Jesus on the Cross and the crucifixion is now over for him. Catherine saw Jesus’s descent from the Cross.’

Disorders and indeterminacy

A brightly-colored sheet, the excessive gesture of a believer, the question raised by the secretary: These disorders disrupt and undermine the ritual. They show a principle of indeterminacy that echoes the questions arising at the sight of a woman being crucified: Is Catherine faking? Who is she? Is she hysterical? Is she an authentic saint? Are those around her spectators or believers? Who was on the Cross? An image or a flesh-and-blood being? The Virgin or Her daughter Catherine? The Mother or the Son? etc. These disorders spin a web of intrigues.

Francis of Assisi, the first stigmatist, is an unequaled model for female sainthood: ‘Women identify with this icon, they can relate to it; they are committed to this figure, whose memory bridges the masculine and the feminine’ (Dalarun, 2008: 127). Dominique de Courcelles (2001: 12) explains that the Poverello ‘has become a represention of Christ’. In this sense, the stigmata would somehow mark the passage from man to image. Eight centuries later, Catherine experiences a similar process. Like a narrative image (historia), she re-presents an event (the Passion) and two of its main characters (the Virgin and Christ). There is a continual interplay in her house between the numerous paintings, statues, and photographs of saints, which bleed, weep, and cry, just like her. Her body, ‘heavy as wood,’ is the Cross: it is the ‘scene’ (mashhad) where the primordial sacrifice is re-enacted through gestures and speech. A believer feels the ‘nail’ in her hand; another one takes her shoes off to examine her feet; a man lifts her sweater to see and take a picture of the ‘spear in her side.’ In other circumstances, this could be deemed inappropriate, even obscene. However, the faithful can do so, since they are not touching Catherine’s but Christ’s feet and body, as imagined and staged. Likewise, they do not feel and photograph Catherine’s swellings but Christ’s ‘nails’ (mismâr), ‘spear’ (sahm or harba), and ‘thorn’ (shawka). Like an icon, she embodies a ‘sacred presence,’ a manifestation, a parousia. The stigmata stand out: they are contemplated and scrutinized ‘in detail’ (Arasse, 1996: 82), so much so that they become a narrative scene in themselves. Being both the wound and the instrument (arma Christi) that inflicted it, the stigma invites the viewer to reconstruct and somehow participate in the re-enactment.

But let us get back to the woman who surreptitiously kisses the mystic’s cheek. Had she kissed an icon or a statue, the gesture would seem natural. But in this context it is awkward and reproved. ‘We can’t let this happen! Imagine fifty, a hundred strangers kissing Catherine. It would be inappropriate!’ said George, one of the ceremony organizers. Actually, the mystic’s body turns into an image, while still being the physical body of Catherine, an ‘ordinary’ woman, who must be respected as such. The ritual’s fleeting scenography places the sacred and the profane side by side: The boundary between them, albeit imperceptible, must be preserved.

Catholic women’s stigmatization is part of a long imitatio Christi tradition. As the two historians Bernard Heyberger (2001) and Chantal Verdeil (2006) showed, it was in the modern period that Eastern Christianism, influenced by Latin missionaries, started to conceive the body as the locus of union with the divine. Hindiya (1720–1798) and Rafqa (1832–1914) are two affective Maronite mystics highly influenced by Western Catholicism. Canonized in 2001, Saint Rafqa is present through images in Catherine’s apartment. In the living-room hangs a framed photograph that shows the gaunt figure of the ‘patron saint of suffering’ (Verdeil, 2006) lying on a pallet, with one eye ripped out and a bone piercing the skin over her right clavicle. Catherine undergoes a similar, abeit attenuated, bodily ordeal. She literally imitates Christ’s suffering. ‘Raised by pain to the status of instrument of salvation’ (Albert, 1992: 12), her body bears others’ suffering and sins, without being annihilated through martyrdom. Unlike the mystics studied by Jean-Pierre Albert, she does not perform or organize a total ‘undoing of the flesh’ (défaite de la chair) (Albert, 1992: 3). Her position is original in that, although she follows in the wake of famous saints such as Catherine of Siena († 1380) or Veronica Giuliani († 1727), she does not renounce worldy values. Not only does she want to stay a homemaker, wife, and mother-of-three, but she is also eager to show this aspect of her life.

The shadows under her eyes, her slumped shoulders, and her shaking hands attest to ceaseless pain: ‘She soaks up sufferings, she takes upon her body others’ sufferings,’ her followers say. Yet she seems quite ‘fashionable’ with her flawlessly dyed hair, manicured nails, and neat outfits. ‘Is that her?’ first-time visitors frequently ask. People are surprised by her looks and by the fact that they see her cooking or doing housework. Far from disturbing the ritual, this ordinariness permeates it. It is called to mind by the colorful child’s fitted sheet used year after year to cover the ‘crucified’ body. Both eye-catching and disturbing, this discordant ‘detail’ clouds an almost picture-perfect scene. It brings out Catherine’s ordinariness in contrast to the unfolding extraordinary event, resulting in an ‘effective surprise’ (Arasse, 1996: 122). Furthermore, it creates a presence effect, whereby the devout viewer cannot remain aloof from the re-enacted scene. On the contrary, he/she feels a strong connection to it, which may enhance the affectum devotionis.

Catherine’s holy gest is built on a continual oscillation between the ordinary and the extraordinary. During the insilâb ritual, she becomes an indetermined entity, half-sacred, half-profane. Both a person and an image, she somehow merges with/into the Virgin and Christ. Who is worshipped when one kneels in front of her? The mystic who, through her five wounds, becomes the ‘redemptive body’ to be seen and touched, and who can therefore be considered a saint in the making? The Virgin as present in and through this screaming body? Or an eternally suffering Jesus? The three figures are simultaneously ‘presentified’: Christ, by the wounds; the Virgin, by her cries and moans; and finally Catherine, by the colorful and cheerful child’s fitted sheet, which reminds attendees of her ordinariness, her status as a mere woman and believer.

Catherine’s stigmatization cannot but be seen as a literal mimesis of the Passion. While it is part of a long imitatio Christi tradition, it also draws attention to the myth’s transformation. When I described the 2011 crucifixion, I focused on the ritual’s closing scene, which was marked by the secretary’s untimely – to say the least – interference. How should we understand this moment of disorder, when Mariam, until then completely absorbed in her role as a scribe, interrupted the ritual to reveal her confusion and to question the situation she had just witnessed: the image of Catherine embodying the Cross, the suffering Virgin, and the crucified Son; embodying both the Mother and the Son. Who was crucified? The Virgin or Jesus? The Virgin/Catherine is ‘questioned.’ After the confusion comes the reordering of the story: ‘It was Jesus on the Cross,’ says Mariam. ‘It was Catherine who saw Jesus coming down from the Cross,’ adds the deacon/coordinator. Each actor resumes his/her distinct role: Christ as the sole redemptive body; the Virgin as the weeping Mother; Catherine as the visionary. However, the awkwardness is still palpable and voices remain hesitant: something has indeed ‘been disrupted’ in the Passion myth enacted by and in Catherine.

A woman crucified instead of Jesus. The phenomenon is not new, nor is the resulting puzzlement. In his work on Claire of Rimini (1282–1346, beatified in 1784), Jacques Dalarun relates the outrage caused by this mystic who, every Good Friday, would live a Passion. She would have her hands tied behind her back, be dragged by a rope to a column. She would be tied up to it and then beaten (Dalarun, 2008). At the very beginning of the fourteenth century, this ‘act’ ¹² was shockingly novel. The scandal was all the greater as ‘the part of Jesus was played by a woman, who wandered half-naked throughout squares and streets’ (Dalarun, 2008: 311). Even Saint Catherine of Siena’s stigmatization caused the Church embarassment for a while. Whereas the depiction of Saint Francis of Assisi’s stigmata received an almost immediate pontifical approval and soon became a major theme in religious art, the depiction of Saint Catherine’s was prohibited – by a series of papal bulls issued between 1472 and 1478 (Vauchez, 1968: 611) – or disputed until the seventeenth century (Le Brun, 2001: 104). Historians agree that the proscription derives from the fierce competition between Dominicans and Franciscans. For the latter, acknowledging the reality of the Dominican saint’s stigmatization amounted to denying that God granted this privilege only to Saint Francis (Vauchez, 1968). However, for the historian Gabor Klaniczay, Catherine of Siena’s stigmata dispute also shows how difficult it was for theologians to allow for the possibility that ‘the divine favor of stigma may be granted to the “weaker sex”’ (Klaniczay, 2009: 276).

Although still a subject of controversy, suspicion, and even rejection, women’s stigmatization became over the centuries a recurring phenomenon in Catholicism. ¹³ At different times, it resulted in various discourses (literary, philosophical, theological, medical, etc.) indicative of particular political, religious, and social contexts. In the present case – that of a Lebanese twentieth-century stigmaticist – what causes embarrassement is not so much that a woman is crucified instead of Jesus. Rather, it is the fact that she embodies both the Savior and the Virgin: She bears the five wounds of Christ and repeats the famous question Jesus asked in Aramean: ‘Eli, Eli, lema sabaqthani’ (‘My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?’ ¹⁴ ), while screaming in despair like the Mother: ‘No! My son, my son. No!’

Conclusions: Interpretating a ritual

Catherine does not experience an intimate union with God. Her Passion is a public ritual many devotees participate in. The latter belong to various socio-economic backgrounds: whereas many live in Nab’a, an extremely poor neighborhood on the outskirts of Beirut, others in contrast come from the richest areas of the capital. Furthermore, the gatherings are multidenominational: Armenians, Greek Orthodox, Syriacs, Maronites, and Greek Catholics flock to her living-room. The crowd of visitors grows larger year after year during insilâb. Their presence is indicative of a ‘sociological niche’ in Lebanon, conducive to the blooming of a mysticism oscillating between ordinary and extraordinary. In another context – in France, for instance, or elsewhere in the West – Catherine would undoubtedly be reduced to a ‘psychiatric case.’ As a social phenomenon, her stigmatization is open to sociological and religious interpretations.

First, it is symptomatic of the distress experienced by Lebanese society. In April 2011, a month after the start of the revolution in Syria, fear was at its height. The armed conflict had begun: it would inevitably impact on the Land of the Cedars. The fear was all the greater in the Maronite community given that it had been the main loser in the Lebanese civil war (1975–1990) and therefore remained deeply divided. For Catherine’s followers, her suffering and stigmatized body mirror the divisions and blows endured by the Lebanese ‘homeland’, which the Virgin/Catherine designates in her messages as her ‘second Son.’ Thus, the Passion Catherine re-presents ‘tells’ several stories: the sacrifice of God made man, the past war, and current situation of Lebanese Christians. It also hints at a future eschatological hope of reversal of the situation, renewal, and peace.

Moreover, Catherine’s stigmatization and the corresponding rituals reflect current changes in the Maronite Church, especially the definite rise of the Charismatic Renewal. Most of the divine messages the mystic delivers during her ecstasies come down to recommendations – ‘Pray, my children’, ‘Confess’, ‘Recite the rosary’, etc. – meant above all to reaffirm the central role of the Church and the importance of the sacraments. At the same time, they emphasize a ‘personal’ and ‘ethical’ religiosity, as well as constantly referring to the Holy Spirit, Satan, and the Virgin. The priests who visit her perform the laying-on of hands and practise the slaying by the spirit. They also invoke the power of Jesus’s blood during improvised exorcisms and healing prayers. These discourses and practices attest to the appeal of the Spiritual Awakening ideology within the Maronite community, although they do not identify with it – neither do Catherine or the clerks who accompany her claim to belong to a new community.

Finally, how should we interpret the image Catherine conveys, with the Virgin on the Cross, experiencing and sharing Christ’s suffering? In 1951, an unprecedented iconography of the Virgin appeared in the Netherlands. The image was made under the direction of a visionary, Ida Peerdeman (1905–1996). She saw the Virgin several times from 1945 onward. In her vision, the Mother of God appeared under a new title: ‘the Lady of all Nations.’ Her revelations were clearly eschatological: the Virgin announced that she would free the world and become the Mother of mankind. She mentioned a cross she had to bear and said: ‘My body was taken up into heaven, like my Son’s. And here I am, as an offering, before the Cross. For I suffered with my son, spiritually and even more in my body. This dogma will be highly disputed.’ (Laurentin and Sbalchiero, 2007: 82). The Virgin asked for a new dogma: ‘Mother Co-Redemptrix, Mediatrix, and Advocate’ (Laurentin and Sbalchiero, 2007: 82). Her various revelations laid the foundations for a new iconography that became quite widespread, especially in the 1980s and 1990s. This image shows a lone Virgin before the Cross. Christ’s body is absent, giving the impression that she has replaced him. Her hands radiate light rays onto the world and mankind, represented by a globe at her feet as well as by black and white sheep (Margry, 2009). For the lay and the priests who take part in the worship of ‘the Lady of all Nations’, the ‘radiation’ comes ‘from open wounds in her hand, which would imply that the Lady must also have had the stigmata, or even had also been crucified’ (Margry, 2009: 187).

The image and the theological program she proposed – a new and final Marian dogma, after the Mother of God (431), the Perpetual Virginity (649), the Immaculate Conception (1854), and the Assumption (1950) – caused a scandal within the Catholic Church (Margry, 2009: 187). A commission of inquiry issued an adverse opinion. The image was condemned. But the messages went on. Despite the Church’s disapproval, ‘elusive’ priests (Margry, 2009: 189) continued to associate with and support Ida Peerdeman. The appointment of Bishop Bomers at the head of the diocese of Haarlem in 1983 marked a turning point. The prelate regularly visited the visionary in secret and, convinced of the veracity of her revelations, took part in the devotions to ‘the Lady of all Nations.’ In 1995, moreover, the newly founded congregation of ‘the Family of Mary Co-Redemptrix’ was officially recognized by the Church. In 1996, a decree authorized public devotion to ‘the Lady of all Nations’ (Laurentin and Sbalchiero, 2007: 83). For the Dutch anthropologist Peter Jan Margry (2009), this was due to the fact that the image, despite its condemnation, succeeded in circulating within a global Marian network thanks to the internet.

I mentioned the Dutch apparitions because it seems that, to understand Catherine’s stigmatization, which re-presents both Jesus’s and the Virgin’s sufferings, we need to put it into the context of the debate on the fifth Marian dogma. It shows that the concept of the co-redemptrix Virgin, albeit still transgressive for the institution, has made its way into Catholic imaginary: it tends to impose itself not through a formalized doctrine, but through an image.

Catherine does not use the internet. She does not fit into the ‘Global Catholic visionarism’ described and criticized by Paolo Apolito (2003, 2005). But her followers do. Furthermore, Catherine conveys various kinds of iconographies: images are ‘adopted’ by her; others are laid at the altar in her living-room for a few days; still others are given or sent to her, sometimes from afar. Among them is the image of ‘the Lady of all Nations.’