Encountering Albacete

The 2023 New York Encounter featured a wonderful panel on Lorenzo Albacete’s latest book Cry of the Heart. Titled “You Cannot Love What Shocks You” (from a line in a Nathaniel Hawthorne short story), the panel featured writer Heather King, physician Anthony Lechich, and tech consultant Dan Bushman. Introduced by moderator Camil Martinez, the three panelists spoke movingly about the book, their memories of Lorenzo Albacete, and of their own experiences facing suffering.

Heather King began the panel by interweaving quotes from Cry of the Heart with reflections on how those insights were forged by Lorenzo Albacete’s struggles to care for his mother and younger brother, as relayed in the biographical essay that concludes the book. Even in her one, brief interaction with Lorenzo Albacete, King said that she was moved by her sense of “a total self-offering of his person, his gaze, his gestures, his presence, that only deepens with Cry of the Heart…”

Dr. Anthony Lechich first met Lorenzo Albacete when the priest came to him for treatment. A deeper friendship formed when Dr. Lechich was faced with his own medical crisis. “I must accompany you,” Monsignor Albacete told him over the phone. Dr. Lechich then reflected upon Albacete’s insights on co-suffering through his own experiences trying to care for severely ill patients, seeking “moments of connection” with those facing the “loss (of) function, cognition, agency, aspirations, and so much more.”

Finally, Dan Bushman spoke to the standing-room-only crowd about his memorable friendship with Albacete that began when Bushman moved to New York City as a college student. The first time he went to confession with Albacete, part of Bushman’s penance was to fetch him some “food from a street cart outside.” Bushman shared his own experiences as a leukemia patient and how he saw his diagnosis in a different light when the pandemic suddenly struck. “I was intrigued by this book,” he continued, “talking about how, while we all share in suffering, there is this universal suffering, it is the situation of man that each suffering is both common and universal, but also entirely and completely unique.”

THE SURPRISE EXHIBIT

Despite the publication date of this post, this is no April Fool’s joke—though we hope the Surprise Exhibit brought laughter and smiles to many.

Produced by the Albacete Forum for the 2022 New York Encounter, The Surprise Exhibit looked at our everyday experiences of surprise and what they tell us about ourselves and our relationship with reality. Combining original artwork with short videos, historical objects, quotes, and interactive experiences, the exhibit invited visitors to look at life’s surprises and to examine the ambivalent attitudes we commonly have toward the new and unforeseen. Several quotes from Lorenzo Albacete’s writings were interwoven with these riches and acted as an informal guide to the meaning of the exhibit.

The exhibit space was designed to be aesthetically enticing, airy, and provocative. One visitor described the experience of going through the Surprise Exhibit as “fun and strange, like walking through a weird murder-mystery.” In fact, the exhibit was a whodunnit of sorts—where do all of the surprises we experience come from and who gives them to us?

Everywhere there was something to catch the eye and take visitors by surprise—through beauty, or humor, or by an unexpected question. One benefit of this approach was that the exhibit could be experienced on multiple levels and by everyone, young or old. It was both family-friendly and intellectually challenging.

At one moment, you might open a box and be confronted by Big Foot (a favorite of young visitors)...

... while just around the corner, you might be invited to grapple with an Emily Dickinson poem...

The artist Adam Thompson contributed several cartoons to the exhibit that looked at surprise from his unique, comic sensibility. They were placed throughout the exhibit as we led visitors on a path that explored A) how the need for surprise is part of the structure of our brains, B) how we enjoy surprises so much that we try to surprise ourselves (although this usually disappoints us), and C) how reality keeps surprising us no matter what our attitudes or expectations are. Many of Adam’s cartoons have appeared in the New Yorker, but Adam also created an original, full-color cartoon to emphasize that last point.

This area also featured a display of sculpted panels that looked at historical examples of surprises—like the attack on Pearl Harbor, the day that John Lennon met Paul McCartney, the sudden appearance of a Mandarin duck in Central Park a few years ago, etc. Another panel spotlighted the Apollo 13 mission:

Those are just a few of the highlights, which also included the bizarre Ames Window that seems too move in impossible ways, a “Clickbait” box that showed how easily we can be manipulated online due to our yearning for novelty, and a tree with multicolored leaves alongside this quote from Chesterton’s Orthodoxy:

 Many visitors left the exhibit with a better understanding of what it means to be a “fairy-tale philosopher,” with a view of reality that is open to mystery and an attitude of wonder in front of the ordinary.

Near the end of the exhibit, there was a quote from Lorenzo Albacete, which laid out why the “jolt” produced by the unforeseen and surprising is critical to our human journey to truth.

Finally, visitors were left with a question:

Is surprise a false promise or a knock at my door?

In a world that has been constantly rocked by new strains of Covid, by sudden wars, by protests, by economic turmoil and millions of other surprises—good, bad, and enigmatic—we think that this is an important question we must each ask ourselves each and every day.

Our openness to reality and to our ultimate destiny may depend upon the answer we come up with.

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You may watch an interview with researcher Vincent K. M. Cheung here. The video was shown as part of the presentation of The Surprise Exhibit at the New York Encounter. Vincent studies how our brains process music and the role that surprise plays in this.

Meeting for Friendship Among Peoples 2021

Our friends at the Meeting for Friendship Among Peoples offer a preview of the 2021 edition. The theme will be “The Courage to Say I.” Stay tuned for more information about the presence of the Albacete Forum at the Meeting this summer!

The Albacete Forum YouTube Channel

The Albacete Forum is pleased to announce that we have a new YouTube channel. Subscribe today and receive alerts when we post new content—including archival interviews, videos of Forum events, and encounters with Lorenzo Albacete’s friends and fans. New content will appear weekly.

If you missed the New York Encounter presentation on The Relevance of the Stars, it can be viewed here.

A Letter to Monsignor Albacete from Dan Bushman

Our friend Dan Bushman has written the below letter to Monsignor, which we share with you. Please keep Dan and his family in your prayers!

Dearest Lorenzo,

I find you in my mind today. I spent the evening with your good friend Olivetta. As you know, my leukemia has come out of remission rapidly after my transplant. Olivetta reminded me of your recount of Christ to the apostles after his resurrection “don’t be afraid, it’s me”. It is easy for me to be sad in the time, as there is no medical path towards a cure, but it is hard to be afraid. Looking at my life, I see myself having be en plucked out of nothing, and pulled into this life of overwhelming beauty that I could not have imagined. Fully embraced, fully loved. I ask that you stay with me in this time, and I ask that you advocate for me and a cure. I am certain that there is a miracle coming (I have a preference for the type though!). Please pray for my family, there is much confusion and uncertainty.

Dan

THE ALBACETE FORUM AT 2019 NEW YORK ENCOUNTER

The Albacete Forum will have a table at the 2019 New York Encounter where you will find information about our work—and purchase a new book of Lorenzo Albacete’s writings, What is Christian in Christianity?

We are also co-sponsoring an exhibit at this year’s Encounter. Lost in the Cosmos: the Last Self-Help Exhibit looks back at one of Walker Percy’s most famous books and finds it as pertinent as ever to our current stranger-than-fiction reality. It is funny, thought-provoking, and moving—exactly what you would expect from the acolytes of “the mystical Monsignor!”

Please visit the Encounter, stop by our table to say hi, and take a ride to the 5th floor to view the exhibit!

www.newyorkencounter.org

Albacete and Fatherhood

We would like to share the beautiful witness given by our friend Camil Martinez during this year's New York Encounter. She speaks about her relationship with Msgr. Albacete. The panel was titled The Father: Who is He? Camil begins speaking at the 37:30 mark, but we suggest you watch the entire panel if you are able.

New York Encounter

If you are in the New York metropolitan area this weekend, we encourage you to visit the New York Encounter, an annual cultural celebration in the heart of Manhattan. And while you are there, stop by the Albacete Forum table!

Happy Thanksgiving!

We wish you a Happy Thanksgiving and a blessed beginning to your holiday season! As you digest your turkey and pumpkin pie, we offer some food for thought, "Thursday Thanks and Friday Frenzy" a short reflection by Msgr. Albacete on the way today's Americans celebrate Thanksgiving and the Friday that follows...

A Night to Celebrate and a dark Night of the Wallet

Last Friday we officially launched The Albacete Forum with a reception before Crossroads Cultural Center’s yearly Albacete Lecture. We want to thank Crossroads for welcoming us and all the friends who joined us to celebrate. The video of Fr. Julian Carron’s lecture is available to view online.

Tuesday, October 24 will mark the third anniversary of Lorenzo Albacete’s death. He will be remembered at the 12 noon Mass on Sunday, October 22 at St. Mary's Church, 440 Grand Street in Manhattan. All are invited to attend.

Finally, we must shamelessly plug our new appeal…

Yes, folks, it is indeed “the dark night of the wallet” here at The Albacete Forum. We need your help, so please consider making a donation. All contributions are tax deductible and will go toward helping us publish Monsignor Albacete’s writings, uncovering and archiving new material, and expanding the offerings on this magnificent website!  And while you are making your donation, we also invite you to leave a memory or tribute to Lorenzo Albacete that will appear on our new MEMORIES page starting on October 24. (If you don't know what a "dark night of the wallet" is, we suggest you check out the WORKS page!)

A Wedding Feast

We are thrilled to share the full text of a homily that Monsignor Albacete delivered on October 18, 1992 on the Parable of the Wedding Feast, which happens to be this Sunday's Gospel reading. Enjoy!

Also, Friday's Albacete Lecture at the Sheen Center, sponsored by Crossroads Cultural Center, is sold out. However, you can watch Fr. Julian Carron's talk via a live-stream.

The Determination Not to Give Up

The new week began in horrifying tragedy. Questions of "how" and "why" inevitably arose, as did the same familiar arguments about Americans' Constitutional rights and the need for gun control. Today we have posted three new Albacete writings that we believe can put us in a better frame of mind to face these questions together. As Monsignor says in one of the writings, "This determination not to give up in the search for truth is one of our main contributions to the dialogue."

We also want to point you to the AVSI campaign raising funds for hurricane victims in Puerto Rico. AVSI does amazing work and will put any contributions to good work.

Finally, our friend Flor told us about an exhibit at the Metropolitan Museum, "Cristóbal de Villalpando, Mexican Painter of the Baroque," featuring his amazing altarpieces and chapel paintings. I visited the exhibit yesterday and found it fascinating and moving. It only runs until October 15th, so see it while you have the chance! We hope to speak more about it soon.

The Quest Begins

“To dream the impossible dream... to fight the unbeatable foe... to bear with unbearable sorrow... to run where the brave dare not go!”

— from "The Impossible Dream," lyrics by Joe Darion

We are excited to announce the launch of The Albacete Forum, an initiative born from the love and gratitude we feel for our dear friend, Lorenzo Albacete—Catholic priest, theologian, columnist, and former scientist.  The Forum is our attempt to honor Monsignor's life and legacy as we "seek to keep his works in the public sphere and to promote his outlook and interests in the Church and wider world (...)." We encourage you to read our full Mission Statement.

As we approach the third anniversary of Monsignor's death, we risk losing his unique and essential contributions to Catholic thought and American culture if we do not act quickly to preserve them. An immediate priority for the Forum is to gather every scrap of Albacete material we can find—written works, audiovisual files, emails, photographs, etc.—and store them in our digital archive, where they will be regularly maintained and backed up.

This work has been underway for months, and although we have already collected hundreds of items, vast amounts of material remain undiscovered. Monsignor Albacete was a prolific writer and speaker. Who knows what treasures are still out there? The hunt is now on and we need your help. If you possess any original Albacete material or have a hunch where we might look, please contact us. There is no time to lose!

Our next concern is make these materials available to a wide audience. Through our online presence, in-person events, and the publication of Monsignor's writings, we hope to enable an encounter with the man and his thought. A collection of his essays on faith and culture is currently in preparation for expected publication in 2018. More volumes will follow, including our first ebook of Albacete material.

Over the next months, we will be constantly updating our website with excerpts from Monsignor's work, interviews with his colleagues and friends, and scholarly articles that engage his thought and outlook.

Other initiatives are also in the works—all informed by Albacete's own curiosity in front of reality, his passion for engaging with others, and his concern that everyone in the Church and our society feel welcome and valued. Check back here for more information in the days ahead.

As this adventure begins, we ask you to pray for our work and to consider making a donation. The Albacete Forum is a nonprofit organization. We can only succeed with the support of those who love and respect Monsignor Albacete and want to see his memory continue and his legacy live on!