Around this time last year, I met with Damien to discuss a series of photographs he wanted to create in order to commemorate his father and grandfather, Patrick Weldon and Thomas Weldon (nat. December 19, 1919). The way in which he chose to do this was by visiting areas around Dublin in which soldiers from WWI and other battles fought were commemorated such as the Irish National War Memorial Gardens and St. Patricks Cathedral given both his father and his grandfather were soldiers themselves and much of their war memorabilia was kept and taken care of as a sort of tie to the people involved. A few months later, when Damien returned to Ireland from his home in San Francisco, we photographed the final series of photographs. Damien paired the final images with the writings of Henri Nouwen, “The Return of the Prodigal Son: A Meditation on Fathers, Brothers and Sons”. With his permission, I’m sharing the final piece:
In mem. Patrick Weldon et Thomas Weldon (nat. December 19, 1919).
Quis nos separabit a caritate Christi?
- Apostoli Ad Romanus Epistula Sancti Pauli VIII:XXXV
Photography Joanna O’Malley
Writing Henri Nouwen, “The Return of the Prodigal Son: A Meditation on Fathers, Brothers and Sons”
Photographed in Dublin, Ireland on May 31, the Feast Day of the Visitation of the Blessed Virgin Mary, 2019.
© 2019. All rights reserved.
This place has not always been there. I had always been aware of it as the source of grace. But I had not been able to enter it and truly live there.
The invitation is clear and unambiguous. To make my home where God had made his. This is the great spiritual challenge.
“The time has come to claim your true vocation - to be a father who can welcome his children home without asking any questions and without wanting anything from them in return. .. We need you to be a father who can claim for himself the authority of true compassion.”
I have come to know in a small way what it means to be a father who asks no questions, wanting only to welcome his children home.
In the context of a compassionate embrace, our brokenness may appear beautiful, but our brokenness has no other beauty but the beauty that comes from the compassion that surrounds it.
“Faith is the radical trust that home has always been there and always will be there.”
… the true voice of love is a very soft and gentle voice speaking to me in the most hidden places of my being. It is not a boisterous voice, forcing itself on me and demanding attention.
I am loved so much that I am free to leave home. The blessing is there from the beginning.
Without trust, I cannot let myself be found.
Generosity creates the family it believes in.
The grief is so deep because the heart is so pure.
It might sound strange to consider grief a way to compassion. But it is.
Our human brokenness can be acted out in many ways, but there is no offense, crime, or war that does not have its seeds in our own hearts.
And still, after a long life being a son, I know for sure that the true call is to become a father who only blesses in endless compassion, asking no questions, always giving and forgiving, never expecting anything in return.
Many thanks to Damien for allowing me to be apart of something quite personal and for allowing me to share it with the world.