Art ‘bypasses’ brain, ‘goes straight to the heart’

Michelle Benzinger is creative director of the Greenhouse Collective, a Catholic group that forms young adults, and co-host of the Abiding Together podcast. She is also author of Restore the Beauty, a prayer journal that accompanies the “Four Woman Doctors of the Church” Abiding Together series. She is a 2001 graduate of Franciscan University of Steubenville, is married with six children (including two adopted from Haiti), and lives in Pensacola, FL. 

She will speak at the Legatus Women’s Enclave, which will be held October 24-27 at The American Club in Kohler, WI, and includes a day-pilgrimage to the National Shrine of Our Lady of Champion. 

What will be your topic at the Enclave?

It is my goal to help the women who participate to learn to pray deeper, blending in experiential art activities. In their writings, both Pope St. John Paul II and Pope Benedict XVI discussed art and spirituality. 

Pope John Paul wrote, “Not all are called to be artists in the specific sense of the term. Yet, as Genesis has it, all men and women are entrusted with the task of crafting their own life: in a certain sense, they are to make of it a work of art, a masterpiece.” Pope Benedict said, “The only really effective apologia for Christianity comes down to two arguments, namely the saints the Church has produced and the art which has grown in her womb.”

We will be engaging in Ignatian spirituality meditations, and then instead of journaling, we will paint. Participants don’t have to have any technical artistic ability; we will use tools such as Q-tips and sponges and let the Holy Spirit work through our hearts. Art bypasses the brain and goes straight to the heart.

I’ve successfully engaged in this activity a few times, most recently with postulants for the Franciscan Friars of the Renewal. They were a little skeptical when we started, but it ended up being beautiful.

What sort of pictures do you draw?

We might draw our emotions, what it might look like to be in communion with the Trinity, or a scene from Scripture, such as something we read about with the Garden of Eden. Each part is layered: we set the scene, we consider what color and texture to use. Afterward, participants keep their pictures and can look back at them and remember the experience.

Who would benefit from participating?

Women who want to go deeper in their personal faith and walk with Jesus.

Your Abiding Together podcast has had 40 million downloads since you launched it five years ago and is among the top 50 Christian podcasts.  What is it about?

I join with two friends — Heather Khym, a wife and mother of three from Vancouver, Canada, and Sister Miriam James Heidland of the Society of Our Lady of the Most Holy Trinity — and we talk about Catholic spirituality, how we abide in the Lord, and how we live out in healing and wholeness our Catholic faith. We have real and vulnerable conversations and make harder theological concepts relatable. 

You had a “re-conversion” to Christ as a young adult and enrolled at Franciscan University of Steubenville.

Yes, I was living in the art and design world, going through the motions of being Catholic. However, at church I experienced other Catholic young adults having a personal relationship with the Lord. I became more zealous about my faith and hungry to learn more. I went to Franciscan and not only expanded my knowledge of the Church and her teachings, but I learned ways to pray better and be docile to the Holy Spirit, which I try to share with others.