This Easter Friday morning, I found myself praying with this song – “And Jesus Said” by Tony Alonso. Here’s a little video prayer reflection I made a little while ago to this beautiful song.
And Jesus said
Don’t be afraid
I’ve come to turn your fear to hope
I’ve come to take you through the deep
To be your friend
Until the end
And give your troubled heart to sleep
I will never forget the first time I drove on to the property at St. Mary-on-the-Lake, the west coast regional center of the Sisters of St. Joseph of Peace. I had driven 3 hours from Portland to attend my first ever vocation retreat. While I had been in contact with the vocation director by email, I had not yet met any of the Sisters and was still a bit unsure about this whole becoming a Catholic Sister thing. Truth be told, I was more than a wee bit nervous.
And then I drove onto the property and was immediately calm and at peace. It was the trees. St. Mary’s is on a wooded property with beautiful tall cedars and evergreens. When I say tall, I mean tall. They tower over our three story residence buildings. They are majestic and strong. They provide shade and endless green. They make for a cozy peaceful spot. They speak to me of home.
This morning I arrived back at this sacred spot, flying to Seattle from New Jersey where I am living at our eastern regional center (also a beautiful spot to be sure – in its own way). We have our Spring Assembly here on the weekend. It is always good to spend time with our CSJP Sisters and Associates, whether in the East, the West, or the UK. One benefit of my new gig is that it is now part of my job to spend time with them. How lucky am I?
I have moved around quite a bit in the past decade since I entered the community, and I will be spending the next six years or so living in New Jersey. But the Pacific Northwest is home. It is the place where my being is most at peace. Several of the Sisters greeted me in the dining room earlier today, welcoming me home, even if just for a short visit. I was lucky enough to live here at St. Mary-on-the-Lake the year after the Novitiate, and this community was my home base while I was studying in Chicago. They would always welcome me home for holidays and vacations or just for a visit. It is good to have a place like that, where people and landscape make you feel at home.
Some of you may realize that the title of this blog post is a nod to one of my favorite poems, by Mary Oliver. I’ll end this post with her words, inspired by a different landscape but entirely transferable:
When I am among the trees,
especially the willows and the honey locust,
equally the beech, the oaks and the pines,
they give off such hints of gladness.
I would almost say that they save me, and daily.
I am so distant from the hope of myself,
in which I have goodness, and discernment,
and never hurry through the world
but walk slowly, and bow often.
Around me the trees stir in their leaves
and call out, “Stay awhile.”
The light flows from their branches.
And they call again, “It’s simple,” they say,
“and you too have come
into the world to do this, to go easy, to be filled
with light, and to shine.”
– Mary Oliver –
I’ve got a reflection for Triduum posted on our new CSJP Vocations Blog
The journey through Triduum is always a transformative one for me. Part of my love of the Triduum might be the fact that even though I was raised Catholic and went to 12 years of Catholic school, I never really experienced it until I came back to the Church as an adult in my 20s. My first Triduums were experienced as part of a parish faith community that took these days seriously and journeyed together in a meaningful way. In fact, when I reflect upon my own personal vocation discernment journey, I realize that Triduum played a key role.
Head over to www.csjpvocations.org to read more!
My latest column has been posted on Global Sisters Report, in which I reflect on religious life through the lens of Downton Abbey, specifically comparing being a younger catholic sister in elected leadership to the experience of Matthew Crawley being the heir to the Earl of Grantham.
“There I was, sitting in the chapel with my Sister housemates, when I found myself thinking: ‘It’s almost as if I’m Matthew Crawley.’ … I am grateful for my random Matthew Crawley thought because it has helped me to come to grips with some of the responsibility I feel for the future. If I am honest, at times it is a heavy weight on my shoulders, as I suspect it is heavy on the shoulders of many younger members. How can we possibly follow in the footsteps of the women who answered the call of Vatican II so fearlessly? … “
Today is the Feast of St. Joseph! Margaret Anna Cusack (Mother Francis Clare) chose St. Joseph as the patron of my religious community, the Sisters of St. Joseph of Peace, because he was a model of peace. In the words of our original 1884 Constitutions:
A few years ago I made this video prayer reflection for St. Joseph’s Day (complete with a rather funny typo). I invite you to spend some time today with Joseph, model of peace.
Happy St. Joseph’s Day!
As I prayed with today’s Scripture readings this morning, I was reminded of this video prayer reflection I created last summer as I was facing the possibility of major changes in my life. It is set to “If Not Now” by Tracy Chapman, a song that has had great meaning to me ever since I first heard it as a 16 year old (this album was constantly in the tape deck of my first car). It’s also a song with meaning that has grown for me over the years. Even now, in a new context, the meaning shifts and deepens.
I’m not quite sure why the story (John 4: 43-54) of the royal official who asked Jesus to heal his child made me think of this video prayer. Perhaps it had something to do with my suspicion that while the official did believe that Jesus could bring about healing, and he took the step to ask him to do so, he also wondered how it could be so.
So much in our life and in our world cries out for healing. In the words of Isaiah 65, may we too believe that God is about to create something new, something which will be the cause of great rejoicing and happiness.
Our job is to show up, here and now. The rest, my friends, is up to our loving and creating God.
Walking by I see
what I have seen
for days and days and weeks,
just white
snow and slush and ice.
Or
do I see what I expect
to see
and miss
the small
patch
of green.
Because it is there
it has been there all along
waiting to break free
of the snow and slush and ice
and proclaim the good news
of Spring.
It makes me wonder
What else do you think
I miss
because I do not
expect it to be there?
Periodically on Fridays I will share some words of wisdom from the founder of the Sisters of St. Joseph of Peace. Known in religion as Mother Francis Clare, Margaret Anna Cusack was a prolific writer in her day. She wrote lives of the saints, spiritual works, histories, and social reform. I find great inspiration in her life’s word and work. Here’s a little tidbit from her 1876 book, Advice to Irish Girls in America.
The world gives us the example of pride; our dear Saviour Jesus Christ gives us the example of humility. My children, we must take our choice, we must follow the example which the world gives us of pride, or the example which Jesus gives us of humility.
The Lenten Scripture readings can sometimes be hard to wrap your head around, and yet, on another level, they are so very simple. Trust in God. Serve. Forgive. Love. Be merciful just as God is merciful.
I find consolation in that the disciples also seemed to have a hard time wrapping their head around the message of Jesus.
Two cases in point …
In Sunday’s Gospel from Mark (9:2-10) we have Peter wanting to set up tents and stay on the mountaintop with Jesus, Elijah, and Moses, almost missing the point that this was a new moment. In the end it required a voice from the heavens to snap him out of it!
Today we have the story of the mother of James and John (Matthew 20: 17-28) asking that “these two sons of mine sit, one at your right and the other at your left, in your kingdom.” The sons also did not get it, thinking they were up for what was ahead without stopping to think of the level of sacrifice following Jesus might entail.
I imagine that Jesus must have been just a little bit frustrated when, once again, his friends just did not get it. But he rolled up his sleeves, sat down, and tried another way of teaching lessons in paradox. His way was not business as usual, but something new centered on God’s way of love, justice, and mercy.
“You know that the rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and the great ones make their authority over them felt. But it shall not be so among you. Rather, whoever wishes to be great among you shall be your servant; whoever wishes to be first among you shall be your slave. Just so, the Son of Man did not come to be served but to serve and to give his life as a ransom for many.”
It shall not be so among you ….
What are the ways that we are called to live the paradox of the Gospels today? In our families? Communities? Ministry?
What is is that I just don’t get? My prayer this morning is for my heart and mind to be opened to Jesus’ never ending lessons in paradox this Lent.
Periodically on Fridays I will share some words of wisdom from the founder of the Sisters of St. Joseph of Peace. Known in religion as Mother Francis Clare, Margaret Anna Cusack was a prolific writer and advocate for women and children. She was very attuned to the social realities and situation of oppressed people in her day.
Her contemporary experience was the Irish famine. The common folks were starving, and the young and able bodied (men and women) were being forced to emigrate to make money to keep their family alive back home. Margaret Anna, then Sister Francis Clare Cusack of the Poor Clare Convent in Kenmare, County Kerry, experienced this first hand. Her Sisters fed the poor in the area district, and she funded a famine relief fund for the people of Ireland through the sale of her books. As an example of her impact, here’s a tidbit from a letter to the editor of the Dublin Free Press by a Mr. J. Sullivan:
The poor, starving people have to depend almost entirely on the funds obtained by that lady for relief. She has disbursed within a very short period, very little short of $10,000, to the poor of that district …
Serving the poor in need was not enough for her. She asked questions as to why they were poor, and looked at the social structures that perpetuated (and created) the problem. In terms of trafficking, she also looked at the situation where young women especially were made vulnerable to victimization. She saw that they were being forced to emigrate to seek work, in factories or most often as domestic servants, and she was worried for their safety–spiritually as well as physically.
“How many girls are driven to a life which they abhor simply to get bread, the bread which is denied to them by those who squander on folly what is due to justice!”
“I knew that the only way out of their victimization was to help them become economically and intellectually independent.”
She reflected on what her faith taught her, and was motivated to do as much as she could for those who Jesus had loved so well … poor and starving people.
And she acted.
I wish with all my heart that our girls were not obliged to leave their own country; but since they will do so, it is a most urgent duty of charity, and it would undoubtedly be a public benefit both to America and Ireland, to help them prepare for their future lives.
She founded St Joseph’s Sisters of Peace in 1884. Her aim was to prepare young Irish women before they emigrated, giving them skills that would help them both to survive and support their families. She also opened homes for “working girls”– meaning simply girls that worked. These homes were places of safety, rest, and renewal. Really, if you look at it through the lens of what we know today about human trafficking, she was seeking to support vulnerable women and prevent them from being trafficked.
So, what does she have to say to us today about human trafficking? Based on her own response in her day, I think she would encourage us today :
In light of all this, I am very proud of something our CSJP Leadership Team did yesterday – we approved a statement in support of the End Modern Slavery Initiative Act of 2015, an important piece of bipartisan legislation recently introduced in Congress. We also joined in Shine a Light on Slavery Day, which is today, by taking a picture of our hands with red x’s marked on them to show our commitment to end slavery.
There is a social media campaign today as part of Shine a Light on Slavery Today. If you blog, tweet, or use Facebook, consider writing on the issue of modern slavery/human trafficking and add the hashtags #EndItMovement and #EndSlaveryAct.
At the Corner of Susan and St. Joseph 