Category Archives: Cloistered life

Cloistered life, Women's Communities

Magdala Apostolate – For Cloistered Women Religious Too!

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By Mother Mary Paschal, PCPA, Abbess

Several years ago, a friend of our community who is an integral member of the Magdala Apostolate venture, encouraged us to take the plunge and join in the classes they offered. A period of discernment ensued since an online forum of classes was so far outside our realm of lived experience in the cloister. Yet the opportunity for ongoing formation offered by Magdala answered a real need that was not being met in our studies and classes. For many an enclosed monastery, bringing in someone to teach the basics of theology or philosophy is a rare feat that is seldom realized.

Thus the Magdala Apostolate offers an ingenious gift to women religious around the world. Under the guidance from proficient clergy, scholars, and professors, the horizons and the heights of our Catholic Faith and Tradition are opened up for apostolic and contemplative religious. The courses on Scripture and the Liturgy have deepened our life of prayer and illuminated the mystery of Christ in which we are immersed every day. Philosophy and Theology classes have opened the door for many of our Sisters to search with greater understanding for the wisdom hidden in Christ. We have benefited greatly from the classes offered on Religious Life itself and have often learned much from the insights and questions asked by fellow Religious Sister-students.

It would be impossible to quantify the gift that Magdala Apostolate has made towards our human and spiritual formation over the past few years. It has struck us deeply how much those who give their time and resources to make this endeavor possible, believe in the importance of building up a solid formation program for women religious. Joining with fellow Sisters and teachers of the Faith each week, we experience the truth of St. Paul’s exhortation through Magdala: that their hearts may be encouraged as they are knit together in love, to have all the riches of assured understanding and the knowledge of God’s mystery, of Christ, in whom are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge (Col 2:3).

 Mother Mary Paschal, PCPA, Abbess
Poor Clares of Perpetual Adoration
Our Lady of the Angels Monastery
Hanceville, Alabama

The Magdala Apostolate is an outreach project of the Institute of Catholic Culture and is dedicated to providing sound doctrinal formation, both initial and ongoing, for women religious and novices, in accord with the Church’s call for a new evangelization.

Cloistered life

“Contemplative Nuns Speak For Themselves” from Where Peter Is

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On the website Where Peter Is, there is a recent article on the implementation of the guidelines/instructions contained within Vultum Dei Quaerere and Cor Orans.  In the article, called “Contemplative Nuns Speak for Themselves,”  they cite the Institute on Religious Life and the series of articles we have been doing on the same topic. The IRL articles have been written by our National Director, Fr. Thomas Nelson, O.Praem, as well as by the nuns themselves.  So far, we have heard from the Passionists and the Carmelites with the Poor Clares and the Visitation nuns yet to come.  To read the articles: go to the CloisteredLife.com website,  resources page (middle of page), and click on the VDQ CO articles.

As it says in the Where Peter Is article: “At the same time that Fr. Nelson was planning the IRL’s series of articles, a similar, but much smaller, initiative began in the shape of a new website, Seeking the Face of God. This is a website “About Contemplative Nuns By Contemplative Nuns.” It was established by our friend Sr. Gabriela of the Incarnation, OCD, a Carmelite nun and a regular contributor to Where Peter Is.”  This is another resource for VDQ CO information.

More from Where Peter Is:

On May 15, 2018, the Vatican announced the promulgation of Cor Orans, the document containing the directives for communities of contemplative nuns around the world. In the years that followed, few Catholic websites in the United States have given a platform for contemplative communities who want to follow the Vatican’s directives to share their perspectives. Where Peter Is has covered Cor Orans and has provided a window into how some of the subsequent issues and controversies have affected these communities. You can find our series of articles here.

 

 

Cloistered life, News, Women's Communities

Carmelite Monastery in San Rafael Officially Closes on March 1st

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On March 1, 2021, the Carmelite Monastery of the Mother of God in San Rafael, California, officially closed its doors after 55 years in Marin County.  The four remaining nuns were informed in May after a decree of closure was issued to the archdiocese by the Vatican’s Congregation for Institutes of Consecrated Life. The sisters range in age from 59-98, the oldest being Mother Dolores Sullivan, OCD, 98, one of the founding sisters of the monastery, founded from the Carmelite monastery in Carmel, California.

The monastery resides on 45 acres studded with 400 redwood trees worth millions of dollars, all planted by Sister Vanni, the last Prioress. But when you have so few sisters, she said, “you really have to look at your vitality.”

The monastery has a distinctive “eastern” look about and for good reason, the sisters were entrusted with a very special mission – to pray for Russia. Here is how this came about:

We have a special call from (Jesus Christ) and from Mary, His Mother, to pray for our own Archdiocese and also for Russia. We were founded in 1965 in answer to a summons from Our Lady of Fatima, received by our Foundress, Mother Miriam of the Trinity. Our Lady has asked for prayers for the conversion of Russia. Mother Miriam responded to that call as though addressed specifically to her, and for those who would join her in founding his Carmel.

After the fall of Communism, two of our Sisters went to Russia to found a small “Carmel” in Moscow. However, it was eventually discerned that our vocation is to pray for Russia within our Carmel here in the Archdiocese of San Francisco. Our former home in Moscow has since become the nucleus of a thriving Catholic parish, under the direction of the Divine Word Fathers. St. Olga’s Parish began there and now has expanded into a larger building nearby. There are already 350 parishioners who attend Catholic services there regularly.

It is obviously a very difficult and sad time for them and for the community who have loved and supported them. Two nuns will go to the Carmel of Mary Monastery in Wahpeton, North Dakota, and the remaining two will go the Carmelite Monastery of St. Therese in Clinton Township, Michigan.

We pray for the people of Marin County who are losing their beloved sisters, and we pray that the sisters will be blessed in and be a blessing to their new communities.

For more information:

https://catholic-sf.org/news/san-rafael-carmelites-to-resettle-in-separate-monasteries

https://catholic-sf.org/news/carmelites-pray-for-new-home-together

Cloistered life, News, Women's Communities

Dominican Nuns Launch First International Website

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Today, October 7th, the Nuns of the Order of Preachers, commonly known as the Dominican Nuns, launched their first international website: www.monialesop.org, in order to make their mission of prayer within the heart of the Order of Preachers better known.

St. Dominic de Guzman founded the Nuns of the Order in 1206, ten years before the friars were founded in 1216,  when nine women who were Catholic converts from the Cathar sect, gathered together at the Monastery of Notre Dame de Prouilhe in southern France. From the very beginning St. Dominic associated the contemplative nuns with the mission of the Order to preach the Gospel for the salvation of souls through their lives of prayer and penance.

Although each Dominican monastery is autonomous, the Dominican nuns are bound together by a common Rule and Constitutions and their profession of obedience to the Master of the Order of Preachers, which is unique among the contemplative orders of nuns.

The new website www.monialesop.org is in the three official languages of the Order of Preachers: English, French and Spanish. Readers can learn about the different elements that make up the contemplative life of the Nuns and the particular way the contemplative nuns participate in the preaching mission of the Order.

There is an interactive map where one can locate any monastery in the world. Links to individual monastery websites as well as contact information can easily be found.

There is a resource page featuring various articles about the nuns’ charism as well as back issues of Monialibus, the international bulletin of the nuns.

Although the Nuns of the Order were always listed on the main website of the Order of Preachers, the information was very difficult to find. Sr. Lioba Hill, OP, of the Monastery of Our Lady of Prouilhe, France, representative of the French monasteries on the International Commission of Nuns, proposed the idea of a website totally dedicated to the nuns.

Sr. Mary Magdalene, OP, Monastery of Our Lady of the Rosary, Summit, NJ, was commissioned to create the website. Despite the challenges of language, nuns from all over the world collaborated with Sr. Mary Magdalene making the website a fruit of sisterly communion on an international level.

There are approximately 2500 nuns in 190 monasteries in five continents of the world.

Contact: Sr. Mary Catharine Perry, OP
smc@summitdominicans.org

Cloistered life, News, Women's Communities

Dominican Nuns of the Perpetual Rosary of Buffalo Announce Relocation Plans

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August 15, 2020

Dear Friends,

This letter is long overdue, as so many of our friends and benefactors have expressed warm concern in hearing of the move of the Monastery of Our Lady of the Rosary from Buffalo. The community has been considering the possibility of a move for the last several years. Our location in the city, the serious maintenance demands of our building and a growing desire for a physical environment where we might live out the fullness of our Dominican contemplative life made it clear that remaining in our Doat Street location was unrealistic. At first it seemed impossible to relocate, in light of our strong ties to the Diocese, the devotion of many friends and benefactors, and our strong Chapter of the Lay Fraternity of St. Dominic. Gradually, however, the community began to feel called by the Holy Spirit to consider a move to a place in the United States lacking a contemplative monastery of nuns, in response to the call of Pope Francis for contemplative religious to recognize the cloistered life as a work of evangelization among the People of God. Since Buffalo has a vibrant community of Discalced Carmelite Nuns, we began to consider a move to another diocese in a different part of the country.

After much prayer and discussion, our community has decided to relocate to the Diocese of Columbus, Ohio. The bishop, Most Reverend Robert J. Brennan, has long desired to welcome a community of cloistered religious into the diocese.

Once the decision was made, matters developed rather quickly, particularly with the offer of purchase for our present building and property by the Buffalo Academy of Science Charter School, which plans to open a school at the location. This decision came as a shock to many of you, our dear friends. We must continue to impose on your patience and understanding, as current circumstances make it impossible for us to say a proper goodbye to you in the way we had hoped. We originally intended to celebrate a Thanksgiving Mass for all of you at the monastery on Doat Street, followed by a reception, but even now it is still not possible to arrange anything of this kind. We trust that in the future God will provide for this.

We hope to be fully moved to Columbus by the end of September. Our address will be: Sts. Peter and Paul Retreat Center, 2734 Seminary Rd SE, Newark, OH 43056-9339 and our telephone number is 740-928-4246.

Until early September, we continue to reside in temporary accommodation with the Sisters of St. Francis of Penance & Christian Charity in Stella Niagara, New York. We could not have found kinder and more gracious hosts than the Stella Franciscans, and we thank them for their hospitality and the blessing of the time we had with them.

It is not an exaggeration to say that it is with heavy hearts that we will leave Buffalo and our many friends who have known us over the years, even decades. We want you to know that wherever we are, the good people of Buffalo and Western New York will always be in our hearts and prayers. Words cannot express the gratitude we feel for your tremendous support, friendship, and generosity over the years.

With our heartfelt love and prayers,
Mother Mary Dominic and Sisters

Cloistered life, Women's Communities

A Remedy for a Plague: Sr. Anne Madeleine Rémusat & Devotion to the Sacred Heart

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During the years 1720-1721, an outbreak of the bubonic plague occurred in Marseilles, the largest French city on the Mediterranean Sea.  Sr. Anne Madeleine Rémusat, a Visitation nun and mystic, received a revelation that led to the end of this plague on humanity, sometimes called the Black Death.  Prayer and penance to the Sacred Heart of Jesus on her part and the cooperation of the diocesan Bishop, Henri de Belsunce, resulted in the cessation of this terrible trial.

While in adoration, Christ revealed to Sr. Anne-Madeleine that the plague would lead to the institution of the feast in honor of His Sacred Heart. Just a few days later, He made known to her the conditions. The message was immediately transmitted to Bishop de Belsunce who published an order establishing the Feast of the Sacred Heart in his diocese. On November 1, for the first time in the world, he solemnly consecrated the city and the Diocese to the Sacred Heart of Jesus.

In what historians call the appeasement, sufferers began to recover and the mortality rate fell dramatically. The brief outbreak in 1722 was the last appearance of the bubonic plague in Western Europe. However, a side note about that! The plague ceased for good when the bishop AND civil authorities walked in procession with a banner of the Sacred Heart.

Pray to the Sacred Heart of Jesus during this current worldwide health crisis! Consecrate yourself, your family, your parish, your diocese to Jesus. Dear Sacred Heart of Jesus, we place all our trust in you!

For more information about the Visitation Order, visit their website.

Cloistered life, Women's Communities

Letter from Cardinal Ouellet to the Poor Clares of Assisi

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Letter from Cardinal Marc Ouellet, Prefect of the Congregation for Bishops, to Mother Clare Agnese Acquadro, Abbess of the Protomonastery of the Poor Clares of Assisi.

Dear Mother Agnes, you phoned me about the coronavirus pandemic. It was the time when Pope Francis asked families in involuntary isolation that their hearts go beyond the home. Cor ad cor loquitur. We helped each other to respond in faith and you begged me to write a few words to your nuns.

I do this willingly out of friendship, but above all in the name of Jesus who one day called you to voluntary isolation out of love. Are you not blessed because you walk with Him to the heart of the pilgrim Church, opening your soul more and more to the secrets of His Heart? It is sometimes thought that you have fled the world to rejoice peacefully in God’s friendship. Current events free us from this partial vision. In fact, at a time when, despite the heroism of men and women working in health care, so many families suffer the illness and death of their loved ones in solitude, without being able to accompany them or give them the final farewell, you, contemplatives of the Crucified One, are at their bedside, you to whom the Spirit enlarges the heart to the most hidden frontiers of suffering humanity.

Dear Mother Agnes, the pandemic which confines us in our house is your hour, the hour of contemplative life which brings humanity and the Church back to God, to the essentials of faith, prayer and communion in the Spirit. You, brides of the immolated Lamb, bow maternally over those dying during the day and those struggling with despair during the night, and invoke on every pain and every death the consolation of Hope which does not disappoint. Your discreet and widespread presence, carried by the Breath of the Risen One and the fragrance of His nuptial Love, is a balm of tenderness and peace on the wounds of all brothers and sisters in humanity.

How is this possible? This question is asked by a generation paralyzed by the globalization of indifference and blinded by the cult of Mammon. Yet, in the great test of today, each conscience is questioned by this planetary arrest which resembles a universal Lent. The fear of uncontrollable contagion, the collapse of financial stock exchanges and social paralysis force us to open ourselves to more essential questions. One day, the Virgin of Nazareth, astonished by the Angel’s Annunciation, asked a question that was vital for the whole of humanity: How will this happen, since I know not man? The divine answer, unheard of, came down from heaven: The Holy Spirit will descend upon you and the power of the Most High will cover you with his shadow. This response inaugurates the last stage of God’s plan, his marriage to his creature in Jesus Christ, He who raises his created bride to the highest peaks of Love.

This dream was that of divine Wisdom at the origins of creation, when the Spirit hovered over the primordial waters, preparing the Garden of Eden for the happiness of the human family. The Lord created me as the beginning of his activity, before all his work, at the origin. When the abysses did not exist, I was generated (Pr 8:22,24). Wisdom was not at all upset by the madness of humanity, she was able to lead it back from its bewilderment with the madness of Jesus’ Love until death on the Cross. For this reason, God exalted him and gave him the name which is above all names, so that in his Name we too might share in the prerogatives of his creative and redeeming love.

Dear nuns and contemplative souls who guard the hope of our threatened land, the Love of the Redeemer who married you, this Love without frontiers and without limits in the freedom of the Spirit, allows you to fly high and far like messenger doves of Peace and Hope. The Love that has been charged with our sorrows and our errors, that was made sin in our favor (2 Cor 5:21) and that has overcome evil, death and Hell with its obedience, this immolated and victorious Love leads you with it in its race towards the most suffering victims of its mystical body.

Saint Teresa Benedicta of the Cross (Edith Stein), destined for the hell of Auschwitz, one day expressed it this way: Do you hear the moans of the wounded on the battlefields? Do you hear the rales of dying people’s agony? Do the moaning, thirst and pain of men move your heart? Do you wish to be near them, to help them, to comfort them and to heal their deepest wounds?

Embrace Christ. If you are united to him with the nuptial bond, his blood will flow in your veins, his blood that heals, redeems, sanctifies and saves. Joined to him you will be present in all places of pain and hope”. (Ave Crux, Spes unica, September 14, 1939).

In the days of that horrible tribulation, Etty Hillesum, another sacrificed Jew, in ecstasy by a joy wholly Christian because of a fascinating intimate discovery, tenderly held her God to help Him, because she felt Him wounded by an unspeakable hatred.

It is true that we are not all chosen souls, the weight of error weighs down our wings of compassion, but is not our contemplative life wrapped up in Mary’s immaculate offering, indissolubly united to the Easter sacrifice of her divine Son? What is the point, then, of mourning heavily for our sins? Let us forget our misery and have eyes only for this infinitely fruitful Covenant of which we bear joyful witness to the world. Because of the voluntary isolation of our souls hidden in the cracks of the rock, are we not the Church-Bride dedicated to the worship of the Bridegroom God, representing the whole of humanity, ardently awaiting his return like the sentinels of dawn?

Dear contemplatives of the Lord’s Passion, you find in this suffering of Love all humanity and all divinity united in one flesh. You are lovingly present to God and in God to all creation which He carries in His sovereign hand. In love, you move the stars, you move the mountains, you irrigate the earth with subterranean and purifying living waters, you turn the hearts of Angels and men towards peace in history, you embellish the Church with flowers and tasty fruits, in short, you cheer the Heart of the Holy Trinity with your resonant praise to the Glory of his Love.

Since you are in the front line of the Church in all the battles of the Spirit, we, priests and laity grappling with the urgent needs of the field hospital, lift our eyes to the light that shines on the Tabor of your cloisters. We stand in the plain supported by your listening to Jesus and your arms raised to heaven. Your life illuminates our life and makes us more alive from this divine Life to be given to the beggars of this world. Be blessed and thanked by Him whose intimacy fills every desire and even more so. Take care of us in your prayer, together with the Successor of Peter who implores you to assist him always and above all in this hour of the pandemic.

Dear Mother Agnes, in this unprecedented time of Lent and hope, I remain united and grateful to you for your call, glad of this deeper communion which rekindles our hope in the Risen Christ. Glory to God, Thanks be to you, Peace on this Earth in the midst of its tribulation!

 

Cloistered life, News, Women's Communities

Passionist Tri-Centennial Jubilee Icon

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This beautiful icon was commissioned by the Passionist Fathers as a part of the celebration of the 300th anniversary of the year their Founder, St. Paul of the Cross, received the charism to found their Congregation.

The figures in the main part of the triptych are Jesus, experiencing His death on the Cross, with the Blessed Virgin Mary on one side and St. Paul of the Cross on the other.  Saint Paul has his hand over his heart, where on the Passionist habit is depicted the beautiful “Passionist Sign” or emblem (pictured above Jesus).   Below the Cross is the devil, about to experience  his final defeat.

Tot he left and right are two angels carrying instruments of the Passion – the spear and the reed of hyssop. The Passionist saints on the left are St.  Gemma Galgani and Bl. Isadore de Loor. On the right are  St. Gabriel Possenti, with the skull, and Bl.  Dominic Barberi, who played such an instrumental role in the conversion of Bl. John Henry Cardinal Newman.

For a detailed description and for more information on the Jubilee celebrations, visit the Passionist nuns’ website (PassionistNuns.org)

I pray to a merciful God to console you in the great trials you are presently experiencing. However, don’t stop placing them all in the Most Holy Wounds of Jesus.  This will ease them for you.  Also place them under the mantle of Mary’s Sorrows. She will bathe and soothe your heart with her tears.  —St. Paul of the Cross

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Cloistered life, News, Women's Communities

Cistercian Sisters Monastery Campaign

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The Cistercian nuns of Our Lady of the Valley Monastery in Prairie du Sac, Wisconsin, are in the midst of a building campaign for a new monastery.  Arriving in 1957 from Germany to the newly formed Diocese of Madison, the sister currently live in what was intended to be temporary housing.  As you can see from the picture, the monastery, while quaint, it is not adequate for the 22 sisters currently residing there and has needed a lot of maintenance recently to keep it inhabitable.

As you can also see from the building plans, a monastery such as this rising up from the beautiful rolling hills of central Wisconsin will be a glorious reminder to all who pass by that there are women within who have dedicated their lives to prayer and penance for the Church and the world.

“Dwelling in the very heart of the Church, the Sisters offer their lives to God in a hidden oblation of self,” said Bishop Donald Hying of Madison. “We will never know this side of heaven the blessings and graces we have all received through the life and prayer of our beloved Cistercian nuns!”

The completed monastery complex will include a chapel for nuns and guests; quarters and parking for guests; living, working and other liturgical and ceremonial spaces for the nuns; an altar bread production building, garage and various outbuildings.

For more information, contact: Sister Bede, Valley of Our Lady, E11096 Yanke Drive, Prairie du Sac, WI, 53578 or email: nmfund@valleyofourlady.org.

 

 

Cloistered life, Eremitic Life

Pro Orantibus Resources Now Available Online

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On November 21 (the Memorial of the Presentation of the Virgin Mary in the Temple), the Church will celebrate World Day of Cloistered Life, an ecclesial event for all Catholics worldwide to commemorate the hidden lives of contemplative religious in cloisters and monasteries. On this day, the faithful are encouraged to reach out to the cloistered religious in their diocese, through prayer, encouragement, and material support.

We’ve put together some free, downloadable resources to help your community celebrate this event:

Some concrete ways to support cloistered communities are: participating in a novena and offering up Masses, writing notes of appreciation to contemplative communities, visiting them, and making a special point to teach families, religious education classes, youth groups, etc., about the tremendous value of the contemplative life.

Pope Francis has said, “It is a good opportunity to thank the Lord for the gift of so many people who, in monasteries and hermitages, dedicate themselves to God in prayer and silent work.”