Category Archives: Women’s Communities

News, Women's Communities

Last Titanic Story

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Sorry, one more Titanic story (written Lord David Alton) because it comes full circle to the first one I noted about Fr. Thomas Browne, SJ, who was on the Titanic but providentially left her before she set sail for New York.

The Titanic was operated by the White Star Line whose chairman was J. Bruce Ismay, one of only 710 survivors of over 1500 passengers (and a pariah for his presumed cowardice). His father’s partner in the business was William Imrie who since he was childless, adopted his niece Amy in 1872 and made her his heir.

After her conversion to Catholicism, Amy embarked on a Grand Tour of Europe. While in Assisi at the basilica of Santa Maria degli Angeli, she vowed to give her life to Christ as a Poor Clare. When Imrie died in 1907, a nun of poverty became an extremely wealthy woman.

Amy, known as Mother Mary Clare, used her money to build the stunning church of St Mary of the Angels in Liverpool, England. Mother Mary Clare said that, “Liverpool people will never be able to visit Rome, so I will bring Rome to them.” What a beautiful testimony to the power and purpose of our beautiful cathedrals and churches so often castigated as a waste of money. Her grand nephew said that his great aunt “deliberately located the church in what was, and still is, one of the poorest wards in England. Her dream was to enable those less fortunate than herself to be able to worship in a setting containing architecture and works of art that would stand comparison with the finest in Europe.”

The Church is now closed but is open to the faithful. This year an selection of photos taken of the Titanic by Fr Francis Browne, SJ, who was himself a periodic visitor to Liverpool will be exhibited this weekend.

News, Women's Communities

Vatican Calls For Reform of the LCWR

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“The Vatican Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (CDF) has called for reform of the Leadership Conference of Women Religious (LCWR) and named Archbishop Peter Sartain of Seattle as its archbishop delegate for the initiative.” This was the headline on Zenit today. The release highlighted “addresses given at LCWR assemblies (that) contained serious theological and doctrinal errors.”

Most of the IRL women religious belong to communities that are part of the Council of Major Superiors of Women Religious (CMSWR), the LCWR counterpart, that was founded in 1992 to promote religious life in the Unites States. The CMSWR seek to promote unity among Major Superiors, thus testifying to their union with the Church’s Magisterium and their love for the Vicar of Christ on earth. They also staunchly back the Bishops as they fight the assault on our religious liberty.

Let us pray that all faithful women religious may come together as one. The Church teaches that “the bishops have by divine institution taken the place of the apostles as pastors of the Church, in such wise that whoever listens to them is listening to Christ and whoever despises them despises Christ and him who sent Christ.” (CCC 862)

News, Women's Communities

Honk If You Love Nuns!

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During spring break this year instead of heading for Daytona Beach, 12 young women decided to participate in a “Nun Run,” a beautiful journey of faith which allowed them to see different communities and their apostolates up close and personal. All twelve students were from Benedictine College in Atchison, Kansas, whose 2 traveling minivans were decorated with the words: “BC Nun Run” and “Honk if you love nuns!”

Their journey took them to 5 IRL Affiliate Communities: the School Sisters of Christ the King; Marian Sisters; The Benedictine Sisters, Mary Queen of the Apostles; the Little Sisters of the Poor (see their write up on the 4 days spent there); and the Sisters of Saint Francis of the Holy Eucharist. The “run” ended at the IRL Midwest Meeting in Independence, MO, where Fr. Thomas Nelson, O.Praem., offered advice on the practical steps for vocational discernment in general and discerning a religious community in particular.

One young women said, “The breathtaking truth that is found in religious life was clearly felt and experienced. And it has helped me so much to grow as a person, to love others, to live and share my life with others. It has been great!”

 

News, Women's Communities

The Growing Norbertine Family

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The Sisters of the Canonry of the Bethlehem Priory of St. Joseph in Tehachapi, California, otherwise known as the Norbertine Canonesses are expanding! On March 30, 2012, a groundbreaking ceremony was held marking a new chapter in the life of this new community which was founded in 1997. The canonesses have grown from five members to 25 members,  ten of whom who are in final vows.

The old modular trailers are a “health hazard” and a new building will accommodate not only the nuns but also their artisan cheese, biscotti and jam production. The nuns also make priestly vestments and sell Christmas wreaths. Over 1000 were shipped last year!! Plan a retreat with them and stay at their guest house for a time of spiritual renewal.

The Norbertines were founded by St. Norbert on Christmas Day in 1121 in France. The canonesses in the spirit of St. Norbert sing the divine office seven times a day in community in both Latin and English. They are the first women Norbertines in the US.

Click here for the full story in the Tehachapi News. Zenit also had a wonderful story after their solemn possession in 2011.

Women's Communities

A Beautiful and Real Vocation Story

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Annie Stuhlsatz, now Sr. Mary Lucia, unexpectedly heard the first stirrings of a vocation call when she attended a retreat one summer while in high school and the priest asked those who were interested in religious life or the priesthood to come forward.  She was shocked and “terrified” that she felt strongly motivated to come forward. However, she didn’t know any sisters or what religious life was like so, “I didn’t move.” But when she stayed at convents and monasteries on a journey east, she discovered that “Sisters are real, and they’re kind of fun.”

When she visited a  convent in Wichita, right close to home, she thought, “Why not here?” Now she is a novice with the Sisters of the Immaculate Heart of Mary, an IRL Affiliate Community, along with two other novices. Before religious life she was searching and lost but now she says she has joy and contentment and peace. Her mother says, “She’s so happy, so beaming, so much at peace….We’re very proud of her.”

Read the full story in the Wichita Eagle.

Women's Communities

Vocations Up North

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It is encouraging to see that the faith is alive and well in Canada from whence you hear so many stories about the decline of the Church.

On the Feast of the Annunciation, March 26th this year, 4 women professed vows  and 5 women were established as members of a new community in Ottawa called the Queenship of Mary.  The ceremony was held at the beautiful Notre Dame Cathedral Basilica where they received their habits and new religious names.

 

Cloistered life, Women's Communities

You Shall Run and Not Grow Weary

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On March 10, 2012, the Poor Clares of Perpetual Adoration in Tonopah, Arizona, an IRL Affiliate Community, held their 3rd Annual Nun Run to raise funds to continue the building Our Lady of Solitude Monastery. Previous runs allowed them to complete for the most part their chapel. Current funds will be used for the monastery enclosure walls.

The run attracted 1,135 runners and walkers and “shadow” participants from around the world, including Rome and Zambia. Runners wore shirts with this year’s motto from Isaiah 40:31: “You Shall Run and Not Grow Weary.”

The nuns, the first contemplative order in the Phoenix diocese, arrived in 2005. Eucharistic Adoration is their apostolate, for as their Foundress, Mother Marie of St. Claire, once said: “We are adorers of the Most Blessed Sacrament and the purpose of our adoration is thanksgiving.”  Essentially, they begin to do on earth what every blessed soul will do for all eternity:  praise, adore, and offer thanksgiving to our God.

For the complete article, visit the National Catholic Register website.

Cloistered life, Women's Communities

Traverse City Carmelites Chapel Renovation

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The Carmelite Nuns of Traverse City, Michigan, will soon have a renovated chapel, one that will be “more beautiful so the mind is lifted up to heaven.” For almost 50 years, the nuns have lived on their 60-acres of property worshiping and praying in a chapel  that “has some very beautiful elements, but we thought it would be difficult if not impossible to give it a more traditional and transcendent look due to its structure and small size.”

Then they were introduced to the work of architect Duncan Stroik whose recent commissions have included the Shrine of Our Lady of Guadalupe in La Crosse, WI, and the  Chapel of St. Thomas Aquinas College in Santa Paula, CA. A professor of architecture at the University of Notre Dame, he authored the book Reconquering Sacred Space and is editor of the professional journal Sacred Architecture.

The Carmeltes small chapel would seem to be small potatoes for a man of his renown but he is excited about the project. “The sisters have a great love of beauty, of the liturgy and of tradition, and want to do something worthy of Christ. The fascinating part of the project is the sisters’ desire that the sanctuary be designed to be beautiful and inspiring from the nave as well as from their cloister chapel.”

Bishop Bernard Hebda of the Diocese of Gaylord is an enthusiastic supporter of the project. “My deepest hope is that these sisters may soon offer their praise and prayers in a setting that reflects the best of Catholic theology and the deep reverence and beauty of their personal faith,” he wrote. “At a moment when Pope Benedict has invited the Church in the English-speaking world to renew its appreciation for the Mass, and as we actively embrace a new Roman Missal which restores some of the richness of our traditions, the timing is perfect for construction of a new sanctuary within the Carmelite monastery chapel.”

For more information about the renovation project, contact chapelrenovation@charter.net

To be WOWed and I mean WOW by Duncan Stroik’s other works, visit his website.

News, Women's Communities

Visitation Nuns 400th Anniversary Pilgrimage

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Revolutions come and go, and today’s social milieu will change with the wind, but for four hundred years a group of nuns have born witness to the merciful heart of Jesus through their lives of gentleness and humility.

The Order of the Visitation of Holy Mary, founded in 1610 in France, has grown to a worldwide congregation of active and cloistered sisters, and today they can be found in nearly every country. The cloistered Visitation nuns from Toledo, Ohio, recently made a pilgrimage to Annecy, France, where the congregation was founded, to celebrate the 400th anniversary of their founding.

A new video made for the occasion captures the spirit of the Visitation and chronicles the happy excursions of the sisters in the areas once walked by their founders, St. Francis de Sales and St. Jane de Chantal. The video opens with a beautiful panorama of the valley surrounding Annecy.

Delighted to See the Nuns

“We walked everywhere,” the sisters said. “Going to the basilica was always ‘up’ and a steep climb. It allowed us to meet the people who seem delighted to see this large group of nuns, and were all smiles.”

Join the sisters as they journey the next 400 years as they walk in the footsteps of St. Francis de Sales and St. Jane Frances de Chantal. The video capturing the spirit of the pilgrimage was released on January 2, 2012, and has received more than 2,500 views.

Saints, Women's Communities

Poor Clares – 800th Anniverary Celebration

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Today, March 18, 2012, Poor Clares from all over the world are celebrating the 800th anniversary of the religious consecration of their Mother and Foundress, Saint Clare. On the night of Palm Sunday, 1212, Clare left her home and all of her belongings to follow Christ’s call to a life of prayer, penance and poverty.

Saint Clare was born in Assisi, Italy, in about 1194 into a family of knights and nobles. At the age of eighteen, Clare became the first female follower of Saint Francis and later the first woman in Church history to write a Rule.  Because she remained for 40 years “rooted” in one place, she liked to call herself the Little Plant of St. Francis.

Today, there are over 20,000 Poor Clares and Poor Clare Colettine Nuns around the world.

The Poor Clare Nuns of Belleville, Illinois, have put together a beautiful reflection on the life of Saint Clare as expressed by our Holy Father, Pope John Paul II. We thank God for the gift of the Poor Clares; lives hidden yet shining brightly for all the world.