In the Shadow of His Wings

Sponsa Christi July 7th, 2008

    Does anyone out there still think cloistered life is dull?  

Sharon, on this blessed feastday of St. Maria Goretti, we are pleased to admit you into our postulancy. Although Maria was not a Passionist religious, she lived in a Passionist parish, and our Passionist Fathers had a great deal to do with her canonization. So our Congregation has always claimed her as part of our great Passionist family.When looked at from the standards of our world today, St. Maria Goretti “did” nothing noteworthy. She was the child of a poor family, and her life was one of great simplicity and hard work. And so in her life the words of scripture come true: “Man sees what is on the surface, but God looks into the heart.”
     When God looked into the heart of this young girl, He saw delicate cooperation with grace. Indeed, Maria must have been very faithful to grace because when that great moment of decision came, Maria showed heroic fidelity—making a firm choice for God and rejecting sin with maturity of soul well beyond her years. Someone has written—the canonization of this girl who was not even 12 years old, was the triumph of a young soul who loved God and hated sin. God truly exalted her lowliness in raising such a one to sainthood in the Holy Catholic Church.
 
    And so, Sharon, as you enter the postulancy today, we place the simplicity, purity and heroic love of Maria Goretti before you as a model to imitate. May her tender love for Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament and for His Holy Mother, as well as her modesty, cheerful obedience and humility as she accepted the simple way of life that was God’s plan for her, encourage you to be very generous in responding wholeheartedly to the graces God has in store for you.
 
     The presence of so many Passionist missionaries here today as you begin your postulancy, is testimony that a hidden life with Mary beneath the cross of Jesus reaches far beyond the cloister to strengthen and sustain the missionary activity of the Church. The prayer and sacrifice of a cloistered Nun reaches around the world. It reaches Jamaica – to encourage and sustain these missionary brothers of ours.

     So, Sharon, we assure you of our love, assistance and prayers as you take your place in the school of Mary, Mother of the Passionist Congregation. In her company and imitating her, you will learn more and more how to devote yourself entirely to the Person and the work of her Son.

     We will bestow upon you now your postulant’s crucifix and give you the Sign of Peace. God bless you and your whole family, Sharon.

     With Mary, and with St. Maria Goretti and all our Passionist saints, may your life be something beautiful for God–a precious return of love to the One who first loved you and laid down His life on the cross for you.

 

• Future Nun ? , Life as a Passionist , Passionist Saints
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Sponsa Christi July 3rd, 2008

So what are you doing to celebrate the birth of our nation? 

     We normally have a gaudeamus day. But since the 4th this year falls on a Friday we will be having our regular Friday of Exposition of the Blessed Sacrament in the morning (a wonderful day to pray for our nation and the upcoming elections - God help us!) and a work afternoon with our Gaudeamus postponed to Saturday. We have a wonderful Liturgy of the Hours designed for this important day. We normally even put off some fireworks in the evening but since our dear missionaries are going to arrive ANY MOMENT (!) and our Sisters plus some volunteers will be busy working preparing their meals or cleaning up the next 13 days AND our postulant Sharon will be arriving Saturday evening to enter the monastery (!) we are going to bypass them this year. But fireworks are a lovely way to celebrate the birth of our beloved nation.

     About 10 years ago we purchased a set of videos from David Barton’s Wallbuilders. (Please check out the website!) We have watched them over and over again. On these videos he tells the TRUE story of what was meant by “the wall of separation between Church and State” - forbidding government from establishing a national religion - and how this has been redefined to mean freedom from religious expression in public since the ’50’s and how it especially played out in the 1963 court case of removing prayer from school. 

     On these videos he gives so much interesting info about how important the Christian faith was to the Fathers of our Nation. So many people say they were just Deists but that’s really not true. Many of them really knew Jesus in a personal way and were true Christians. Mr. Barton states how in George Washington’s Farewell Address he tells us what brought our Nation to success and what must be done to maintain it.  He stated that religion and morality are inseparable and indispensable to patriotism! True patriotism flows from the Gift of piety.

     In 1787 during the Constitutional Congress Benjamen Franklin stated that a nation needs God and prayer. And that Individual accountability takes place in eternity but that national accountability will take place in the present. Nations answer to God in the present through either disasters or blessings.  Mr. Barton has provided us with a wealth of truth about our Nation and its founding principles.  He states that “God’s people must be involved (in politics, education, etc.) to have God’s principles in our nation.” We have to get the truth out!  This would make a great segue to our nations upcoming elections and our need to get out and share with people about the need to vote, etc. but I’ll have to save that for another blog post!

~ Frances Scott Key

God bless each of you and may God bless America!

Click here for an historical 7 min. video about our national anthem - The Star Spangled Banner

• History , Life as a Passionist , patriotism
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Sponsa Christi June 30th, 2008

    Passionists the world over celebrate the Feast of the Precious Blood on July 1st. As you probably already know the entire month of July is devoted to the Precious Blood our Divine Spouse, shed for us in His most Sacred Passion. We have an entire Office for this Feast in our Passionist Liturgy of the Hours. The following is a quote from the apostolic letter Inde A Primis by Blessed John XXIII which is part of a larger excerpt used in the 2nd reading of the Office of Readings.

Since the value of the blood of the God-man, Jesus Christ, is infinite, and teh love which moved him to shed it is infinite, it is not only fitting but highly proper that all those born again in its salutary torrents pay it the homage of adoration and grateful love.

     As Passionists we also have a devotion called the Offerings of the Precious Blood. It is very similar to the prayers of the Chaplet of Divine Mercy…we are encouraged to make these offerings throughout the day and several times per week we pray this prayer communally with our arms extended.

 Offerings of the Precious Blood

    I encourage you to make this prayer as you go about your daily duties, offering to our loving Father the sacred Passion of His Son, extending the graces of the Holy Mass through out the day. And let us especially pray for our country as we near the upcoming elections. May our loving and compassion High Priest intercede before the Father for our Nation!

 P.S. Thanks to all who sent the lovely comments. I hope to answer some of the questions that have been asked regarding our Foundresses and also to share more info about our formation, the types of classes we take here in the monastery, etc. I’m still catching up from being out of the office! :)  

Happy Feast Day!

• Feast Days , Life as a Passionist , Liturgy
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Sponsa Christi June 27th, 2008

Mother Mary Agnes Roache (center) ~ Founding Superior of our monastery in this diocese of Owensboro, KY in 1946.

     Greetings fellow “dwellers in the shadow of His wings”!  I have been out of the vocation office for 2 1/2 weeks and therefore it has been quite some time since I posted. I pray you all are doing well and staying “cool” in His shadow during these warm summer months. By the way, if any of you wrote to my personal email address all emails that were in my account prior to my leaving and the ones that arrived while I was out of the office were all lost when we transferred to a new email account…so send it again!

     I have added 2 very inspiring poems of St. Paul of the Cross in the Poems section. Special love and gratitude to our dear Mother Mary Agnes (1896-1974) who translated these from the Italian. I hope to some day also share with you the history of our foundation in this diocese. We have some really good photos of those early years. (Special thanks to Shannon, our soon-to-be postulant, for typing these for me before she headed back to Houston to spend some precious time with family and friends - in fact, her friends just had a “bride of Christ” shower for her this past weekend. Is that a great idea or what?! She was able to give away some of her personal belongings and they generously provided many items on her list of things to bring.)

    Mother and several of our Sisters are busy getting ready for the arrival of nine Missionaries of the Immaculate Heart of Mary (Mission Society of Mandeville, Jamaica, West Indies) who will be arriving Wednesday and will be here for about 10 days. They will be making a retreat and also having their Community Elections. Please keep them in prayer. I know you want to learn more about them - just click their website that I have listed in our Links section. I hope to share more about them in the weeks to come.

   Until we meet again, may God be glorified in all we do, say and think. 

Most Sacred Heart of Jesus, have mercy on us!

Our Lady of Sorrows, pray for us!

• Future Nun ? , Life as a Passionist , Passionist History , Passionist Poetry , Saint Paul of the Cross
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Sponsa Christi June 5th, 2008

     Wow! Do I have a lot to share with you - this is going to be a long post…and hopefully this will be a nice treat for you our dear blog friends as ”Sponsa Christi” is going to be out of the blogosphere for 3 weeks.

    Before leaving the “blogosphere” I wanted to follow up on the promise I had made earlier of sharing with you about our aspirants.  Before coming for a live-in Shannon had just graduated from Texas A & M in December and was searching high and low for a job…”how does one use a B.A. in English when she doesn’t want to teach?”  Through the providence of God and she found our website and also met a Passionist priest - Fr. Cedric Pisegna - when he was giving a mission in Houston. This was the catalyst that put her in touch with us.  Once she got here, she fit in so well, that after prayer and reflection, we asked her to stay on for the aspirancy program to further discern her vocation.  She says there are many things that draw her to our community but the greatest is her “thirst for God”. Shannon loves to write poetry, she also paints and plays violin.

    Shannon leaves Friday to return home, spend time with her dear family and prepare to enter the postulancy. That’s correct! Both she and Sharon have been accepted to enter the postulancy in July. Please keep them in your prayers as they continue to seek and respond to God’s call in their lives. And keep their friends and families in prayer as well.

    Kirstine will be returning home after her 2 week live-in. She was a joy to have with us!  Keep her in prayer as she continues seek where our Lord is calling her to give herself wholly to Him.

Kirstine and others enjoy a rousing game of “monastery bowling”! And who said a nun’s life is dull???

    I hope to write again at the end of June. Let’s remain united in Jesus through Mary!

• Future Nun ? , Life as a Passionist
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Sponsa Christi June 1st, 2008

June is the month devoted to the Sacred Heart of Jesus

    I actually began this post on the eve of the great Solemnity of the Sacred Heart of Jesus last Friday but, you might be surprised at this…time for writing posts can be tight when one is following a monastic rhythm of prayer, work and other observances.  But, gratefully we have the whole month of June to celebrate the love of Jesus expressed through devotion to His Sacred Heart.

     Throughout our community’s history (we were founded from a monastery in the Scranton, PA diocese to this diocese of Owensboro, KY in 1946) this solemnity has held a special place in our hearts. Our dear Mother Mary Agnes Roche (founding Superior) started the tradition of each Sister receiving a “virtue” on this special day from the Heart of Jesus.  A beautifully decorated slip of paper with a scripture passage and quote from a saint is created for each Sister. These are then placed near the monstrance and each Sister goes forward to receive her word of love from her Divine Spouse.

     Our Founder considered devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus as primarily a debt of grateful love and also as a means of reparation for the humiliation and insults suffered by Our Lord in His Sacred Passion and in the Holy Eucharist. I will share below an example of his thoughts written in a letter of spiritual direction.

     I thought each of you would also enjoy receiving a “virtue”. This can be your special meditation during this month of June devoted to the Sacred Heart of Jesus.

      Come to me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me; for I am gentle and lowly in heart. And you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden light.       

~ Matthew 11:28-30 RSV Catholic Edition

     Never cease to abide in the most holy and most pure Heart of Jesus. Love Him through His own Heart. Be penetrated with sorrow as you reflect on the insults He receives in the Blessed Eucharist and make atonement for them by acts of humility, adoration, love, praise, thanksgiving, etc. …Realize your own nothingness more and more and let yourself be guided increasingly by the breath of love, according to the good pleasure of the Divine Majesty. Whoever shall make himself little shall be exalted. The more we annihilate ourselves, the more we shall be lifted up and ennobled. Such a soul will be brought more surely into this cenacle, this wine-cellar of the Beloved, this royal vestibule leading in the nuptial chamber where the spouse has loving converse with the Divine Bridegroom. All this, and infinitely more, is what it means to enter into the most amiable Heart of Jesus, in which the soul finds itself transformed and made divine and absorbed into the ocean of the Infinite Perfections of God.   

 ~ Saint Paul of the Cross

• Feast Days , Life as a Passionist , Saint Paul of the Cross
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Sponsa Christi June 1st, 2008

Three Vocation Directors! Msgr. Aaron Brodeski (NET ’91-’92) and Sr. Mary Emily ,O.P. (Kelly Knapp - NET ‘90-’91) - vocation director of the Dominican Sisters of St. Cecilia (Nashville) - greet Sr. John Mary on the day of her Perpetual Profession of Vows - September 13, 2003.  Click here to read more about that day.

     Heartfelt congratulations to Msgr. Aaron Brodeski, priest and vocation director of the Rockford, IL diocese. Today is his official installation as a “Monsignor”- a “Chaplain to His Holiness”. Monsignor and our Sister John Mary were teammates when they worked with the National Evangelization Teams (NET Ministries). Have you heard of NET? It is a Catholic ministry working with youth primarily in the US, Canada and Australia. Sister worked with NET in 1991-1992 and 1992-1993 and still enjoys sharing the memories, skits and lessons learned from those formative years. 

Sister John Mary in one of those crazy NET skits at a camp in the boondocks of north central Ontario, Canada

     Sister has been looking for an opportunity to promote NET on this blog for a couple months now and thought she would take this occasion to put in a good word!  She also sends greetings to all her former teammates and all NETters who read this blog.

     Msgr. Brodeski, our thoughts and prayers are with you as you receive this papal honor! And happy 10th anniversary of priestly ordination!

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Sponsa Christi May 29th, 2008

Greetings from the monastery!

Today I just have some odds & ends…

~ Does anyone know where I can find good photos of Pope Benedict XVI to use on this blog?

~ Don’t miss the new poems page that has been added - there are two subpages there - one focusing on the Passion of Christ and the other on the spousal relationship inherent in being consecrated to God.  I hope to add more in the near future.

Keep walking by faith!

• Life as a Passionist
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Sponsa Christi May 28th, 2008

I thought you might be interested in seeing what a typical day is like for the professed sisters in our monastery. 

(Daniela, perhaps this schedule will answer Mother’s Superiors question about our horarium?) 

5 a.m.  -  Rising bell (many of the Sisters rise before this)

5:15 a.m.  -  Contemplative Prayer in private or in Chapel

6 a.m.  -  Morning Prayer in monastery chapel (Lauds)

6:30 a.m.  -  Holy Mass followed by 15 minutes of private prayer and then Midmorning Prayer (Terce)

Breakfast

Tidy cell

Work/Class/Spiritual Reading

12 noon – Midday Prayer (Sext)

Dinner & dishes

Recreation

1:25 p.m. – Silence Time (free to exercise, read, rest, etc.)

Wednesday, Friday and Saturday - 2:45 p.m.  -  Midafternoon prayer (None) followed by the “Offerings of the Precious Blood” with arms extended for 6 minutes and the Mercy Chaplet

Monday, Tuesday, Thursday and Sunday - Silence time ends at 3:15

Work/Class/Study

4:30 p.m. - Rosary can be prayed communally at this time or in solitude.

5:00 p.m.  -  Exposition of the Blessed Sacrament & Evening Prayer (Vespers)

Followed by 1 hour of private contemplative prayer

Supper

Dishes

Recreation

8:00 p.m.  -  Office of Readings and Night Prayer (Matins & Compline)

9 p.m.  -  Great Silence

9:30 p.m.  -  Retire

·        During the year we have various days of retreat, Forty Hours devotions, Lectio Divina afternoons, etc when there is more time for prayer and study.

·        On Fridays we have exposition of the Blessed Sacrament all morning and are free from unnecessary work to spend time with our Eucharistic Lord in honor of His Sacred Passion.

·        On Sundays, certain feast days and Holy Days of Obligation there is extra time for prayer and recreation.

 Also, we have Gaudeamus days several times per year (Thanksgiving, Fourth of July, Mother Superior’s feast day etc.) when we are dispensed from silence all day and have more time for recreation: skits, games, fishing, hiking and just being together as sisters in the Lord!

• Life as a Passionist
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Sponsa Christi May 24th, 2008

    Greetings from the desert!  Us “Marys” had a powerful, grace-filled 8 days of solitude. Our Bridegroom is so generous - He gives one a glimpse beyond the “Shadowland” - by way of dark faith of course; a peek into “Aslan’s Country” as C.S. Lewis would say. God reward you* for all the prayers. 

    As we approach First Vespers of the Most Holy Body & Blood of Christ I wanted to let you know we are thinking and praying for each of you, for all your spiritual and temporal needs. I hope to be posting again within a couple days!  Please pray for our sister in the Lord - Kirstine -whose plane is landing about right now in Evansville, IN.  She will be with us for a couple weeks seeking to know the Lord’s will in her life.

     (Abby, glad to know you are back safe and sound!)

     *God reward you - monastic way of saying “thank you”.

• Life as a Passionist
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