In the Shadow of His Wings

Sponsa Christi August 16th, 2012

Summer days are almost gone…along with many of you, this summer has been unusual with the triple-digit weather and lack of rain.

This summer brought us a large track hoe to dig out the sides of our lake which was becoming quite the weed-bed. So now we have huge piles of clay in our woods where they dumped the lake mud. It was a messy job; grass seed will definitely need to be sown in the fall.

Sisters watch the track hoe at its first day on the job.

Independence Day brought us a Gaudeamus Day  – a free day with time to relax and enjoy one another’s company. With the terrible drought we skipped the fireworks. This was the final day of the Fortnight for Freedom.

Grilling out on Independence Day. Delicious! But those barbecued grills were tough to clean!

Braving the heat on Independence Day—after a water balloon toss! The Lord sent a nice cloud cover and we enjoyed a game of croquet before Vespers.

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Today we had a Passionist Renewal morning led by our Msgr Powers. He has gradually been leading us through our Holy Founder’s letters to Mother Mary Crucified. This was letter #7. Msgr likes to pull words out of the letter and go very deeply into them.  He himself is a poet and mystic and keeps busy giving retreats and days of recollection and spiritual direction.

In today’s letter St. Paul of the Cross told Mother Mary Crucified (the Superior of the first Passionist Nuns, she was a Benedictine for many years, waiting the foundation of the Passionist Nuns) that he so desired her to be clothed as he was in the Holy Passion of Jesus Christ. Ah…he waxed eloquent on the holy habit for about an hour…one point he brought out is how we are clothed in the Passion of Christ, clothed in Jesus’ greatest act of love clothed in a spousal garment. This is the reason we wear black…to symbolize the love of Jesus crucified.  Our Passionist emblem – that the Passion of Christ would be ever in our hearts…not only his physical sufferings but the love, the virtues that motivated our Lord to endure all he did for our redemption, our sanctification – that this would be ever in our hearts!  Then we had a 45 min prayer period and then discussion time.  Truly, Passionists are “robed in salvation!”

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I just read in our Holy Cross Province Newsletter of our Passionist men that tomorrow, August 17, four men will be vested in the Passionist habit and enter the novitiate! Alleluia!  I don’t have any other details but please keep them in your prayers.

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Next Wednesday will bring our Gaudeamus Day in honor of Sr. Mary Elizabeth’s Golden Jubilee. Which reminds me that I only have 5 days to finish my card for her.  You see, each Sister creates some kind of card for Silver or Golden Jubilarians….recycled cards, computer cards…whatever a Sister can come up with!  I must get busy…

Next week’s post should bring to you all the goings on that have been thus far worked on in secret for Sr. Mary Elizabeth’s day!

Ta ta!

Tags: Gaudeamus Days, Letters of St Paul of the Cross, Mother Mary Crucified, Msgr Bernard Powers, Passionist News, Religious Habit

• Catholic Vocations for Women , Cloistered Life , Passion of Jesus , Passion Sign , Passionist Life , Passionist Spirituality
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Sponsa Christi March 16th, 2012

Last month I shared with you a bit about the life of an aspirant in our community. (In case you have forgotten our monastic terminology – an aspirant is a woman who lives in the monastery for 3 months to discern our way of life.)

I forgot to mention that a special point in this stage of discernment is the reception of the small Passion sign pin at the beginning of her aspirancy.

Mother Catherine Marie places this pin near the Tabernacle, asking for our Lord’s blessing upon our aspirant. During Vespers she takes the pin and gives it to the novice directress to pin it on the aspirant, asking our Lord to bless her and that if it be his will one day she receive the large Passion sign of a professed Passionist Nun.

If the woman is so blessed to enter the monastery she will continue to wear the passion sign pin along with a crucifix.

In the Sourcebook on St. Paul of the Cross by Fr. Jude Mead, CP, Fr. Jude gives this explanation of the Passion sign:

Among the intellectual visions that preceded the foundation of the Congregation of the Passion, St. Paul of the Cross received one of the “sign” or emblem: a white heart, surmounted by a cross, bearing the title of the Passion of Jesus Christ. It was formed in his mind in successive phases: first the Cross and the name of Jesus, then the rest. He always considered it as a sublime gift that came to him through the hand of the angels, and he referred to it as holy, most holy and the terror of Hell, the sign of salvation.

The signs worn by the saint himself had a special, even miraculous power. He had no difficulty in giving away those signs which he no longer wore…

The seal of the whole Congregation is composed of this sign, which he had encircled with the devices of victory and peace: the palm and the olive branch. It is a compendium of his charism.

St. Paul himself explained the white color of the heart as meaning that the heart which had the Passion imprinted on it ought to be pure. He further affirmed that this public and visible glorification of the Passion caused all Hell to tremble in a special way…

Please keep up those prayers for Anne during this important time. We recently admitted another young woman to the aspirancy – praise the Lord! She hopes to come this summer after graduating from college. Please pray for these two and for the other two women who hope to visit us this spring.

Tags: Stages in Formation

• Catholic Vocations for Women , Monastery traditions , Passion Sign , Passionist Spirituality , Passionist Vocations for Women , Saint Paul of the Cross , Vocation Discernment
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