Jubilee

This weekend we are celebrating our Sister Jubilarians and their many years of faithfully living the vows of chastity, poverty and obedience. There is a record turn out of people to celebrate with us this year filling our Motherhouse chapel to the rafters from Evening Prayer II last evening to Morning Prayer today. The Eucharist will be at 2:00 pm this afternoon in St. Joseph's Church. We are hoping that everyone will fit! We have been practicing the harmony parts. I'm singing Alto, which I haven't done for some time but my voice seems comfortable there. The Descant group had the most stringent work out! I'm very glad not to have to hit some of those notes and sustain them. More power to them! May God bless them with good lungs and rich tongues. We have quite a powerful repertoire lined up. Our new choral director has a great sense of humor but notices every little too sharp note and too stretched e. I love singing with my sisters. It is one of the parts of our life that unites us as a family if we don't get too concerned about perfectionism and our own self pride. A song sung well is joy indeed! May it be so today.

Jubilee 2010

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Website and Facebook

I've been building websites, updating profiles, trouble-shooting issues with domain conflicts and making improvements to some of the sites that have been entrusted to me. Facebook seems to be building to a crescendo but I'm not sure where its all leading. It does seem to be a good way to get the people who might be interested in certain sites and causes together though. I've been adding about 100 friends a day to our congregational site and am trying to do the same for listening journal, substantially catholic and the mariological society. Managing several Catholic and Christian blogs, twitter, facebook pages and websites is just a part-time work for me and most gratis. Every now and then I just take a day to update everything. Today was the day for that. Has anyone else noticed that there is a lot of cyber junk out there. One day we will have to have a whole new field of cyber sanitizers to go out and retrieve all the junk in cyberspace and clear the way. Whenever you Google something you run into old sites that are no longer maintained or bogus sites that look something like the one you really want. Some of our sites have look alikes that are not at all the right site to go to. I wonder what can be done about that!

St. Mary's Graduation

On Saturday I attended the graduation of some of my "spiritual companions" from St. Mary's college. There were graduates who have volunteered with us in our schools and some who keep in touch through spiritual direction, young adult retreats and discernment days here at the Motherhouse. The keynote address spoke of making the journey from being a daughter of migrant farm worker in the fields in California to being a successful lobbiest for labor rights in the tradition of Cesar Chavez. Some found her message to be too political...it was definitely leftward leaning....but she spoke her truth with conviction and resolution. She is an alumna of the college and a member of one of the first co-ed graduating classes. We should all strive to be beyond politics by being magnanimous enough to find inspiration and wisdom in the words of anyone speaking their truth with love and conviction...even if their views come from a part of the the political spectrum different from our own. While I understand why Republicans in the audience might have been offended by her clearly Democratic message, I think there was no cause to take offense. Both her personal story and her position statements are authentic truths that need telling. I am an independent voter who tries to listen with an open heart to messages conveyed by all parties in an election year. Unfortunately, most political speakers ring hollow or are weighed down by self-serving concerns. Some are downright bitter and spiteful. It was good to hear a speech that was free of that kind of political jockeying. It was passionate and heartfelt and grounded in the speaker's own lived experience...an experience which is very different from my own. I hope her words motivated the students present to have the courage to speak out that same way themselves one day even though some might not "have ears to hear it."

Mariological Society of America

At our annual meeting we heard presentations from doctoral candidates and theologians on the theme of Mary in Scripture since Vatican II. I had the pleasure of introducing Dr. Robert Fastiggi who presented a paper on the use of the "sensus plenior" in the Mariology of Pope John Paul II. Sensus Plenior is a term made popular by the late Raymond Brown. It means the fuller sense, or the sense intended by God. In this usage it is a deep understanding that goes beyond the intellect to a true knowing with the heart, mind, body and soul. The society gives collegial critique of the papers and publishes some of them in a peer reviewed journal, Marian Studies. We were impressed with the scholarship of this year's presentations by doctoral candidates and theologians. It was a great delight to see 40 or more diocesan seminarians studying for the priesthood. What a sign of promise for our Church. After the meeting we went on a pilgrimage to the Montfort Missionaries shrine to Our Lady of the Island overlooking the Long Island Sound. Pictures from the event are in the smilebox below. To find out more go to mariologicalsociety.com

Marilogical Society of America 2010

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The Merry Merry Month of May

The weekends in May are always full of end of the year celebrations at our schools and at our Motherhouse. This weekend I attended a fund raiser for inner city schools at Golden Gates Fields and a sister who entered the convent with me, Sister Elizabeth Lee of South Korea graduated from Holy Names University. It is such an inspiration to an arena of excited new Baccalaureates full of energetic hope and proud conviction that they will make a difference and change the world. My prayers this month are filled with exhortations that God will look kindly on those who are just starting out in new careers, trying to build life experiences in places they have only read and dreamed about. The more somber economic picture makes this exciting time so much more of a challenge. I am mindful too of the scors of people with years of experience who are trying to start over later in life. Surely, God's hand is at work in this making all things new. I feel passionate confidence in the Love and Truth that sets us free even when the way is most unclear to us. As the May flowers burst forth from their tender enclosures, may God bring to fruition the bright dreams of all who hope for a better world and brighter future.

Photos from our Fundraiser for Inner City Schools at Golden Gate Fields

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Albert Einstein

My quote of the day from Albert Einstein says, "Anyone who has never made a mistake has never tried anything new." This new technology is teaching me to experiment and be more open with our communication. Yes, it can all go awry very quickly...but I see that it has the potential to build human harmony and accord very quickly as well. As long as I can keep a positive outlook and let myself make little mistakes and learn from them, then I can really enjoy the new openness and connectivity it offers. I want to share this new learning with you, and invite your comments and questions, but I'm a little afraid of what might happen. My guiding rules are to keep it honest...no phonies allowed! and upbeat... no rampant negativity! and interesting ... try to say something you wouldn't mind listening to yourself. I started out on a couple of other blogs that were going to be generic. But it was hard for me to summon up much interest in being generic, so I've decided to just be myself. The point of this blog is share with you a day in the life of a Dominican Sister. I started out with a post about my favorite day this year. I'll keep you posted on interesting things that happen to me as the year goes on. So you can learn what life is like for me, just one of over 25,600 women who are members of the worldwide Order of Preachers.

Blessing of the Lambs

In 2010 I went on a pilgrimage "Walking in the Footsteps of the Early Christians" as a Spiritual Companion to students from St. Mary's College of California. On the feast of St. Agnes we visited the Church of Sant' Agnese. Two white lambs were brought into the Church in a large basket decorated with red roses. They were blessed before the assembly and taken back to be taken care of by the Sisters there. These lambs will later be shorn to make the pallium, a white stole given to the Bishops installed in the coming year. I love the story of St. Agnes and the devotion the Roman people have to her. It is a story of innocence and courage in the face of injustice. Lambs are such a perfect symbol for that!