Catherine's Cafe Vocation Blog

For decades, the Sinsinawa Dominicans have been engaged in becoming an anti-racist institution.   This work offers us the opportunity to daily assess our privileges and commit ourselves to deepen our awareness of how our very lives and the institutions in which we operate perpetuate those privileges.   Recently, in a citizenship class I offer on Thursday evenings for Spanish-speakers, a guest speaker who recently passed the citizenship test came to share her experiences of taking the exam.   When asked if the class had any questions for her, several persons asked almost simultaneously, “Did you experience a lot of racism?”   Despite all my years of working on becoming anti-racist, this question woke me up once again.   First of all, as a white woman, I would never have to think of that question.   Secondly, the lens through which I look at life, at my daily experiences, has been shaped by the color of my skin.   I am always grateful for my m...

Already this month, two have written about experiences of the Dominican Sisters Conference Convocation.   This was/is my plan as well. My perspective comes as part of the planning committee.   We began our work more than 2 years ago and as it took form and focus, I came to the event excited and hopeful that those gathered would experience a deepening of our Dominican life and mission across 18 congregations of Sisters. We prayed, studied, celebrated, reconnected to friends and made new ones, we acted as one voice around the issue of Climate Change and blessed four Sisters who will be attending the global conference in Paris later this on this issue.   We did this in the context that as part of the Order of Preachers our upcoming 800 th Jubilee Year calls us to continue the Holy Preaching begun by St. Dominican and the early women and men who joined him. As the days have unfolded since the convocation, I hear from attendees how the experience continues to stir th...