Catherine's Cafe Vocation Blog

Here at Sinsinawa, we have been in community meetings for the better part of a week. As is true with any group, while we may agree on many things, there are always points of dissonance. I think that on the whole, we often view dissonance as a negative thing and tend to avoid it, minimize it, or make it into a source of division (just think of our current political climate!). However, a recent conversation with sisters gave me an image that helps me understand dissonance in a whole new way. Some of the most beautiful pieces of music are those with chords that include a note of dissonance. While they’re more difficult to compose and perform, songs with tight chord clusters are so much more interesting than standard major chords. (Listen to one of my all-time favorite examples of this  here .) Can’t the same be true in our interactions with one another? Sure, there are times when dissonance is just plain ugly and painful, especially when our root values seem to collide. But...

This summer I had the opportunity to take a month off.  I traveled north by car.  This gave me the opportunity to pack some items for delivery to Sinsinawa and plan for several events and visits.  For the drive, I had intended to listen to lectures on spirituality and scripture but the changing scenery really captured my heart.  I drove in silence except with the GPS voice reminded me of my next route change or a car on the side of the road or even that police were spotted ahead. Driving through Kentucky there was a sign that caught my attention.  You know the digital signs set up to given instructions of a lane closure or other related notices.  What was recorded made me laugh (and to be cautious of other drivers):  “This Ain’t A Nascar Raceway!” I wanted to move that sign to Florida and plant it many places on I-95. The sign also made me think of the ways we sometimes go through life events at racing speeds and don’t take time to savor the...

One, among the many blessings of Dominican life, is our connections around the world and the ways social media keep us connected. Recently I was at Sinsinawa for a meeting but also invited Springfield IL (Beth) and Iraqi (Habiba) Dominican Sisters to visit.  Beth and I have traveled to Iraq to be with the Dominican Family there and Habiba was a welcoming host to us. Now she is on sabbatical learning English.  Habiba also spoke to the Sisters at the Mound about life in Iraq since ISIS swept across the Nineveh Plain on August 6, 2014.  I have frequent shared news with my Sisters but the opportunity to hear firsthand account was so important. During the visit, Habiba asked Beth and I how we became friends.  I told her, that while Beth and I knew each other, it was our first trip together to Iraq and Habiba’s community that led to our friendship.  I also shared that the days we had together at Sinsinawa deepened the friendship for the three of us.  The...

Earlier this month, Sr. Toni Harris. OP talked about involvement in the democratic election process in our country for the sake of the common good.   Since she wrote that blog entry, she and I and more than 200 Sisters gathered to exercise our voice and vote at our General Chapter.   Chapters like this one occur every 5 years as we Sisters consider our future, especially the next 5 years.    Then we elect a Prioress and Council to lead us in the direction we said we want to go. Since we held this Chapter at our motherhouse, we were well cared for, including our snack times.   Since Sinsinawa is in Wisconsin, it was fun to see cheese curds make an appearance one afternoon.   And we had choices of three flavors. Chapter days were filled with choices, “ flavorable ” conversations, decisions, directions and then elections. We asked Sr. Toni Harris, OP to be our Prioress for the next five years.   She said: “yes.” This summer will be the installa...

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...

Why are you reading this?   Perhaps our Sisters, whom you love, taught you in grammar school? Or you’re feeling a pull to religious life and are checking things out?   Or maybe you’re just curious?   Whatever the reason, you’re always welcome here! Truthfully, my mind was blank for this month’s offering.   I’m preparing for First Vows in less than a month and have been preoccupied with that and what comes next.   However, Pope Francis’s recent environmental encyclical, Laudato Si , led me to settle on our bees. Did you know that the Sinsinawa Dominicans kept bees as early as 1896, and possibly even earlier?   Or that beekeeping was reintroduced to the Mound a couple of years ago?   “Why”, you ask?   Bee-sides (sorry) being incredible architects and engineers, bees are responsible for pollinating over 80% of the food we eat.   Bees are dependent on plant pollen for food; plants are dependent upon bees for reproduction.   Quite a ...

This week some of us in initial formation had the opportunity to spend a week at the motherhouse of the Maryknoll Sisters of St. Dominic , a global missionary congregation based in New York.   It was an honor to spend a week with these women, especially because of the unique Sinsinawa connection: when the Maryknoll congregation was just beginning, sisters from Sinsinawa moved to New York to assist them in its foundation. I found myself drawn to photos of their foundress, Mother Mary Joseph: she has a jolly smile on her face in almost each one.   She was clearly a woman who valued a good laugh!   In describing qualities that should mark a Maryknoll Sister, she finished with “the saving grace of a kindly humor.” It’s easy to see the Sinsinawa connection in these words!   Humor and laughter are not only qualities that drew me to my sisters; they’re also important components of a healthy spiritual life.   They’re reflections of the deep joy that comes from ...

I am in the last four months of a year of full-time study.   I have been writing a thesis relating to the unaccompanied minors who have been crossing our southern borders.   As a Dominican, I have not and cannot just sit behind a desk to study.   Twice during this past year, I have traveled to the borderlands to understand in a deeper way what these young people experience.   During these trips, I have sat in court rooms, hiked into the desert to migrant trails, and spent days welcoming these newcomers at a social service center.   My study has also sent me to a nearby parish where these unaccompanied minors now live with family members.   I have interviewed service providers and organized focus groups with the minors themselves. For the Dominican women of Sinsinawa, study is a way of life.   It happens everywhere we are and everywhere we go.   What we learn is that the mystery of God is unfolding. Study is actually not meant to make us smart...