Catherine's Cafe Vocation Blog

Preparing to leave water in the desert for travelers   How do we live today as citizens of our global village?  How do our decisions and choices create or hinder a future for others?  Some of our state governments have decided that our newly arrived brothers and sisters can be treated like chattel and loaded on buses or planes to be dropped off in cities all over the country.       What are Dominicans called to do when we witness injustice?     Can we use our voices to bring the oppressive practices to light, such as writing editorials to local papers or joining GET OUT THE VOTE campaigns?     Can we join with others to eliminate suffering?     Can we offer time and energy as volunteers at respite sites?     How will this suffering of our brothers and sisters enter into our prayer?     We have a line in our Constitution:   “Present to God’s people whose hopes and sufferings are our own, w...

One of my favorite spiritual writers is Dorothee Soelle.   Thinking about winter, weather, the cold, the angst and suffering in our world, I came across a line from her book,   The Silent Cry.     In this work she writes that amazement includes ‘a bleak side of terror   and   hope’. She muses that: ‘This ability for wonderment brings about consenting to amazement and is a way of praising.’ These juxtapositions move me outside of the ‘gray’ and invite me to really hear longing to be part of the whole from an immigrant knocking at the door of our border.  I hear awe and wonder in the yearning with the call for voting rights for all in our nation and in our countries as well.   One small Washington town received three feet of snow in one day this month. What a climate change statement! Those who came to help dig this village out brought their hunger to serve and their shovels were praising!  What amazes you these days? What m...

Since I was seven years old I’ve worn glasses to correct a severe myopic condition.  I still remember my astonishment when I put on my first pair of glasses.  It was a whole new world! A few years ago I had cataract surgery and again I was astounded at the miracle of sight. For the first time in my life I could wake up and see what time it was without help from my glasses.  At that time I was told that I had “2020 vision.” What a miracle! Now the miracle is that with the past year behind us, ALL of us have 2020 vision! That means we can see things we had never seen before, such as a worldwide human family suffering together the horrors of a pandemic .Now we can see more clearly than ever the dreadfulness of racism and the vileness of a broken political system. On the other hand, we can now see more clearly the generous response of people helping people in need, sharing their resources and comforting the afflicted. Now we can see not only the potential depra...

Didn’t it seem like spring would never arrive this year.  And while we were waiting, COVID-19 came to our world and began to wreak havoc among us.  As we watch news reports, we see so much suffering and devastation, and yet at the same time we witness the best in human beings’ care and compassion for one another.  As we ponder the dark days in our lives and continue to hope for more light at the end of this tunnel, we grasp for hope, faith, and ever more insight.   A breakfast conversation with some of our sisters some time ago (before social distancing) led me to believe that suffering does, in fact, make us stronger, give us wisdom, and in the end, enables us to be the women we are today – powerful, durable, intelligent, prudent, hopeful women of faith able to share the “Good News” that God is indeed with us throughout all we are experiencing. So I’ve continued searching for the signs of spring, and I have begun to see my favorite image...

Over the last months, my prayers have included in a particular way people in cities and towns along the might, muddy, murky Mississippi River - and especially for residents of Davenport, Iowa, my hometown, which has experienced devastating record flooding. Experts fear that while the waters will wane, flooding could continue throughout the summer if rainfall is heavy, both locally and upstream. Businesses will, and are, experiencing losses - physical, financial and emotional. And, as is always the case, here and globally, those who suffer most are the materially poor who do not have the financial or human resources to rebuild and move on. Clearly climate change is part of the problem, with polar ice caps melting at alarming rates under the ever warming blanket of earth’s atmosphere, the product of human activity more than anything else. Yet there is another voice crying out in the midst of this ‘natural disaster’...the voice of the river, whose plaintive cry is, “Where would you hav...

The title of this reflection may lead you to believe I am musing about the sunlight that has peeked through the cold, cold winter days of freezing rain, sleet, snow, and heavy clouds.  Though this pattern has described the last several weeks of the weather we’ve experienced lately, I am really contemplating a conversation I encountered with several of my Dominican sisters during breakfast recently. A couple of sisters shared stories about difficult times (dark, dark days, weeks, months, and even years) from their early lives in the congregation.   Though I didn’t share my own story at that particular time, I understood the pain and anguish those sisters must have undergone. As we continued pondering those experiences, one sister noted that the suffering did, in fact, make us stronger, gave us wisdom, and in the end enabled us to be who are today – powerful, durable, intelligent, prudent, hopeful women of faith able to share the “Good News” of Jesus with those who wi...

There is a woman living in one of the temporary housing units where I minister who I have never seen cry, despite the extreme challenges she has faced that would bring others to their knees.  It is easy for some to dismiss this woman as cold and uncaring, though I know that is not true. Reflecting on her lack of tears, I am reminded of a conversation two years ago with the mother of a childhood friend who had died at the tender age of 62.   As we embraced at her daughter’s wake, this loving mother did not shed a tear.   She looked at me with deeply sad eyes and in what seemed both an apology and a plea for understanding, explained that due to a physical condition, she was no longer able to cry – outwardly - choking instead on the saltiness of her silent tears.   I could only imagine how that compounded her deep suffering. Both the client with whom I work and the mother of my childhood friend remind me that judging on outward appearance is as unfair as it i...

Reading Roberta’s reflection on Catherine’s Café (December 19) and seeing her reference to the O Antiphons, I began to reflect more deeply upon the O Antiphons of Advent.  The antiphon for today, December 21, couldn’t be more perfect as we begin to see days of lengthening light.  O Radiant Dawn, Splendor of eternal light, sun of justice; Come and shine on those who dwell in darkness And in the shadow of death. Not only are we seeing the physical darkness, we also observe those who dwell in darkness and in the shadow of death.   We are experiencing so much suffering on this planet of ours.   On the evening news, we hear so many horrific stories of people’s inhumanity to their brothers and sisters.   We keep asking ourselves, “How can people do that to other people!”   How can someone drive a semi into a group of shoppers in an outdoor Christmas market in Germany?   How can …?   We desperately need some good news. We need the ra...