Catherine's Cafe Vocation Blog

Surprises happen to us all the time. Sometimes they are small, like walking into a Ben and Jerry's and finding out they are giving away free samples of their newest flavored ice cream. But sometimes they are significant, and then you wonder if God is behind the surprise. This is what I experienced recently. I had moved to the Mound, our motherhouse, last November, expecting to  live there for a number of years. I had settled in and was beginning  to be asked to help in various ways. But then, unexpectedly, in April  I was made aware of a need for someone to move to a house in another  city. What was this about? Was I really being asked to be uprooted so  soon? I went to visit the community, I prayed about it, and in the end  I felt God was calling me to answer this need. Was it hard to leave the motherhouse? Yes, but I knew that if God was  behind the surprise I would receive all the graces I needed to begin  anew in another location. And that ...

I just finished reading  At Play in the Lions’ Den: A Biography and Memoir of Daniel Berrigan  by Jim Forest (Orbis Books, 2017). Daniel Berrigan, SJ has been a hero of mine for a long time because of his intrepid dedication to the cause of peace and non-violent resistance. Recalling his example reminded me about the importance of “showing up” to oppose whatever militates against the Gospel in our time. “Showing up” means acting even when it is inconvenient or frightening. Action on behalf of justice can be crushing if undertaken by one person, but a group can make it possible to be courageous and to persist when opposition is strong. Participating in communal action for justice can be truly joyous. There’s another kind of showing up that is more muted but is an expression of the love and caring that we have for those who are near and dear to us. It is definitely a high value in the Sinsinawa community that we go the extra mile (often literally) to attend wakes and fu...

Last weekend I enjoyed celebrating the Diamond Jubilees of 26 women. The festive celebrations, with colorful decorations, and joyful music, and delicious food created an atmosphere of “jubilation.” Smiles were contagious along with well wishes and lots of storytelling. This time last year I was busy sending out invitations for my Golden Jubilee. I am so glad I am on the other side of my jubilee. Don’t get me wrong, I enjoyed my jubilee very much. But, do you ever realize the deeper meaning of something after you have experienced it?  Jubilee is a year-long celebration. It has its roots in the Jewish tradition. (Leviticus 25:8-12) A year of jubilee was announced with trumpet blast and was heard throughout all the land. Every fifty years marked a jubilee year. It was a consecrated year when all debts were forgiven. The peoples were set free. Jubilee is a fresh new start.  The tradition of jubilee is alive in our Judeo-Christian lives. Women and men religious honor...

She was beatified by Pope John XXIII and he called her ‘the apostle of the Holy Spirit.’  She was a 19 th  Century Mystic who founded an Order in Italy, called the Oblates of the Holy Spirit.  She shared with others her love for and promoted a devotion to the Holy Spirit in their everyday lives.  She petitioned Pope Leo XIII many times, asking him to invite the whole Church to grow in this devotion.  Moved by her passion he mandated that the entire Church pray the Novena to the Holy Spirit leading up to Pentecost.  In one sense Jesus himself instituted this Novena when, at his Ascension he said to the disciples: “Stay in the city until you are clothed with power from on high.” Luke 24:49. The apostles returned to the city and spent the whole time in prayer with Mary the Mother of Jesus.  We all know what happened!   Today is the 4 th  day of this Novena which begins on the Friday of the Sixth Week of Easter.  You can find t...

At our motherhouse the Sisters gather three times a day for communal prayer: Morning Prayer, Eucharist and Evening Prayer. Most of those who are there are retired. Many are quite frail, but there they are, three times a day. We sit facing each other “choir to choir” and I love to look at their faces, worn and wrinkled, but alive with the joy and peace that are the fruits of their years. Some can hardly see or hear, but they come. Many are leaning on walkers or canes, but they come. They come because they are faithful to what they promised long ago. They are faithful to their profession of obedience to a way of life that will someday be culminated by the jubilant encounter face to face with the God who called them.  This communal prayer is built on the private prayer of each of these holy women. In the cloister of their rooms, in the sanctuary of nature, in the silence of the chapel, each one has had her unique encounter with her Creator. Each one brings her precious experience...

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...

Three of us made up a local community for a number of years. Just recently  we became four of us.  The three of us left a residence in which we formed  community in order to join another sister who  now is able to live in the parish  house where she works. How do I find all the things that I brough t with me  in boxes?     How do we form a new community?    Prayer together is important.    Meals together are important.    In both prayer  and celebration, we meet  those that each of us has met as we have gone to  the places where God called us—                    o     The homeless person who came to the bookstore o    The sister/brother ill with cancer     o    The young person in the prayer group at prison, who was sentenced for life o    The friend whose relative just died o ...