March/April 2022

Introducing an Evangelizing CatechesisThat Answers Life’s Deepest Questions

Word of Life: A multifaceted,

PreK–8 curriculum with the most

complete tool kit ever to call parents,

catechists, and students to conversion

and transformation in Christ.

Learn more about our new vision of

catechesis. Call Word of Life at 855-967-3720

or visit wordoflifeseries.org. Build Strong Catholics

Table of Contents

Features3 “For the Life of the World”

—A National Call to Eucharistic Revival Sr. Alicia V. Torres, F.E.

6 Confession of Sins —A Divine Institution Rev. John A. Hardon, S.J.

16 Moved to Discern God’s Active Presence —Homily for 2022 World Day of Consecrated Life

Pope Francis

18 The Lenten Season and Religious Life Rt. Rev. Marcel Rooney, O.S.B.

Departments2 InstItute Insights

20 InnerVIew With Sr. Helena Raphael Burns, FSP, Blogger, Media Literacy & Theology of the Body Presenter

23 IrL news & notes

26 Affiliate in Focus Benedictine Nuns of St. Emma Monastery —Greensburg, Pennsylvania

Columns8 Wake Up the World!:

Essential Elements of Religious Life Revisited Communion in Community Mother Marie Julie Saegaert, S.C.M.C.

11 Answering the Master’s Call Thirsting for Our Eucharistic Lord Sr. Maria Epifania, SSpSAP

13 Religious Pioneers in America: Trailblazers of Faith —Venerable Rev. Patrick Peyton, C.S.C. Anne Tschanz

28 Theological Reflections Capital Sins and Virtues

Rev. John A. Hardon, S.J.

2 March/April 2022

Institute InsightsRe v. Th o m a s Ne l s o N, o.PR a e m .

March/April 2022 Vol. XLVI No. 2

Our Mission: Religious Life is published by the InstItute on RelIgIous lIfe, Inc.

(IRL). The IRl is a national organization founded in 1974 to encourage, support and assist authentic consecrated life as set forth by Vatican II and its implemen-tation by the Holy See. Membership in the IRL is comprised of bishops, priests, religious and lay persons.

Religious Life is sent to active mem-bers of the IRl ($30 per year for U.S. membership) or to those who request it. Institutional or library subscriptions are also available. Send all correspondence to Religious Life, P.O. Box 7500, Liber-tyville, IL 60048, or call 847-573-8975.

Executive EditorRev. Thomas Nelson, o.PRaem.

Managing EditorMr. Michael D. Wick

Assistant Editor/CirculationMrs. Anne TschanzLayout & Design

Catholic Creative Services, Inc.

IRL Founder + Rev. John A. Hardon, S.J.

IRL Executive Director Mr. Jeffrey Karls

IRL Officers Most Rev. Bob Lombardo, C.F.R.

Vice PresidentMr. Paul Doetsch, Treasurer

Mr. Frederick R. Dempsey, Secretary

Rev. Robert McDermott Mrs. Bonnie Quirke

Mrs. Patricia Sanders Mr. Patrick Spencer

Executive Committee

© 2022 InstItute on RelIgIous lIfe, Inc. All rights reserved. Religious Life is printed in the U.S.A. Reproduction of material ap-pearing in Religious Life is prohibited with-out written prior permission. Unsolicited articles, poetry and other original works may be submitted for consideration. Please email submissions to: irlstaff@religiouslife.com. Submissions may be edited for length and style.

About the Cover: Ecce Homo (“Behold the Man”) was painted by Adam Chmielowski (Saint Brother Albert), Founder of the Albertine Sisters. Done at the special request of Archbishop Andrew Szeptycki, the original painting is located in the Sanctuary Ecce Homo of Saint Brother Albert in Krakow, Poland, displayed above the main altar (AlbertineSisters.org/ecce-homo-history).

We celebrate the last of the Christmas mysteries with the Solemnity of the Presentation of the Lord and Pope Francis has a beautiful reflection for us religious on this mystery in his homily for

the 26th World Day of Consecrated Life. We are now in the Lenten season which, according to Rt. Rev. Marcel Rooney, O.S.B., is a favorite time for religious. There are good reasons for this which he explains in his article, “The Lenten Season and Religious Life.” For one, Lent is a penitential season and we all have need of penance, especially considering our fallen human nature with its tendency towards sin. Yet, as the late Rev. John A. Hardon, S.J., reminds us in his Theological Reflections, the capital sins lodged deep in our soul are a constant invitation to practice their contrary virtues, made possible by the grace of God. Though our bodily human nature is fallen and inclined towards sin, it is still fundamentally good and it is made very good by the grace of Christ. Pope St. John Paul II gave us his Theology of the Body to show us the transforming power of grace upon our bodily nature. Sr. Helena Raphael Burns, FSP, is a popular presenter of the Theology of the Body. You can find out why in our interview with her. Grace is communicated to us through prayer and the Sacraments especially the Sacrament of Confession. Father Hardon. in his article, “Confession of Sins,” reminds us that sacramental confession is of Apostolic origin and was instituted by the Lord Himself. Prayer is another way to access grace and there is no more efficacious private prayer than the Rosary. Many of the saints were devoted to and recommended to others the most holy Rosary. Among them was the Venerable Rev. Patrick Peyton, C.S.C., affectionately known as “the Rosary priest.” Anne Tschanz has a wonderful article about his amazing life in her column, Religious Pioneers in America: Trailblazers of Faith. The supreme source of grace, of course, is the Holy Eucharist because it contains the Author of grace and renews the Paschal Mystery of our Re-demption. Unfortunately, many Catholics have fallen away from or have been weakened in their Eucharistic faith. To remedy this, the Bishops of the United States have issued a national call to Eucharistic revival. Sr. Alicia V. Torres, F.E., explains the three-year stages for this spiritual reawakening in her article, “For the Life of the World.” There have always been those who have been touched by a certain Eucharistic amazement which has molded their vocation in life. Sr. Maria Epifania, SSpSAP, attributes her vocation tes-timonial to just this in: “Thirsting for Our Eucharistic Lord.” The Eucharist above all builds communion with God and neighbor. Religious express this in the communal life they live with their fellow religious. Mother Marie Julie Saegaert, S.C.M.C., expounds on this in her article “Communion in Community” in our column Wake Up the World: Essential Elements of Religious Life Revisited. Benedictine monasticism highlights community as an essential element of religious life and we feature the Benedictine Nuns of St. Emma Monastery in Greensburg, Pennsylvania, in our Affiliate in Focus.

March/April 2021 3

As the First Communion class sat attentively

on the large carpet, they shared an anxiety

that was eager and expectant, but trusting. I

had just told them I was about to share something very

serious, and very important. I drew a picture of the Host

on the white board and asked them what I had drawn.

“Jesus!” one child shouted. I smiled, and asked what was

the special name for Jesus as I’d drawn Him. Another

child raised his hand, “The Eucharist,” he proclaimed

emphatically. I looked at them earnestly, and shared that

The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops is sponsoring a National Eucharistic Revival. This dynamic, multi-year initiative aims to inspire “a movement of Catholics across the United States,

healed, converted, formed and unified by an encounter with Jesus in the Eucharist —and sent out in mission ‘for the life of the world.’”

By Sr. Alicia V. Torres, F.E.

“For the Life of the World” –A National Call to Eucharistic Revival–

most grownups don’t believe the Eucharist is Jesus. There

was an audible gasp among the whole group of children,

and one child shouted, “How could they!?”

“How could they?” is the same question our Ameri-can Bishops are asking today, yet not with the shock of an innocent child, but with the hearts of loving shepherds. Their question, discussion, prayer and discernment has led to a bold decision: the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops is sponsoring a National Eucharistic Revival. This dynamic, multi-year initiative aims to in-spire a “movement of Catholics across the United States, healed, converted, formed, and unified by an encounter

4 March/April 2021

with Jesus in the Eucharist—and sent out in mission “for the life of the world.”

This renewal will be accomplished “by enkindling a living relationship with the Lord Jesus Christ in the Holy Eucharist.” Isn’t it incredible that what our country (and our world) needs most at this very moment in history is something that has been entrusted to religious life in a unique way? As we draw near the National Eucharistic Revival kick off on Corpus Christi Sunday this coming June, now is exactly the time for religious communities to understand more about the Revival, pray, discern and decide how our unique charisms and spirituali-ties can be at the service of this critically life-giving movement.

UnderstandIn order to discern and make a deci-

sion, you need facts. The National Eu-charistic Revival is a multi-year initiative with a clear focus: renewed faith in and devotion to Jesus in the Eucharist.

Year One: June 19, 2022 to June 11, 2023

DiOcesan Year

During this initial year of the Re-vival, the focus will be to renew and in-spire the clergy, church leaders and the faithful at the diocesan level. Dioceses are encouraged to host Corpus Christi processions to lo-cally inaugurate the Revival. The National Eucharistic Preachers, a group of diocesan and religious priests who have been formed in the charism of the Revival, will be available to preach at diocesan events around the coun-try. Their mission is to help cultivate the spirit of the Revival and a genuine Eucharistic faith and devotion. There will be an intentional emphasis on the celebration of the Eucharist, which is the “Source and summit of the whole Christian life” as the Second Vatican Council so beautifully stated in Lumen Gentium, no. 11. The fruit-fulness of the Revival is intimately linked to a renewed understanding of and dedication to participation in the Mass and the great Mysteries it contains.

Year TwO: June 11, 2023 to July 17, 2024Parish Year

This second year of Revival will bring the movement into the parish. Parish-based Corpus Christi Processions,

Eucharistic small groups and times of Eucharistic Adora-tion are just a few of the ways the bishops invite parishes to engage in the Revival. Eucharistic Missionaries will be formed to help cultivate the Revival at the parish and also bring the movement to the margins the following year.

National Eucharistic Congress: July 17-21, 2024

These years of Revival will culminate in a gathering of over 80,000 Catholics in Indianapolis for the 2024 Nation-al Eucharistic Congress. These days of celebration, inspiration, formation and prayer will culminate in missioning tens of thousands of Eucharistic Missionaries to bring the Revival to the existential and social margins.

Year Of Going OutJuly 17, 2024 to Pentecost 2025Eucharistic Missionaries, and in-

deed the whole Church, will be sent on mission to the peripheries: to those who have no faith or who have lost hope, to the poor, the prisoners, the addict-ed, the abandoned—to all who need to hear the good news that Jesus is alive and He has come to save. Indeed, this is Jesus’ mission: the salvation of souls.

The Eucharist is literally His flesh for the life of the world: “Amen, amen, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink His blood, you do not have life within you. Whoever eats My flesh and drinks My blood has eternal life, and I will raise him on the last day” (Jn 6:53-54).

Strategic PillarsThese special years of the National Eucharistic Re-

vival will be guided by five strategic pillars: Foster encounters with Jesus through kerygmatic

proclamation and experiences of Eucharistic devo-tion. From apostolic times, the Eucharist has been the constant source of Kerygmatic proclamation, predating even the New Testament. Preaching always flows from and returns to the Eucharist, and the Eucharist is Jesus. A renewed proclamation focused on proposing a living relationship with Jesus will lead to deeper, more authen-tic Eucharistic faith and devotion.

“The National Eucharistic

Revival is a multi-year

initiative with a clear

focus: renewed faith

in and devotion to

Jesus in the Eucharist....

These years will

culminate in a gathering

in Indianapolis for

the 2024 National

Eucharistic Congress.”

March/April 2021 5

golden opportunity to pray and discern how Jesus is inviting our religious communities to be of service to this movement.

Pray: Take time, individually and as a community, to pray over John 6 and the Institution Narratives from the Synoptic Gospels. Pray and re-flect on the Passion

Narratives. Sit silently before Our Lord in the Eucharist. Allow the Holy Spirit to guide your prayer, to deepen your own faith and devotion to Jesus and His Eucharistic Presence: in the Scriptures, in Eucharistic Adoration and especially at Mass. Invite your benefactors, volunteers and friends to pray for the Eucharistic Revival.

Discern: Set aside intentional time with your reli-gious community to discuss the upcoming Revival and discern how Jesus is inviting your community to partici-pate. Reach out to your bishop and/or diocese and ask if there are any ways you can be of service. What is already part of your life and apostolate that compliments the Eucharistic Revival? Is there something new that aligns with your charism that can help renew Eucharistic faith and devotion? Is there a specific sacrifice your community can make by way of time or resources that can support the Revival? If you live the cloistered life, how can your community continue to be hidden intercessors in an even more explicit way by praying for the Revival? Above all else, ask the Lord how He desires you and your religious community to be of service to the Revival. Jesus will let you know.

Decide: Once you’ve taken time to pray and discern, decide! The initial Revival is three years—if you aren’t ready to make a big commitment, start with a smaller one. Whatever you do, do it for Jesus and for the salva-tion souls, and you can’t go wrong. This part of the article is intentionally short because decisions should be clear, concise and actionable. Do not be afraid!

The Eucharistic Revival Starts with Me

As I reflect on how the Lord is inviting me and my religious community to be of service to the Revival, I

Contemplate and proclaim the doctrine of the Real Presence of Jesus in the Eucha-rist through the Truth of our teaching, the Beauty of our wor-ship, and the Good-ness of our accom-paniment of persons in poverty and those who are vulnerable. There is no better lens to express our Eucha-ristic faith and lives than through the transcendentals. Just as Jesus pours Himself out for us in the Eucharist, we are called to be poured out for one another, especially the most needy and vulnerable in our midst.

Empower grassroots creativity by partnering with movements, apostolates, parishes and educational in-stitutions. The Revival hopes to foster organic, fruitful Eucharistic initiatives from among various organizations within the Church.

Reach the smallest unit: parish small groups and families. How beautiful is family life as the Church pro-poses it, yet how far the lived reality! By focusing on the smallest unit, both in the parish and the home, the Revival hopes that the healing Jesus wants for family life will be a visible and abundant.

Embrace and learn from the various rich intercul-tural Eucharistic traditions. The United States is replete with beautiful cultures and traditions. The Revival wants to see these beautiful dimensions of our Catholic faith flourish, as well as an openness to learn from one another so that our own Eucharistic love will grow.

Pray And DiscernAs religious, we are consecrated for mission, and our

mission is Jesus’ mission: the salvation of souls. In a beau-tiful way, our charisms and spiritualities tend toward sal-vation. We strive to allow our lives to be patterned after that of our Divine Bridegroom. We seek to fearlessly lay down our lives as He did—perhaps not in bodily death, but surely in that death to self which is essential for inti-macy with Jesus. He doesn’t demand anything of us that He Himself has not already endured, and Jesus provides all we need, in a most unique way through His Real Pres-ence in the Eucharist. As our Church prepares to launch the National Eucharistic Revival, we religious have a (Continued on page 22)

6 March/April 2021

Confession of Sins

By Rev. John A. Hardon, S.J.

During his first visit to the United States, Pope St. John Paul II pleaded with the bishops to do something about the drastic drop in confessions

in many American dioceses.“In the face of a widespread phenomenon of our

time, namely that many of our people who are among the great numbers who re-ceive Communion make little use of con-fession, we must emphasize Christ’s basic call to conversion.”

“We must also stress that the personal encounter with the forgiving Jesus in the sacrament of Reconciliation is a divine means which keeps alive in our hearts and in our communities, a consciousness of sin in its perennial and tragic reality, and which actually brings forth, by the action of Jesus and the power of His Spirit, fruits of conversion in justice and holiness of life” (Pope John Paul II, Address to USCCB, October 5, 1979).

Underlying this phenomenal decline in confessions is an error of factual history that must be corrected. Some nominally Catholic writers are saying that Christ did not institute the Sacrament of Penance or, at least, did not require the confession of sins to a priest to receive sacra-mental absolution.

Books and articles are being published which claim that confession of sins to a priest is a late innovation in the Catholic Church. General absolution is becom-ing habitual in some places, and nineteen centuries of Catholic history are being ignored as though they did not exist.

The Institution of Sacramental ConfessionJesus Christ instituted the Sacrament of Confession

on Easter Sunday night. As St. John describes the event, “the doors were closed in the room where the disciples were for fear of the Jews. Jesus came and stood among them. He said to them, ‘Peace be with you,’ and showed them His hands and His side. The disciples were filled

with joy when they saw the Lord. And He said to them again, ‘Peace be with you. As the Father sent me, so I am sending you.’ After saying this, He breathed on them and said, ‘Receive the Holy Spirit. For those whose sins you forgive, they are forgiven. For those whose sins you retain, they are retained’” (Jn 20:19-23).

As the Catholic Church explains these words, Christ gave the Apostles and their successors the right to forgive sins if they so judge the penitent worthy and the corresponding right to retain sins or refrain from absolving if the sinner is not

sincerely repentant.The implications of this power of judging whether

to absolve or not are at the heart of the Sacrament of Penance. By these words, Christ indicated that before re-ceiving absolution, the sinner must disclose his sins. He must confess what he did wrong.

This means that auricular confession, where the pen-itent speaks his sins and the priest hears his sins, is of divine origin. The Church did not invent the confession of sins. It is a divine law from which no one on earth has the right to dispense. Auricular (or audible) confession is part of divine revelation. It is an unchangeable article of the Catholic faith.

Private Confession of Apostolic OriginIn the early Church, Christians were expected to live

–A Divine Institution–The Church did not invent the confession of sins. Rather, the Sacrament of Reconciliation was

instituted by Christ for the forgiveness of sins. Confession is part of Divine Revelation.

March/April 2021 7

(Continued on page 10)

very holy lives. And they did. To become Christian meant to expect to become a martyr. Every pope for the first three hundred years of the Church’s history was murdered for the faith. Countless thousands shed their blood in witness to their love for Christ.

Understandably, there-fore, the sacrament of Con-fession was not so frequently received by persons whose lives were a living martyrdom. Yet, even in the early Church, sinners were reconciled after they had confessed their sins, received absolution and per-formed what to us must seem like extraordinary penance for the wrong they had done.

The emphasis in those early days was on confessing mortal sins. And there were bishops who had to be re-proved by the pope for excessive severity, either in de-manding public confession of grave crimes or even refus-ing to give absolution for such sins as apostasy, adultery, fornication or willful murder.

One document issued by Pope St. Leo the Great in the middle of the fifth century, deserves to be quoted in full. He is writing to the bishops of Campania in It-aly, reproving them for demanding a public confession of sins before receiving absolution in the Sacrament of Penance.

“I have recently heard that some have unlawfully pre-sumed to act contrary to a rule of Apostolic origin. And I hereby decree that the unlawful practice be completely stopped.”

“It is with regard to the reception of penance. An abuse has crept in which requires that the faithful write out their individual sins in a little book which is then to be read out loud to the public.”

“All that is necessary, however, is for the sinner to manifest his conscience in a secret confession to the priests alone…It is sufficient, therefore, to have first offered one’s confession to God, and then also to the priest, who acts as an intercessor for the transgressions of the penitents” (Magna indignatione, March 6, 459).

It is a matter of history, therefore, that private, in-dividual confession of one’s sins to a priest goes back to apostolic times. Christ Himself prescribed confession

in the Sacrament of Penance, and His directives were followed since the first century of the Christian era.

Church’s Infallible Teaching

Among the doctrines of re-vealed faith which the Church had to defend, was the precept of sacramental confession.

The Protestant leaders in the sixteenth century rejected the sacrament of Confession as divine institution. And they es-pecially reacted against the Cath-olic Church’s teaching about the need for telling one’s sins to a priest. As a result, the Council

of Trent issued no less than fifteen solemn definitions on the sacrament of Penance. Two of these deal specifi-cally with the obligations to confess one’s sins to a priest. They are critically important in our ecumenical age. The following positions are declared as contrary to the Cath-olic faith:

“If anyone says that sacramental confession was not instituted by divine law or that it is not necessary for salvation according to the same law; or if anyone says that the method which the Catholic Church has always observed from the very beginning, and still observes, of confessing secretly to the priest alone is foreign to the in-stitution and command of Christ, and that it is a human origin: let him be anathema.”

• ReligiousLife.com• CloisteredLife.com • ReligiousBrotherhood.com • VocationBlog.com• SpeakLord.net

Is Christ Calling You?Visit Us Online At:

8 March/April 2021

Essential Elements of Religious Life Revisited

Wake Upthe World!

For consecrated men and women in Institutes of Apostolic Life as well as in contemplative life, the foundation of the religious community is always

the founding gift, that is, the respective charism of each religious family. This gift, to be cherished and fostered by each generation of religious, is lived out first within the reality of the common life. The model for the healthy, prayerful, apostolic life has been the community of Jesus and His Apostles. The closest companions of Our Lord during His public life were drawn togeth-er by a common, though unique invita-tion: Come, follow Me.

Every vocation has its own story, and how lovely it is to hear another’s story of the sometimes powerful, sometimes qui-et, sometimes sudden, sometimes evolv-ing invitation that drew the soul to the Heart of Jesus. Peter’s story is different from Matthew’s, and both were different from Bartholomew’s. Pope Francis found his vocation during the Sacrament of Penance one morning, and Mother Te-resa heard her call on a train ride in In-dia. Yet all were led to a community that was rooted in common prayer, a com-mon ministry, and a common structure of daily life. The details of each institute (congregation or order) vary greatly one from another, depending on the respec-tive culture and the circumstances of ministry, among others. But every form of consecrated life is marked by certain characteristics common to all: the celebrating of the Eucharistic Liturgy and the Sacraments, a life of common and personal prayer, the sharing of formation, apostolates, friendships and responsibilities of daily liv-ing within the religious houses. On the other hand there

Communion in CommunityBy Mother Marie Julie Saegaert, S.C.M.C

is a mutual respect for the initiative and the individual talents of the members, qualities that are freely shared for the enjoyment and growth of the larger community. It is especially in the sharing of gifts that the holiness of the Spirit is manifest within a community while serving the ministry—and charism—of the institute at large.

The local houses of the respective institutes each have a chapel where the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, the source and summit of the Christian life (CateChism of

the CatholiC ChurCh, no. 1324) is celebrated as often as possible. Eucha-ristic adoration and the Liturgy of the Hours draw the religious together with cords of love at times when most can gather together. This creates a rhythm of life so indispensable that when one or more members must be absent, the others lift them up in an act of rev-erent communion that supports all in the Heart of the Bridegroom. When a community finds richness in med-itation and lectio divina in common, there will be a hunger for times of intense prayer of intimacy with the Lord in holy hours and the annual retreats. Without these opportunities for prayer in common, augmented by periods of private prayer, the commu-nity runs the risk of losing its spiritual

vision and the members becoming little more than ships passing in the night. A loving devotion to the Virgin Mary according to the sound tradition of the respective communities establishes a safeguard of unity around their Mother Who leads them always and ever closer to her Son and to one another. In addition there should be within each community a remembrance of those who

“Without opportunities

for prayer in common,

augmented by periods

of private prayer,

the community runs

the risk of losing its

spiritual vision and the

members becoming

little more than ships

passing in the night.”

March/April 2021 9

The Rosary is a precious gift in our vocational journey.

The IRL is making available a free e-book, Vocational Dis-cernment Rosary: Discovering God's Purpose and Plan for Your Life, to help you find, follow and fulfill your call.

Visit ReligiousLife.com to download this free devotional prayer resource.

FREE Discernment Rosary E-Book

have gone before them—perhaps a nightly ritual of speaking the names of each member on the anniversary of death. The telling of stories about the lives of those who have entered eternal life will foster a spirit of prayer and appreciation for them, and may well bring about a renewed love for the history of the Institute.

Young people who sense the ten-der invitation of Jesus to the conse-crated life will be drawn most often to those religious communities where they discern a common life rooted in love, strengthened by fervent prayer, and burning with the contagious joy that is the sign of the Holy Spirit’s in-fluence within the institute.

As an aside, albeit an important one, it is wise to raise the question of diversity of gifts when consid-ering applicants for the Institute. Saint Paul (1 Cor 12:4) tells us that there is a variety of gifts but the same Spirit who bestows them all. In the history of Religious Life these gifts have been the impetus for the foun-dation of Congregations which have themselves been immense gifts to the Church. Consecrated religious in contemplative life keep the light burning in the hearts of men and women by lives of more intense prayer, the fruits of which are of-ten only known in Eternity. On the other hand, orders and institutes of mendicants, teachers, ministers to the sick, the poor, individuals strug-gling with disabilities, and mission-aries to all parts of the world have brought a grace to the Church that has been the means of evangelization of millions of people. When guiding those who aspire to the consecrat-ed life, therefore, it is important to recognize the importance of match-ing gifts to ministry. It can happen that the growing need for members in communities experiencing dwin-

dling numbers might lead to the temptation to accept candidates who are not suited to a specific charism. It may be that a soul who promises great virtue would be hindered from the full ripening of that virtue by being sent to a ministry to which he or she has not been called. Before that would happen, these candidates should, in fact, be gently directed to other Institutes which could be a bet-ter fit for the flowering of a vocation. This painful discernment is the task of vocation directors. Formators, on the other hand, must be adept at helping the people in novitiate to de-velop their talents in order to serve the apostolates of the community. Lapses in this area of formation can easily wound the unity within a local house or even the institute at large.

A solid community is a dynam-ic one. There must be room, then, for the voices of all to be heard, and their ideas and opinions to be ten-derly and respectfully considered. Mutual discussion of ideas and dif-fering opinions are healthy signs of the diversity of the members, and make for a richness that enables all to grow closer to one another and to the Lord, since the community is en-riched by the generous spirit of the members.

A religious community, wheth-er local or the Institute at large, is made up of distinct people, each be-ing drawn in unique ways to holiness and sanctity. Some will be content to live their lives in quiet acquies-cence to all that is provided and de-cided. Others may on occasion see before them another way; a new and creative vision of what might be in a certain situation, trivial or more significant. For some members, this latter outlook could be unsettling, even threatening. It is up to the individual proposing the change or

modification to be aware of this, and to raise the suggestion in a way that is respectful to the traditions long observed. At the same time, those receiving the creative option owe it to the more creative mem-bers to receive the new idea with an open mind, seeing it as offered in a spirit of genuine concern for the betterment of the community. The expression of these responses can be difficult at the least, and a labor of love at best. It takes a prayerful heart to become adept at this mutu-al respect, especially if the proposal seems to some to be unreasonable. When a compromise or a mutual agreement is reached, the mem-bers learn to be able to offer and receive with grace all comments for and against the suggestion, seeing in them a fostering of “devotion to the process” that makes for a com-munity dwelling in the spirit of the Trinitarian life that is the icon of all religious communities.

How beautiful it is to see reli-gious men and women moving to-ward a common goal hand in hand, speaking and hearing the Word of God in one another. May the table of the Eucharist be the place where charity is born, and the table of com-munity life be the place where that virtue flowers.

Mother Marie Julie, SCMC, is the Superior General of the Sisters of Charity of Our Lady, Mother of the Church (SistersofCharity.com)

10 March/April 2021

A Personal Encounter with Christ

“In faithfully observing the cen-turies-old practice of the Sacrament of Penance —the practice of individ-ual confession with a personal act of sorrow and the intention to amend and make satisfaction—the Church is therefore defending the human soul’s individual right: man’s right to a more personal encounter with the crucified forgiving Christ, with Christ saying, through the minister of the Sacrament of Reconciliation: ‘Your sins are forgiven’; ‘Go, and do not sin

Confession (cont. from p. 7)“If anyone says that, to obtain

remission of sins in the sacrament of Confession, it is not necessary according to divine law to confess each and every mortal sin that is remembered after proper and dili-gent examination, even secret sins, and sins against the last two com-mandments, and those circumstanc-es which change the character of a sin…or finally that it is not permissi-ble to confess venial sins: let him be anathema.”

No apology is needed for these long quotations from the Church’s irreversible teaching on the sacra-mental confession of sins. Nor need we apologize for one more quota-tion, this time from Pope St. John Paul II. He insists that personal, private confession of sins to a priest in the Sacrament of Penance, is the right of every single believer, as it is also the right of Christ, the Divine Redeemer.

again.’ As is evident, this is also a right on Christ’s part with regard to every human being redeemed by Him: His right to meet each one of us in that key moment in the soul’s life constituted by the moment of conversion and for-giveness. By guarding the Sacrament of Penance, the Church expressly af-firms her faith in the mystery of the Redemption as a living and life-giving reality that fits in with man’s inward truth, with human guilt and also with the desires of the human conscience” (Redemptoris Hominis, no. 20).

Experience proves how valuable is confession for retaining or regain-ing our peace of soul. Nothing is so disturbing to the human spirit as the sense of guilt, gnawing in the depths of a person estranged from God by sin. Nothing is so restful as the sense of well-being, which comes from the awareness of God’s mercy received from the Sacrament of Penance—which in Christ’s own words is the Sacrament of Peace.

too, because embracing Jesus is the essential thing, the very heart of faith. Sometimes we risk losing our bearings, getting caught up in a thousand different things, obsessing about minor issues or plunging into new projects, yet the heart of everything is Christ, embracing Him as the Lord of our lives.

When Simeon took Jesus into his arms, he spoke words of blessing, praise and wonder. And we, after so many years of consecrated life, have we lost the ability to be amazed? Do we still have this capacity? Let us examine ourselves on this, and if someone does not find it, let him or her ask for the grace of amazement, amazement before the wonders that God is working in us, hidden, like

those in the temple, when Simeon and Anna encountered Jesus.

If consecrated men and women lack words that bless God and oth-er people, if they lack joy, if their enthusiasm fails, if their fraternal life is only a chore, if amazement is lacking, that is not the fault of someone or something else. The real reason is that our arms no longer embrace Jesus. And when the arms of a consecrated man or woman do not embrace Jesus, they embrace a vacuum which they try to fill with other things, but it remains a vacuum.

To take Jesus into our arms: this is the sign, the journey, the recipe for renewal. When we fail to take Jesus into our arms, our hearts fall prey to bitterness. It is sad to see re-ligious who are bitter: closed up in

complaining about things that nev-er go right, in a rigidity that makes them inflexible, in attitudes of sup-posed superiority. They are always complaining about something: the superior, their brothers or sisters, the community, the food… They live for something to complain about. But we have to embrace Je-sus in adoration and ask for eyes capable of seeing the goodness and discerning the ways of God. If we embrace Christ with open arms, we will also embrace others with trust and humility. Then conflicts will not escalate, disagreements will not divide, and the temptation to domineer and to offend the dig-nity of others will be overcome. So let us open our arms to Christ and to all our brothers and sisters. For that is where Jesus is.

God’s Active Presence (cont. from p. 17)

March/April 2021 11

Answering theMaster’s CallVocation Stories

By Sr. Maria Epifania, SSpSAP

Thirsting for Our Eucharistic Lord

What do you do with a health care professional degree in the convent? Why don’t

you stay in the world, where you can use your knowledge and help lots of people?”

My answer is: there are many more talented and skilled people who can do that work, but not many are called to be contemplatives. As a matter of fact, it takes much courage to respond to this call, but God gifts with exceptional graces those who do so. I was very happy, and I loved the people I worked with and the patients I served. But deep inside of me there was emptiness, a thirst that I could not explain. I felt incomplete. The satisfaction I gained from my job was only transitory.

My journey into the contempla-tive life began, as much as I can re-member, when I was 6 years old. I had made my first Holy Communion and my family was very active in the par-ish. We were involved in Catechism, music ministry, cleaning, and decorat-ing the church for certain festivities among other tasks. I became very fa-miliar with the changes in the Litur-gical Year, visits to the Blessed Sacra-ment, Benediction, etc. Every time I heard the song, Lord, You Have Come to the Seashore, inexplicably, tears welled up in my eyes. As I grew old-

er, I got involved in youth minis-try at a diocesan level. I learned about the Litur-gy of the Hours and some Sisters who worked in our parish in-stilled my cu-riosity about a possible religious vocation. I naturally brushed it off, for I was about to graduate from high school and I had it all figured out: I will be serving people, sharing my faith with them, perhaps as a mission-ary.

The question about vocation kept haunting me for years, though. I re-member that during my second year of college I met a Sister who served in campus ministry. There was a joy in her that I had never seen before. This triggered all the more my curiosity for religious life and I started discerning. The answer that always came after every retreat or day of recollection I went to was to continue my stud-ies. I started to get discouraged and looked in another direction: maybe I am called to be a missionary after all and even to have a family.

My studies intensified in dental school and as I was away from home,

I treasured my independence very much. I went to parties and enjoyed going with my friends on road trips, got involved in choir and other ac-tivities, and studied long nights, es-pecially the nights before big tests (of course). I even started dating during this busy time. Because I had to stay at college some weekends in order to study, my “church time” was reduced to only Sundays, and, if there was no ride, I had to stick to “TV Mass.” I used to get very upset while watching, especially at the time of communion. I could not stop the tears. I felt far away, so far away from God! As time elapsed, I got involved in a relation-ship and through it I discovered some-thing strange. I felt divided and my heart constricted, as I could not share with others as I used to. The fact that he did not regularly practice his faith although he was Catholic brought

“

12 March/April 2021

For more information visit: MountGraceConvent.org

many problems that affected our relationship. Also, the question about a possible religious vocation was intensified.

After we parted ways, I went to a vocation discernment program that had just opened in our dio-cese. It took me two years to finally decide that religious life was what God wanted of me. The questions were: “Where?” and, “How fast can I pay off my student loans?” After pass-ing the Dental Boards I found three part-time jobs (the amount of time did not reach 40 hours of work, though), which sometimes found me asking: “Which job do I go to today?” Then I decided to look for job opportunities in the Continental U.S. I moved from my native Puerto Rico to the moun-tains of North Carolina where I served as a rural county dentist in a program that gave priority to children of low income families.

At the same time, I contacted the local parish priest for spiritual direc-tion. He encouraged me to go to dai-ly Mass as my schedule allowed and to pray in my free time as much as I

could to help in my discernment. He gave me a brochure of different active congregations, which I thought at first would be good because I could use my professional skills. Nothing appealed to me. I was sad and becoming dis-couraged. Then I remembered during one of my previous retreats a Sister had told me that I had a contemplative mind at prayer. I wondered, “What is that?” Then I saw that there were contemplative religious communities. It started to attract me. My spiritual director was very inclined to the Car-melite spirituality, so I looked on the Internet, but neither the Carmelites, Poor Clares, or Benedictines appealed to me. Maybe the Visitation Nuns... and then, there it was: Holy Spirit

Adoration Sisters. I thought: “Adoration, that’s something I like.” I clicked and the first thing I saw was: Pink??? Is this approved by the Church? I never saw such a thing. Then I saw their charism of prayer for the sanctification of priests and for the missionary activity of the Church in Perpetual Ad-

oration of the Blessed Sacrament and I totally liked it.

I went on to look up their found-er on the Internet and a strange web site with all sorts of calumnies about him came up. This happened close to his canonization in 2003—of which I did not know about. I became dis-couraged and even though I printed the information, I decided not to show my spiritual director. But the truth was that I could not get the thought of these Sisters out of my mind. I was in awe! When I met my spiritual di-rector I showed him the results of my research, but kept back the paper. He said: “What else do you have there?” I took the page and almost reluctantly showed him the paper. It was a picture of our chapel in St. Louis. He imme-diately exclaimed “Those are the Pink Sisters!” I said: “Do you know them?” He went on to explain that while he was at St. Charles Borromeo Semi-nary in Philadelphia he used to go to pray in the Pink Sister’s Chapel there. There are no words for the relief and peace that I felt. I contacted the Sis-ters and visited them in Philadelphia. They prayed for me until I finished paying my student loans almost two years later. I am finally with the Lord, safe in his abode of prayer and adora-tion. The search is over! I thank Him with all my heart for giving me this beautiful vocation!

March/April 2021 13

By Anne Tschanz

Venerable Rev. Patrick Peyton, C.S.C. —The Rosary Priest—

In 1961, my husband Tom was one of some 500,000 people who attended Fr. Patrick Peyton’s Ro-

sary Rally in San Francisco’s Golden Gate Park. His Mother had a tight grip on his hand throughout for fear that she would lose him in the mas-sive crowd. This was only one of 540 such gatherings that Father Patrick organized around the world. In fact, before Pope John Paul II began his epic travels around the globe, Father Peyton was seen “live” by more peo-ple, an estimated 28 million of them, than any other person in Church history.

What attracted people to this Irish-born priest? It was Our Lady. He was the Blessed Mother’s ambas-sador for Jesus Christ. It began with his parents, John Peyton and Mary Gillard, who “knelt each evening be-fore the hearth,” he recalled, “to say together the family Rosary, that God and Mary might protect and bless their home and fill it with the laugh-ter of children.” His parents were married in 1899, and Patrick was one of five boys and four girls who lived with their parents in a three-room thatched cottage. He was born on January 9, 1909, and baptized the next day in St. Joseph Church, parish of Attymass, County Mayo, in

Ireland. Today, the Fr. Patrick Pey-ton Memorial Centre is located in the village.

Trying to earn a living on four-teen acres of stony land was difficult and Mr. Peyton often worked in England as a heavy laborer to sup-plement the family income. They all sacrificed for the greater good of the family. In 1917, Patrick lived temporarily with his grandparents to help with his invalid grandfa-ther. Here too the family Rosary was said every day. “It was a home like my own,” Father Patrick said, “Living there confirmed the image I already possessed of what life was and should be in a normal Christian family.”

When he was about nine, he became a diligent altar server and felt the first stirrings of a call to the priesthood. He made three attempts to enter religious life but academical-ly and financially there were impedi-ments. He gave up his dream of the priesthood and decided to study so he could earn a living. But he was in an unsettled state of mind and eventual-ly, at age 15, left school altogether. He went through his teenage years “rest-less and defiant, distressing my father because of my stubbornness, locked in a prison of doubt and frustration,

conscious that the walls were higher than I could ever hope to scale.”

During one fateful week, he was living with a local family to help with the potato harvest. The first eve-ning, he was astonished when the family went to bed without kneeling for family prayer. Patrick quietly said his Rosary alone in the dark, trying to work up the courage to say some-thing to the father of the home. He got his opportunity on the last day. He was sure it was a terrible appeal, but it was filled with love and con-viction and it was effective.

Religious Pioneersin AmericaTrailblazers of Faith

14 March/April 2021

In March of 1928, Patrick and his brother Tom decided to join his three older sisters living in Scranton, Pennsylvania, but not before his fa-ther gently asked him to get down on his knees before a picture of the Sa-cred Heart. “From now on,” he said, “there will be nobody but yourself to advise you…But your first responsi-bility will always be to save your soul, so I want you to promise to be faith-ful to Our Lord in America.”

Patrick was still haunted by the thoughts of the priesthood. His sis-ters enlisted the help of the local Monsignor, who said, “Maybe we can still save that vocation.” When he couldn’t find a job, the good Monsi-gnor hired him as sexton, where in the Church “all the joy and peace and sense of being at home which I used to feel in the little chapel at At-tymass flooded back in my soul.” He and Tom enrolled in the local high school but it wasn’t easy for this “big giant of a man to sit at a desk with the young whippersnappers.” However, the 19-year-old Patrick was a deter-mined student.

In March of 1929, after some priests of the Congregation of Holy Cross from Notre Dame, Indiana, preached a mission, he went up to one of them and said: “I want to be a missionary.” In the fall, Pat-rick and Tom began their second year of high school at Holy Cross Minor Seminary at Notre Dame. The Congregation of Holy Cross was founded by Bl. Basil Moreau, C.S.C., in 1837 in LeMans, France. What attracted Patrick to them was their understanding of the vow of obedience, their support of the diocesan clergy and the family at-mosphere, which reminded him of his own home. He also with time decided to take an optional fourth vow of commitment to the for-

eign missions, studying at the Holy Cross house in Washington, D.C., to prepare for this work.

In 1938, he began spitting up blood which developed into a fre-quent hemorrhaging of the lungs and a diagnosis of tuberculosis. He became an invalid, flat on his back, where even prayer brought him no joy. He learned that his mother back in Ireland was praying that his suf-ferings would come upon her, so he could get back to his work of saving souls for Christ. In Scranton, his sis-ter Nellie was offering everything, even her life itself, for her brothers’ priestly vocation.

Meanwhile, as every treatment failed, he was presented with a last resort surgery that would have left him severely handicapped. In the infirmary at Notre Dame, Fr. Cor-nelius Haggerty, C.S.C., spoke to him frankly —is your faith real or a sham? You have faith, the faith your mother gave you and you are not using it. Neither one could re-member exactly what happened that night but afterwards, he expe-rienced the Blessed Mother “with a new clarity and intensity.” Father helped him to see how “human she is, how approachable, how sensitive to our needs so that she could never be haughty or turn her back when we call her.” Patrick knew what he had to do —there would be no op-

eration, the Blessed Mother would cure him. Not long afterwards, the Eve of All Saints, the darkness and depression lifted and he was cured. His one thought was: “Mary, I hope I will never disgrace you.”

His Mother and sister died with-in months of each other after his cure, paying a price that he always tried to repay by a fervent love of Our Lord and His Mother. On the day of his ordination, with Tom, on June 15, 1941, he realized: “Christ’s mother was, more than ever before, my mother.”

In the early days of World War II, the idea grew on him that like the Battle of Lepanto, where in 1571 Pope Pius V asked Cath-olics to pray the Rosary for victory against the Muslim Turks who were threatening Western Christendom, recitation of the Rosary should once again play a part bringing about peace and justice in the world. “What was needed,” he wrote, “was not simply an end to fighting but an atmosphere of true peace, peace in the heart, peace in the home, peace in the family….here was the key: family prayer.”

Still considered convalescent, he was sent to Albany, New York to be a chaplain in a boy’s school. Here he began his first foray into the broadcast business when he secured 15 minutes of air time to pray the Rosary on a lo-cal radio station. He started to send mailings about the importance of the family Rosary to Catholic organiza-tions, pastors, and bishops. In 1943, he sent all the pastors folders explain-ing why every family should pray the Rosary and along with pledge cards. Orders came back for 1,200,000. A pamphlet, “The Story of the Family Rosary,” was so popular that he had to request a special allocation of pa-per from War Department.

March/April 2021 15

Always persuasive, Father Pey-ton was given 30 minutes of air time by the Mutual Broadcasting Com-pany to broadcast the Rosary across the nation on May 13, 1945. It was a phenomenal success. The Sullivan family, who tragically lost five sons in one battle in the Pacific, led the rec-itation of the prayers, and even Bing Crosby provided a live endorsement. During the war, Father realized, fam-ilies had been torn apart and unless brought back together, the victory would be in vain. “Our Christian civ-ilization for which we fought will de-cline and atheistic materialism will take its place.”

After much struggle, the “Fam-ily Theater of the Air,” a whole-some, non-sectarian program with star-studded casts debuted on Feb-ruary 13, 1945. The Rosary wasn’t featured, but Father Peyton re-called that a priest once told him that Our Lady was contented with even crumbs when nothing else was

possible. At enormous cost, he also developed fifteen one-hour films, re-enacting the mysteries of the Ro-sary. (They premiered at the Brus-sels World Fair in 1958.) In the early 1950’s, he produced hour-long tele-vision shows, the first called “The Triumphant Hour,” an Easter pro-gram garnering 16 million viewers.

What Father Peyton is best known for is the Family Rosary Cru-sade and his slogan: “The Family that Prays Together Stays Togeth-

er.” In 1948, the first Rosary Rally in Canada brought together 80,000 families. Key to the success was enlisting the men of a parish to go door to door to obtain pledges of commitment to daily prayer. “As head of the house,” he said, “the man represents God in the family, and it is his duty to provide spiritual leadership…”

He never held back any of his time or energy. In one diocese, he once gave three talks a day for thir-ty days in different parishes, which almost killed him. He suffered se-vere sunstroke at a large rally in Kenya that kept him bedridden for two weeks. He visited the sick and the imprisoned to ask them to offer their hardships for the renewal of the family. He also had incredible support from religious communities who underwrote some of his work, prayed for the success of his mission, offered office space and volunteered their time.

The enormity of what he did around the world was staggering. In the Philippines, 1,500,000 peo-ple stood in mud and water pray-ing the Rosary together. He also spearheaded a national billboard

campaign promoting family prayer. “I often shudder when I look back over my life and recognize the mo-ments in which, in my fear, I have resisted grace,” he said. At the same time, “I have long ago learned that to make a fool of oneself is a small price to pay for anything that is worth doing.”

During Vatican II, he was hap-py that “there was no question of de-emphasizing the role of Mary in the Church and in the work of our salvation.” Father spent his last days with the Little Sisters of the Poor in San Pedro, California where he died on June 3, 1992. His last words were: “Mary, my Queen, my Mother.” His cause for canonization was opened in 2001 and he was de-clared Venerable by Pope Francis in 2017.

“The family is the greatest trea-sure the earth possesses. God is the greatest treasure of Heaven,” he said. “The Rosary is the link of steel that has the power to unite them both to-gether for time and eternity.”

For more information, please visit: FatherPeyton.org or hcfm.org. Quotes take from Father Peyton’s autobiography “All For Her.”

16 March/April 2021

T wo elderly people, Simeon and Anna, await in the Temple the fulfillment of the promise that God made to His people: the coming of the Messiah.

Yet theirs is no passive expectation, it is full of move-ment. Let us look at what Simeon does. First, he is moved by the Spirit; then he sees salvation in the Child Jesus and finally he takes Him into his arms (cf. Lk 2:26-28). Let us simply consider these three actions and reflect on some important questions for us and in partic-ular for the consecrated life.

First, what moves us? Simeon goes to the Temple, “moved by the spirit” (v. 27). The Holy Spirit is the protagonist in this scene. He makes Simeon’s heart burn with desire for God. He keeps ex-pectation alive in his heart: He impels him to go to the Temple and he enables his eyes to recognize the Messiah, even in the guise of a poor little baby. That is what the Holy Spirit does: he enables us to discern God’s presence and activity not in great things, in outward appear-ances or shows of force, but in littleness and vulnerability. Think of the cross. There too we find littleness and vulner-ability, but also something dramatic: the power of God. Those words “moved by the spirit” remind us of what ascetic theology calls “movements of the Spirit,” those movements of the soul that we recognize within our-selves and are called to test, in order to discern whether they come from the Holy Spirit or not. Be attentive to the interior movements of the Spirit.

We can also ask, who mostly moves us? Is it the Holy Spirit, or the spirit of this world? This a question that everyone, consecrated persons in particular, needs

The following is Pope Francis’ homily given on February 2, 2022, during a Mass at St. Peter’s Basilica in Rome, celebrating the World Day of Consecrated Life.

to ask. The Spirit moves us to see God in the littleness and vulnerability of a baby, yet we at times risk seeing our consecration only in terms of results, goals and suc-cess: we look for influence, for visibility, for numbers. This is a temptation. The Spirit, on the other hand, asks for none of this. He wants us to cultivate daily fidelity and to be attentive to the little things entrusted to our care. How touching is the fidelity shown by Simeon and

Anna! Each day they go to the Temple, each day they keep watch and pray, even though time passes and nothing seems to happen. They live their lives in expec-tation, without discouragement or com-plaint, persevering in fidelity and nour-ishing the flame of hope that the Spirit has kindled in their hearts.

Brothers and sisters, we can ask, what moves our days? What is the love that makes us keep going? Is it the Holy Spirit, or the passion of the moment, or something else? How do we “move” in the Church and in society? Sometimes, even behind the appearance of good works, the canker of narcissism, or the need to stand out, can be concealed. In

other cases, even as we go about doing many things, our religious communities can appear moved more by mechanical repetition—acting out of habit, just to keep busy—than by enthusiastic openness to the Holy Spirit. All of us would do well today to examine our interior motivations and discern our spiritual movements, so that the renewal of consecrated life may come about, first and foremost, from there.

A second question: What do our eyes see? Simeon, moved by the Spirit, sees and recognizes Christ. And he

“The Holy Spirit...

enables us to discern

God’s presence and

activity not in great

things, in outward

appearances or shows

of force, but in littleness

and vulnerability.”

Moved to Discern God’s Active Presence

March/April 2021 17

prays, saying: “My eyes have seen your salvation” (v. 30). This is the great miracle of faith: it opens eyes, transforms gazes, changes perspectives. As we know from Jesus’ many encounters in the Gospel, faith is born of the com-passionate gaze with which God looks upon us, soften-ing the hardness of our hearts, healing our wounds and giving us new eyes to look at ourselves and at our world. New ways to see ourselves, others and all the situations that we experience, even those that are most painful. This gaze is not naïve but sapiential. A naïve gaze flees reality and refuses to see problems. A sapiential gaze, however, can “look within” and “see beyond.” It is a gaze that does not stop at ap-pearances, but can enter into the very cracks of our weaknesses and failures, in order to discern God’s presence even there.

The eyes of the elderly Sime-on, albeit dimmed by the years, see the Lord. They see salvation. What about us? Each of us can ask: what do our eyes see? What is our vision of consecrated life? The world often sees it as “a waste”: “look at that fine young person becoming a friar or a nun, what a waste! If at least they were ugly… but what a waste”! That is how we think. The world perhaps sees this as a relic of the past, something useless. But we, the Christian community, men and women religious, what do we see? Are our eyes turned only inward, yearn-ing for something that no longer exists, or are we capable of a farsighted gaze of faith, one that looks both within and beyond? To have the wisdom to look at things —this is a gift of the Spirit—to look at things well, to see them in perspective, to grasp reality. I am greatly edified when I see older consecrated men and women whose eyes are bright, who continue to smile and in this way to give hope to the young. Let us think of all those times when we encountered such persons, and bless God for this. For their eyes are full of hope and openness to the future. And perhaps we would do well, in these days, to go make a visit to our elderly religious brothers and sisters, to see them, to talk with them, to ask questions, to hear what they are thinking. I consider this a good medicine.

Brothers and sisters, the Lord never fails to give us signs that invite us to cultivate a renewed vision of

consecrated life. We need to do this, but in the light of the Holy Spirit and docile to his movements. We cannot pretend not to see these signs and go on as usu-al, doing the same old things, drifting back through inertia to the forms of the past, paralyzed by fear of change. I have said this over and over again: nowadays the temptation to go back, for security, out of fear, in order to preserve the faith or the charism of the founder… is a temptation. The temptation to go back and preserve “traditions” with rigidity. Let’s get this

into our head: rigidity is a perver-sion, and beneath every form of rigidity there are grave problems. Neither Simeon or Anna were rigid; no, they were free and had the joy of celebrating: Simeon by praising the Lord and prophesy-ing with courage to the child’s mother. Anna, like a good old woman, kept saying: “Look at them!” “Look at this!” She spoke with joy, her eyes full of hope. None of the inertia of the past, no rigidity. Let us open our eyes: the Spirit is inviting us amid our crises —and crises there are —our decreasing numbers—“Father, there are no vocations, now we will go to the ends of the earth to see if we can find one” —and our diminishing forces, to renew

our lives and our communities. And how do we do this? He will show us the way. Let us open our hearts, with courage and without fear. Let us look at Simeon and Anna: although they were advanced in years, they did not spend their days mourning a past that never comes back, but instead embraced the future opening up before them. Brothers and sisters, let us not waste today by looking back at yesterday, or dreaming of a tomorrow that will never come; instead, let us place ourselves before the Lord in adoration and ask for eyes to see goodness and to discern the ways of God. The Lord will give them to us, if we ask Him. With joy, with courage, without fear.

Finally, a third question: what do we take into our own arms? Simeon took Jesus into his arms (cf. v. 28). It is a touching scene, full of meaning and unique in the Gospels. God has placed His Son in our arms

(Continued on page 10)

18 March/April 2021

The Lenten Seasonand Religious Life

By Rt. Rev. Marcel Rooney, O.S.B.

Religious men and women have always consid-ered the season of Lent as their special season. We might see this as the consequence of the first

verse of chapter 49 of the Rule of St. Benedict. His was the oldest Order in the West, and on the first day of Lent this chapter of his Rule was always read to the monks: “...The life of a monk ought to be a contin-uous Lent.” However, Lent was special to those who wanted to live a serious religious or monastic life before Saint Benedict. The Church had given this season a dual empha-sis, which can be just as valuable in our time as it was for people in centuries past.

First of all, Lent is a time for an intense renewal of our par-ticipation in the paschal mystery of Christ. This might be called the Initiation emphasis of the season, for it is rooted in our Baptism and Confirmation, the sacraments which introduced us into the life of Christ, into the mys-tery of His death and resurrection. In the early centuries of the Church’s history, as new candidates went through the formation process of becoming Christian, the entire community was awakened anew and stimulated to renew

their own fundamental Christian vocation. The celebra-tion of the sacraments on Easter Vigil night always meant a profound renewal of each Christian’s decision and wit-ness to Jesus —new converts do that.

This first emphasis meant that Lent was a very for-ward-looking season, orientated to the Easter-renewal of

the vows of the Ini-tiation Sacraments. Saint Clement, in his late first century Letter to the Corin-thians, has, in part, that emphasis: Let us look to the Blood of Christ, the redemp-tion accomplished the Paschal Mystery, which is the cleansing of our sins. This out-ward/upward orien-tation of the Church made the season of Lent a season filled

with hope, oriented toward new life and zeal for God. “....and look forward to holy Easter with holy and spiri-tual longing,” says Saint Benedict (Rule, 49:7).

One sees immediately how religious life could em-brace such an orientation, how it could see itself as the continuation of the zeal of the martyrs, who in death were so totally configured to the Paschal Christ. It is an emphasis which we must recapture in our lives today, if

The Season of Lent is a special time for religious men and women. It is meant to be a kind of clarion call to be focused intensely on the Paschal Mystery through the cleaning of one’s sins.

March/April 2021 19

Lent is to prove fruitful for us. It means getting our mind’s eye off of ourselves, and looking to Jesus to be our model. That looking at Jesus is done especial-ly through intensified lectio divi-na, more time spent with Christ in prayer and holy reading.

The second great emphasis of the season of Lent is pen-ance. Saint Benedict can guide us here too: “...to keep one’s manner of life more pure, and to wash away in this holy season the negligences of other times” (49:2-3). Over the centuries, in particular as the Paschal Mystery emphasis lessened, be-cause the Liturgy was not fully understood nor appreciated by the majority of Christians, this penitential emphasis came to be more and more important. This was, in part, rooted in a major change regarding Initiation, for infant Bap-tism came to be the normal celebration (and, not just on Easter, but on any Sunday of the year). Along with this, catechesis on the great mysteries of the Faith tended to wane. As Lent tended to be less forward-looking to Eas-ter, the Church stressed more and more the divinity of Jesus —particularly in response to heresy which it wanted to fight with great vigor.

And yet, this is indeed a very valid emphasis. For all of us are sinners. All of us fail in the spiritual life, in many ways. Our religious profession calls us to live the fullness of the New Covenant of Jesus, but how easy it is for us to settle for half of it, or less. And so, Lent is a kind of clarion call to professed religious: be, at least in this special time of the Church’s Year of Grace, what we are professed to be. Saint Benedict, among other founders, admits that few have the strength to live the Covenant fully throughout the year, and urges us to spur one an-other forward especially at this time.

This means paying attention to the normal, every-day things—which can express so well our vowed cove-nant commitment to God. Think, for example: getting up on time for early morning community prayer (which implies going to bed at an hour that will make such pos-sible); care for silence; fidelity to holy reading and private prayer. But we who live in community, need to be atten-

tive to other elements important for supporting one another in our weaknesses, as we strive for union with God. One thinks of undisci-plined talk, which may scandalize others with regard to poverty or chastity; other areas which touch on the use of the tongue, such as: having the last word; complaining or murmuring; nagging. Then there are the areas in which vir-tues can be turned into vices: put-ting a dollar sign on everything and everyone, rather than striv-ing to be really poor; trying to be a perfectionist, instead of striving for good zeal; taking each other for granted, instead of striving for truly chaste love; feeling sorry for oneself, instead of striving for authentic repentance for our sins.

Yes, penance is at the heart of religious life. We must make it an integral part of our daily existence this holy season. But let us strive to do all within the context of the Paschal Mystery, “with joy and spiritual longing for Easter.” Thus, we will follow after our great High Priest, Jesus, who having learned obedience while He was on earth, and having offered His life for the re-demption of all, would lead us into that tabernacle not made by human hands, the heavenly sanctuary of God (Letter to the Hebrews, passim). We should know that it is less important to strive for perfection, and much more im-portant to search for God. For it is when we are least per-fect, indeed; when we were sunk in sin and helplessness that God showed the depth of His love for us, sending His only begotten Son to die for us (cf. Rom 5). If we would strive throughout this holy season of Lent for authentic repentance for the negligences of other times, we should do it knowing that Jesus has already won the victory for us, and awaits us with the crown at the end of the race. “For-getting what is behind, then, and straining toward what lies ahead (Easter, and then, Heaven), let us press forward to the finish line, to win the heavenly prize to which God has called us in Christ Jesus” (Phil 3:12-14).

Abbot Marcel Rooney is a Benedictine monk, abbot, liturgist, musician, and author. He is a member of Conception Abbey locat-ed in Conception, Missouri, which is part of the Swiss-American Congregation. He previously served as the eighth Abbot Primate of the Benedictine Confederation of the Order of Saint Benedict.

20 March/April 2021

With Sr. Helena Raphael Burns, FSPBlogger, Media Literacy & Theology of the Body Presenter

InnerView

You are known, Sister, for speaking on the Theology of the Body (TOB). How did you get interested in Pope St. John Paul II’s integrated vision of the human person?

As you probably know, the Daugh-ters of St. Paul print St. John Paul II’s Theology of the Body text: “Man and Woman He Created Them—a The-ology of the Body,” which has gone through three revisions through the years. I had the privilege of proofread-ing the very first edition as a novice. Although I hadn’t studied much the-ology or philosophy yet, and a lot of it went over my head, I remember absorbing three lasting lessons from that first perusal. 1) I intuited that al-though John Paul II was upholding and explaining Church teaching, this was also something original and earthshak-ing. I found his writing so refreshing and deep, and, unlike many, I enjoyed his philosophical style. He answered some of my unspoken questions like no other author. 2) I came to under-stand that sex is spiritual. It’s not just a carnal desire or an urge to reproduce the species. It’s bound up with our very personhood, individuality, our human dignity and destiny. The fact that a pope was waxing so eloquent on sex meant there was a lot more to it than meets the eye. 3. One of the footnotes blew my mind. In the footnote, JP2 spoke to us Westerners as an Easterner. He said that we Westerners don’t un-derstand symbols very well. We think they’re “just” a symbol, when they’re

actually the way to a reality. They are what they are in themselves, but al-ways something more and pointing to something more. And if we mess with or reject symbols (especially religious symbols), we blur the reality they repre-sent, and the reality becomes obscured and less accessible. Of course, he was referring especially to the spousal and sacramental imagery in the Bible and of the human body, male and female.

Little did I know that many years later, Theology of the Body would take over my life.

The Daughters of St. Paul were founded by Bl. James Alberione and Ven. Mother Thecla Merlo, FSP, to evangelize using various media. To-day, you are called to live as apos-tles in our fast-changing social me-dia-driven world. How do the sisters use today’s means of communications to teach the truths of the Faith?

We were founded in 1915, when the printed word was the primary me-dia used to spread the Faith (and all kinds of ideas for that matter!) Our Founder always said: “Fight fire with fire, the press with the press.” How-ever, Blessed James Alberione also had a kind of foresight that commu-nications technology was about to explode in the twentieth century, and he told us: “Use every new form of communications that human genius provides. Use the most modern, fast-est and efficacious means to reach the greatest number of souls, the masses,

with the Word of God in their own language.” So, we Daughters of St. Paul have always tried to be “early adopters” of each new invention as it comes out. Lately, we’re using the Internet more and more extensive-ly, podcasts, apps, our website and webstore, webcasts, e-books, You-Tube, etc., along side more traditional media. As our Sisters are invited to speak in person or virtually, we offer an accompanying display of pertinent books and media because Father Al-berione also believed that to have something physical in one’s hand: a prayer card, a book, a magazine, an image, makes the Faith tangible, en-during, and supports and prolongs the spoken word that can easily evapo-rate into thin air. I am so grateful that our publishing house, Pauline Books and Media, has an ever-growing line of Theology of the Body resources now. I also offer an online “Theology of the Body Foundations” Certificate Course to acquaint people with basic TOB background, concepts and ter-minology: SacredHeartCollege.ca.

What drew you to the Pauline Fam-ily and how has your personal in-volvement in its apostolate evolved as you have lived your calling?

Without going into the ins and outs of my vocation story, I was very drawn to the Daughters of St. Paul and their mission because I want-ed to share Jesus and the Catholic Faith, and I had always loved the

March/April 2021 21

arts, film, reading, writing, books, poetry, etc. I thought: What better way to bring God into someone’s mind, will and heart than through a story, a movie—something they could ponder in the silence of their soul. My faith journey was a bit intel-lectual, so I wanted to “be there” for others who were searching for God and the meaning of life. I fell in love with Father Alberione from the get-go: a modern saint who wasn’t afraid of technology and wanted to use it for the good. I feel very privileged to have been able to write, produce and direct a documentary on his life and work, which can be screened for free at MediaApostle.com.

Another reason I chose (and, of course, I believe God chose for me) the Daughters of St. Paul is our spir-ituality of Eucharistic Adoration and contemplation of the Word. All to-gether, we have three hours of prayer a day. A special part of our prayer life is to pray in reparation for evil media and for an increase in good media, and all that this entails.

You mention on your blog “Hell Burns” that our society’s separation of sex from love, marriage, and babies has created a culture of death; that separating two things that absolute-ly go together, that are intrinsically

united, results in spiritual and phys-ical death. What is inspiring young people to respond so positively to your talks on the TOB?

TOB provides the “why” be-hind Church teaching. Even those outside the Church pretty much know in general what the Catholic Church teaches. But do they know the “why”? Sometimes the profound “why” isn’t even taught in Catholic schools or other Catholics settings. So much of Church teaching sounds like “Thou shalt not” or “No.” So I dwell on what we’re saying “yes” to whenever we say “no.” I also start with the fact that God, Creation, the Bible, the Church and Science are all saying the same thing. Science backs up everything God ever told us is good for us or bad for us. It’s only the Sexual Revolution that’s out in left-field being unscientific. It blows young people’s minds.

Why is TOB so integral to vocation-al discernment?

Since we are not pure spirits like the angels, but humans made up of body and soul (or “body-persons” as JP2 likes to call us), our vocational discernment must include the body

For more information visit: HellBurns.Blogspot.com

first and foremost. What are we go-ing to do with these bodies that we are (with all their needs and desires for love, affection, fruitfulness, com-panionship, intimacy, etc.)? We can’t repress nor over-indulge these long-ings—no matter what our vocation is. We must redeem them by living the “redemption of the body.” Once we realize that “the body is for the Lord and the Lord is for the body” (1 Cor 6:13), we can make a gift of self appropriately to God and others. We will also understand that every man and every woman is a true spiritual father and spiritual mother, called to cultivate divine love and life in oth-ers. I do a workshop called: “Using TOB To Discern Your Vocation.” I make sure the audience understands that all of life is about marriage. The question simply is: “Which marriage are you called to?” And even with regard to singleness, no one can say: “my vocation is to be all alone,” be-cause God is the Spouse of every soul.

The caTechism Of The caThO-lic church states, “The home is the first school of the Christian life where all learn love, repeated forgiveness, and prayerful worship” (no. 1666). When this is lacking in one’s life (broken homes, abuse, influence of culture, etc), how can

22 March/April 2021

one develop a proper and integrated view of their purpose in life?

In working with youth and young adults, I’ve found that, even though they may be lacking in a Christian home life and masculine and feminine role models in their parents, they are looking for the truth about the hu-man body, about the human person, and thus, are automatically drawn to Theology of the Body. Surrounded by a culture of lies, the truth is very at-tractive! And TOB will stick for these young people if it’s accompanied by a loving, supportive community. TOB can’t just be a head trip, an intellec-tual exercise, a healthy moral code, or even a beautiful vision, without the Body of Christ exemplifying it in its various aspects. I was just at a secular university where this exact dynamic played out in a young man’s life (and now he’s probably the most fervent and zealous Catholic on campus).

The TOB is typically viewed as God’s plan for marriage. As a consecrated religious, how does this teaching res-onate with and inspire you?

Exactly! I viewed it as such until 2006. That’s why I waited so long to dive into it for myself, personally. My thinking was the typical: “The-ology of the Body is about chastity talks for teens and Natural Family Planning for engaged and married couples.” Basta così. Man, was I de-luded! TOB is for every body. What does it mean to be, not have a body? How does understanding and antic-ipating the resurrection of the body affect how we live our lives on earth? Since everyone was created to give and receive true love and true life, how do we experience this “spousal meaning of the body” according to our vocation? I really have to thank Christopher West here, who really drives home the fact that religious life is not a sacrament like marriage and priesthood, because these two sacraments are symbols and signs of the heavenly marriage, whereas we religious are living the heavenly mar-riage now.

I embraced radical feminism from a very early age. It was the only inner structure that I had to work

from. Throughout my religious life I was looking for satisfying answers because I knew the tenets of radical feminism were wrong, untrue and unsound, but it was almost impos-sible to shake the premises that had been so ingrained in me. Until 2006. John Paul II gave me permission to be woman. He told me it’s good to be a woman with my specific femi-nine gifts. It was enough to be “just” a woman without ever trying to be “as good as a man.” And my greatest glory? To be a Bride of Christ. Not only that, but John Paul II proved and demonstrated philosophically and theologically in a foolproof, air-tight manner, from the body, that all the claims of the Bible and the Cath-olic Church are true. He opened for me the meaning of the “first Book of Revelation,” Creation. He took the seemingly disjointed jigsaw puzzle pieces of the Ancient Faith, fit them together, showing how everything is connected to everything else, and left me with the finished, breathtak-ing picture of God’s design that was hiding in plain sight.

can’t help but recall the nature of religious life—that it is by working out our own salvation, by our personal growth in holi-ness, that we first and foremost contribute to the holiness of the Church. When I am a religious who is in love with and dedicat-ed to Jesus, when I am faithful to my life of prayer (both communal and personal), when I participate cheerfully and generously to the communal life and when I give of myself creatively and wholeheart-edly to the apostolate, I thrive. When I thrive, when I am tru-ly alive in Jesus, I am best posi-tioned to preach the Gospel, not

only by what I say, but most impor-tantly by how I live. I am living a Eucharistic life, and by doing so, I can humbly invite others to do the same.

As I end my reflections, I can’t help but recall how the Eucharis-tic Revival is under the patronage of Our Lady of Guadalupe. Wasn’t she so tender and attentive to the needs St. Juan Diego and his fam-ily? Yet, didn’t her love for Juan Diego prepare him for his mission to help make Jesus in the Eucharist known, loved and served? After all, she wanted him to ask the bishop to

have a temple built for her Son: a Church constructed where the Eucharist could be celebrated un-til the end of time. May Our Lady of Guadalupe intercede for us as we prayerfully discern how to say “yes” to God, as she did, by giving our “yes” to how He desires us to serve Him through the National Eucharistic Revival.

Sr. Alicia Torres is a member of the Franciscans of the Eucha-rist of Chicago, a religious com-munity that carries out the mission of the Church through service to the poor, evangelization, teach-ing and Eucharistic Adoration. For more information, please visit EucharisticRevival.org.

Eucharistic Revival (cont. from p. 5)

For more information visit: EucharisticRevival.org

March/April 2021 23

IRL News & Notes

New Vision for Catechesis in Parishes and Schools

The Church needs new cat-echetical resources that go beyond providing faithful

teaching. A true evangelizing cat-echesis must explain who we are as human beings, what our purpose in life is, why the faith is relevant in our modern culture, and how the Church provides the truth and grace to fulfill our mission.

Most importantly, catechesis must effectively call parents, teach-ers, and students to conversion and transformation in Christ. The AugusTine insTiTuTe and ignATius Press have joined together for ex-actly this purpose.

Word of Life offers solutions for authentic catechetical renewal. This innovative resource provides a complete tool kit to effectively form children, parents, teachers, and cat-echists. It calls them to true conver-sion and transformation in Christ to reinvigorate fruitful participation in the Church’s life and mission.

The year 2022 is very special for the Sisters of the Order of the Visitation, as they are

celebrating the 450th anniversary of the birth of their Holy Foundress, St. Jane de Chantal, as well as the 400th anniversary of the death of their Holy Founder St. Francis de Sales.

The Holy See has decreed that the Visitation Order can celebrate a Jubilee Year for their Founder, St. Francis de Sales, in their monastery chapels throughout the world, and that all may come to receive a ple-nary indulgence by coming to their

Double Salesian Jubilee Year Celebrationchapel with that intention. The Jubi-lee began on January 24th, the Feast of St. Francis de Sales, and will end on the anniversary of his death on De-cember 28, 2022.

The 2022 Double Salesian Jubilee may be seen as having three practical pillars: 1) increase knowledge and love of St. Francis de Sales and St. Jane Frances de Chantal; 2) encour-age imploring their intercession; and 3) imitate their virtues and devotion.

The Order was founded in 1610 “to give to God daughters of prayer, and souls so interior that they may

be found worthy to serve His in-finite Majesty and to adore Him in spirit and in truth.”

Through Four Golden Catechetical Threads, Word of Life provides a vision with answers.

—Salvation His-tory: Tells the story of God’s presence and plan in history and our place in that plan.

—Christian Anthropology: Reveals our identity in Christ and who we are called to be.

—Heroic Virtue and Charac-ter Formation: Makes clear that our dignity and purpose are found by choosing to live with heroic vir-tue and character.

—Learning through Disciple-ship: Witnesses ways to inspire stu-dents to live as committed disciples of Christ.

Word of Life Core Compo-nents:

• Parish and School English and Bilingual Editions

• Print and Digital Student Texts and Teacher Manuals

• Numerous video and digi-tal media enhancements for use in the classroom and at home

• Multi-level Teacher and Catechist Formation

• Parent and Family Faith Formation

Grades K to 5 available Summer 2022. Grades 6 to 8 available Summer 2023.

Learn more about Word of Life at 855-967-3720 or please visit WordofLifeSeries.org.

24 March/April 2021

sessiOn i: JulY 4–JulY 15, 2022• CONL 624—The Vows According to St. Thomas Aquinas

— Rev. Brian Mullady, O.P.• SPIR 635—Spiritual Direction

—Rev. Boniface Hicks, O.S.B.• SPIR 633—Living the Beatitudes in a Broken World and Wounded Church

—Rev. Sebastian Walshe, O.Praem. & Rev. Thomas Nelson, O.Praem.

sessiOn ii: JulY 18–JulY 29, 2022• SPIR 633—Christian Asceticism

—Rev. Thomas Nelson, O.Praem.• CONL 701—Theology of the Body

—Dr. Lucy Lu• SPIR 802—Philosophy of Man

—Rev. Anselm Rodriquez, O.Praem.

2022 VCI Summer Courses Scheduled

For more information, please call 703-658-4304 or visit Christendom.edu/vci

The Vita Consecrata Institute will be held this summer, July 4-July 29, 2022, at Christendom College in Front Royal, Virginia. The VCI consists of 2 two-week sessions, focusing on the theol-ogy of the consecrated life, and is ideal for those preparing for perpetual vows, wishing to pursue further academic studies, interested in a sabbatical or currently in formation. This program is designed to assist all participants grow in a deeper understanding and appreciation of the conse-crated life as “a gift of the Father to His Church through the Holy Spirit” (VC, no.1).

Ann Arbor OPs Mark 25th Anniversary

of FoundationOn February 9, 2022, the Dominican Sisters

of Mary, Mother of the Eucharist, marked the 25th anniversary of their founding. They were canonically established in 1997 in response to Pope St. John Paul II’s call for a New Evan-gelization and as such they seek to share God’s message of faith and the joy of religious life with the modern world through various outreach-es including education, vocations, and culture. “We are profoundly grateful for the support of the friends, benefactors, and families of our community who believed in the work of God in our Sisters for these 25 years,” the Sisters said. “Please continue to pray that we may become great saints and bring many souls with us to Heaven” (SistersofMary.org).

March/April 2021 25

Norbertines Host 2022 IRL LA Regional Meeting

For the first time, the Los Ange-les Regional Meeting was held on January 29, 2022, at the

new St. Michael’s Abbey in Silvera-do, California. For many of the 150 attendees, it was their first glimpse inside of the beautiful new home of the Norbertines.

Speakers included Rev. Bri-an Mullady, O.P., Rev. Peregrine Fletcher, O.Praem., and Mr. Enzo Selvaggi, who was extensively in-volved with the interior design of the new abbey. Holy Mass was cel-ebrated by Rt. Rev. Eugene Hayes, O.Praem.

We thank all who made the day an enjoyable one, especially the en-tire Norbertine community of St. Michael’s, as well as the Servants of Mary, Ministers to the Sick, who once again assisted with registration.

Please visit StMichaelsAbbey.com for more information.

Norbertines Announce Plans for the Diocese of Springfield

The Norbertines of St. Mi-chael’s Abbey in Silverado, California, and the Diocese

of Springfield in Illinois have an-nounced that the Norbertines will be establishing a new community in the Diocese, including a new center for Catholic spirituality and the for-mation of teachers of the Catholic faith. The planned evermode insTi-TuTe is named for the 12th century Saint Evermode, a close collaborator of the Premonstratensians’ founder, Saint Norbert. Evermode is known for his “great and effective works of evangelization and formation in the Catholic faith,” the Springfield dio-cese said.

“We have developed a strong relationship with the Norbertine Fathers of St. Michael’s Abbey over

the past several years, and we are thrilled to welcome them to our diocese,” Most Rev. Thomas John Paproc-ki said. “The Norbertines are a vibrant and growing community of holy men, and their presence and ap-ostolic work will be a great blessing to the people of our diocese and to this region.”

The evermode insTiTuTe will focus on formation, offering programming for ordained and lay teachers of the faith such as catechists, Parish School of Religion teachers (PSR), Catholic school teachers, and other groups who teach the Faith.

According to the Abbot, the Nor-bertine approach to forming teachers of the Catholic faith involves “offer-

ing compelling preaching by word and example, to groups and individu-als, which inspires and supports their growing closer to the person of Jesus Christ. From the perspective of the heart, Jesus Christ is the same yester-day, today, and forever (cf. Heb 13:8). Our mission is helping a new genera-tion of lay and ordained teachers ex-perience this truth and share it effec-tively with those whom they serve.”

26 March/April 2021

Affiliate in Focus

Benedictine Nuns of St. Emma MonasteryGreensburg, Pennsylvania

St. Emma Monastery is a small community of Benedictine nuns who seek God in this

“school of the Lord’s service.” Each of them has experienced Jesus in a very personal way that has drawn her to this particular Benedictine Mon-astery planted in Southwest Pennsyl-vania. A vocation is to a particular community—just as marriage is to a particular spouse.

Following the centuries old wis-dom of the Rule of St. Benedict, these women desire to “prefer Christ over all” with the Gospel as their guide. Through the lens of the Rule of Saint Benedict, the Gospel is made person-al and practical for a particular group of people.

The public prayer of the Church, the Liturgy of the Hours, forms the basic daily schedule around which everything else revolves. During Mass and during the Liturgy of the Hours that the nuns pray seven times a day, the nuns take their places in their choir stalls visualizing the Church at prayer. They sing the Divine Office in English according to simplified chant melodies; the melodies for the anti-phons and hymns change from liturgi-cal season to season.

Saint Benedict directs all “to seek peace and to pursue it.” Allow-ing the peace of Christ to change

their hearts is the task and the gift day by day. If peace were easy, the headlines on the newspaper would be different! Pax (peace) greets visi-tors to each Benedictine monastery; peace is the fruit of the struggle to let Christ change one’s lives and hearts like unto His.

The ministry of St. Emma Monastery is the monastic life: the search for God lived within their monastery. They are a spiritual cen-ter where people come to them. Each nun strives to see Christ in the

Seeking God in the School of the Lord’s Service

superior, the other nuns, the guests, the sick.

The eyes of faith see the tools of the monastery as the sacred vessels of the altar. Whatever it is they are do-ing, it is the means at that moment by which they offer their lives to God.

For Benedictines, hospitality is a key dynamic; they are “to welcome guests as Christ.” Hospitality orig-inates in the Heart of God: in Bap-tism they are invited to share the love of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. They offer hospitality to God by inviting

March/April 2021 27

In the Spirit of the Founders. . .

On February 25, 1931, Moth-er Leonarda Fritz, O.S.B., and ten sisters arrived at

St. Vincent Archabbey, Seminary and College, Latrobe, Pennsylvania. By 1939, they numbered 40 sisters. They came in response to a request to their Motherhouse, Abtei St. Walburg (Eich-staett, Germany) for sisters to work in the kitchens and dining rooms. The money they received during these first years helped sup-port the motherhouse in Germany that was strug-gling financially because of inflation and the large number of women en-tering. The sisters were a wonderful, prayerful influence on countless monks, semi-narians and collegians at St. Vincent through May 1987.

In spring of 1943, the sisters purchased a house and 10 acres near Greensburg. This offered a place where the community could go in the summer and eventual retire-ment. Already that first year groups asked to come to St. Emma for days of recollection—the beginning of the retreat movement! The following year the sisters purchased the adja-cent 100 acre farm.

During the 1950s the Fatima Chapel and retreat house were built. They offered the traditional Bene-dictine hospitality and provided the community a means of support.

In 1960, the first monastery wing with a small chapel was com-pleted; the first American women en-

tered the community in 1961. The second monastery wing was complet-ed in 1964. In 2002, the Cor Jesu Mo-nastic Chapel was dedicated, giving a visible center to their monastic life of prayer and dedication.

In January 2008, Mother Fran-ziska Kloos O.S.B., Ab-bess of Abtei St. Wal-burg, began the process to raise the American community to the ca-nonical status of an in-dependent priory. The Decree of Independence set the date as January 1, 2010, the beginning of the 1300th anniversary of the birth of St. Wal-burga, the patroness of their motherhouse and a special patroness for

the monastic community as well.On February 10, 2010, the

Conventual Chapter elected its first Conventual Prioress, Mother Mary Anne Noll, O.S.B. She had served the community as superior since 1993.

This small monastic community continues in its established rhythm of ora et labora. The nuns gather throughout the day to chant the Liturgy of the Hours as well as for the daily celebration of the Eucha-rist. These prayer times provide the framework for their day. The labora finds expression in the various tasks necessary to care for each other and to maintain the monastery, retreat house, monastic guest house and their Catholic gift and book shop with the aid of a very dedicated group of volunteers.

Synthesizing Faith and Culture

For more information contact:

Mother Mary Anne Noll, O.S.B.St. Emma Monastery1001 Harvey Avenue

Greensburg, PA 15601vocations@stemm.org

stemma.org724-834-3060

Him into hearts and lives each day. They offer hospitality to visitors with-in the monastery and to the retreat-ants, gift shop visitors, to the many people who visit their many beautiful Shrines and various events. Their de-voted volunteers (they have no hired help) extend this hospitality as well.

What does a monastery do? In the words of Mother Mary Anne, “A monastery is a GPS—a God Posi-tioning System. People always come to monasteries to get closer to God. In a monastery we become the ears of God when God doesn’t seem to hear. We offer the embrace of God when God can seem so far away. We offer a sacred vessel to collect tears that express emotions that words can only point to. We, in a monastery, are privileged to accompany many people on their roller coaster of life.”

28 March/April 2021

Theological ReflectionsBy Rev JohN a. haRdoN, s.J.seRvaNT of God/IRl fouNdeR (1914–2000)

Capital Sins and Virtues

There is no better way to appre-ciate the power of divine grace than to realize how natural-

ly prone we are to sin. We therefore need the grace of God to cope with our spontaneous evil inclinations, the result of Original Sin. At Baptism, we receive the supernatural power to overcome these passions, as we may call them. But the urges remain. They are traditionally identified as pride, avarice, lust, envy, gluttony, anger, and sloth.

We are naturally proud. We have a built-in self-esteem that tends to make us forget who God is and who we are. The most basic form of pride, therefore, is to think of ourselves independent-ly of God. We are forever thinking of what we want, instead of asking our-selves what God wants. As a result, we not only take other people for granted, we are inclined to use people for our benefit. Our pride leads us to see others as means for our own self-advantage to the point where we practically define “love” as the value that another person can serve in our lives.

We are naturally greedy. We have an instinctive desire to possess things. Of course, we need food, clothing and money to provide for our well-being in life. But avarice urges us to ac-quire more than we need. When it becomes an addiction, it degenerates into greed. We seek to accumulate in order to satisfy our ego, and then expect others to honor and praise us accordingly.

We are naturally lustful. The built-in desire for sexual pleasure, which is reserved for marriage, is not under spontaneous control. The sex-mania of the modern world is a tragic witness to the havoc that lust can create unless it is mastered by the rational will.

Envy is the sadness we feel when someone else has something or has succeeded which contrasts with what we lack or where we have failed. We naturally envy other people’s gifts or achievements, for no other reason than because they put us in the shad-ow. In other words, envy feeds pride.

Gluttony is the irrational desire for food and drink. It is irrational ei-ther in the quantity consumed or in the quality of what we eat and drink. Certainly, we must nourish our body to sustain our life and health. But as a society becomes affluent, its desires go far beyond what is necessary and re-sort to all kinds of exotic satisfaction of the palate.

Anger in itself is not sinful. It be-comes sinful when we are provoked to indignation over something trivial or when the intensity or duration of the anger is out of proportion to its cause. An angry person wants to re-move the obstacles that stand in his way. There is such a thing as using our temper. But we should never lose our temper.

We are all naturally lazy. We do not like to exert ourselves. A sloth-ful person does not want to do what

God expects of him, now, in these circumstances. We want to “take it easy.” Our fallen human nature dis-likes work whether physical, mental or moral.

In God’s providence, the seven capital sins are His way of urging us to a life of sanctity. What are we say-ing? We are saying that what we call the capital sins are really seven capital invitations from God to practice the corresponding virtues.

Our faith tells us that God nev-er permits any evil unless He fore-sees that a greater good will some-how result from the permitted evil. Our human nature has been terribly wounded by sin. Because of the sin of our first parents, we lost what is called the gift of integrity. We all now have concupiscence, which is the natural proneness to sin.

But what is so painfully obvious to us, that we lack the native power to control these sinful impulses, is pre-cisely why we must rely on the grace, won for us by Christ, to not only con-quer these evil inclinations. No, they are meant to strengthen our resolve to became saints. How? By going to Him who alone can enable us to ac-tually profit from the passions that plague our moral life.

Once we realize this, our lives are changed. Throwing ourselves into the arms of Christ, and relying on the help of His Mother, our sinful urg-es become the occasion for rising to heights of holiness.

◆ PRIESTS IN LOVE WITH GOD And Eager to Witness to the GospelArchbishop Alfred Hughes — This work provides an overview of the difficulties that Catholic priests have experienced in history as a background for o� ering a vision for the renewal of the priesthood. Archbishop Hughes draws on the Church's past e� orts to foster renewal in the priesthood to help with the renewal needed today. This book traces the development of priestly discipleship and spirituality in the face of historical challenges, and draws on this history to spell out a vision for renewal, attuned to the contemporary era. PLGEWP . . . Sewn So� cover, $16.95

“The bracing hopefulness of this book is that serious spiritual commitment will lead soon to an era of holy young priests in our midst." — Fr. Donald Haggerty, Author, The Contemplative Hunger

◆ THE MUSIC OF CHRISTENDOM — Susan TreacyMusic plays such an important part in everyone's life but how much do we know about the history of music? How did music shape our civilization and how was music itself shaped by the Catholic Church? Susan Treacy, an experienced professor of music, is an excellent guide to the history of music. Every Catholic should own at least one book on music. � is is it.MOCP . . . Sewn So� cover, $16.95

"While substantial enough to be a textbook, Treacy's ‘Christendom’ walks us through music history in just enough detail, yet with the easy style of a friendly BBC television narrator anyone can understand and enjoy." — Michael Kurek, Author of The Sound of BeautyProfessor of Music Emeritus, Vanderbilt University

P.O. Box 1339, Ft. Collins, CO 80522 (800) 651-1531

www.ignatius.com

P.O. Box 1339, Ft. Collins, CO 80522

Illuminating, Inspiring, Insightful

◆ THE CHURCH: Paradox and Mystery — Henri de Lubac, S.J.In these re� ections written at the end of Vatican II, de Lubac searches out the wrinkled, mysterious beauty of the Church he loves as his mother. He illuminates the documents of Vatican II, o� ering nourishment and clarity to those confused by the hypocrisy among Christians. De Lubac, made a Cardinal by John Paul II, re� ects deeply on the nature of authentic holiness in the modern world and argues that sainthood is not only possible but already—through the Holy Spirit—quite alive amidst all the storms today.CPMP . . . Sewn So� cover, $18.95

“A rich ecclesiology and a ‘road-map’ out of the wilderness in which the Church now � nds herself. � is book could not be more timely and will be consoling and inspirational for both priests and laypeople.”—Professor Tracey Rowland, University of Notre Dame (Australia)

◆ THE CITY OF GODSelections and Introduction by Hans Urs von Balthasar — St. AugustineFew books have impacted the West as deeply as � e City of God, in politics and philosophy, and in the spirit, with its exploration of the relationship between a loving God and a shattered world. Yet few people have read the massive work of over a thousand pages. Edited by Balthasar, this volume offers a simple, yet substantial road through Augustine's masterpiece, with selections culled for their beauty and spiritual power, bolstered with notes, and arranged by theme. It is also intended for prayer and meditation. CGP . . . Sewn So� cover, $19.95

“Taking the best translation of Augustine and drawing from Balthasar’s masterful parsing of the major themes, this is a treatise needed for our times today!” —Fr. David Vincent Meconi, S.J., Saint Louis University

Illuminating, Inspiring, Insightful

PO Box 7500, Libertyville, IL 60048

“Institute on Religious Life”

“Institute on Religious Life”

2022 IRL National Meeting May 21-22“Put on the Armor of God”

The theme for the 2022 National Meeting is “Put on the Armor of God: Renewed in our Evangelical Efforts to Win Souls for Christ.” The meeting will be held on May 21-22,

2022, at the University of St. Mary of the Lake in Mundelein, Illinois. The meeting will be live-streamed and in-person. The focus of the meeting will be to strengthen and encourage the attendees in the truths of the Faith. And how to use social media to present these truths Ad Majorem Dei Gloriam – For the Greater Glory of God.

Theresa Farnan, PhD is an author and moral philosopher who specializes in virtue ethics, moral education, philosophy of the person, gender and sexuality, and ethical issues facing the family. She has taught at Franciscan University of Steubenville and at seminaries and has served as a consultant to the USCCB Com-mittee on Laity, Marriage, Family Life and Youth. She speaks frequently on topics such as Christian anthropology, human dignity, the family, and gender ideology. She will speak on “The Catholic Response to Gender Ideology”

Sr. Helena Burns, FSP is a member of the Daughters of St. Paul. She has an M.A. in Me-dia Literacy Education; a B.A. in theology and philosophy; studied screenwriting at UCLA and Act One; and holds a certificate on Pastoral Youth Ministry. She also has developed a “Theology of the Body” curricu-lum for teens and adults. She will speak on “Media Literacy & Evangelization.”

Fr. Patrick Mary Briscoe, OP is the Associ-ate Executive Director of the Dominican Friars Foundation and the Promoter of Media for the Dominican Province of St. Joseph. Father is also the Editor-in-Chief of Aleteia (English). Aleteia reaches 20 million users worldwide monthly, promoting the Gospel through uplifting and transformational Catholic news, sto-ries and Spirituality. He will speak on “Are Bright Screens a New Dark Age? Evangelization in the Digital Media.”

Br. Sam Gunn, B.H. is a member of the Brotherhood of Hope and Director of Program Resources of Saint Paul’s Outreach, a Cath-olic movement that witnesses to the Gospel on college campuses and beyond. He previously served as a campus minister at Northeastern University in Boston and Florida State University. His latest book is “Clean Break: New Hope for Freedom from Unwanted Habits.” He will speak on “The Importance of Human Formation”

Scheduled Speakers

InstItutE on RElIgIous lIFE | P.O. Box 7500 | Libertyville, Il 60048-7500(847) 573-8975 | IRLstaff@ReligiousLife.com

2022 Pro Fidelitate et Virtute Award Ceremony

During the Saturday evening banquet, we will honor Rev. Brian Mullady, OP, with the 2022 Pro Fidelitate et Virtute Award. A long-time theological advisor for the IRL, Father has been

a staunch defender and presenter of the Catholic faith in a clear, intelligent and engaging way, through teaching, retreats, EWTN programs, books and videos.

(cf. Eph 6:11)