The Legacy of Our Acts of Trust

Many things had to happen for me to make my perpetual profession as a Benedictine sister — some reaching back all the way to 1863! In that year the prior at St. Benedict’s Abbey, Augustine Wirth, decided that a school was needed for the rapidly growing town of Atchison. One hundred families formed a society and pledged to pay 50 cents per month to pay for the new building. My great-great-grandfather, Lambert Halling, an immigrant from Frankfort, Germany, who worked as a carpenter for the Abbey, started swinging his hammer, and seven Benedictine sisters from St. Cloud, Minnesota, agreed to move to Kansas to staff the school. Lambert met the sisters at the Ferry on the evening of November 11, 1863, escorted them to their new convent and school, and stood guard until morning to protect them from harm. Thus the community of Mount St. Scholastica was established — the place where, 159 years later, I have found a home for my vocation.

Prior Augustine, the townspeople of Atchison, my great-great-grandfather, and the sisters from St. Cloud had no idea if their efforts in this frontier town during the Civil War would be successful, but they saw a need and came together to act on it. We can take inspiration from their story to do the same thing in our own time. Not many of us can build a school out of our own resources or meet any of the other pressing needs of our society alone. However, when we are united in the Body of Christ, we have the power to improve the lives of others, and our efforts come back to us as a blessing,

My great-great-grandfather cannot have known that in 159 years, his great-great-granddaughter would take vows in the community of sisters he helped to house and protect. None of us can foresee the effects of our actions, but as American Civil Rights leader Ralph Abernathy said, ““I don’t know what the future may hold, but I know who holds the future.” When we act on behalf of others and leave the outcome in God’s hands, we can be at peace, a peace the world cannot give. 

Yielding to Our Vocation

Sister Joan Chittister says that for anyone with a vocation, whether it is to be a nurse, musician, car mechanic, or monastic, “…there is a deep down, simmering fascination in the subject at hand. Or to put it another way, our vocations are already in us.”

I can attest to that; I have had a “deep down, simmering fascination” with God since I was a child. It took a long time for me to surrender to it, however. Monastic life is no longer a common vocation, and being countercultural is not an easy path. The world is not geared for those who crave silence, solitude, a simple life, and a primary relationship with God. Eventually I saw the value of “seeking my tribe” in the monastery. Some people expressed surprise at how readily I adapted to monastic life, but as one with a contemplative temperament, I have found it much easier to deal with expectations in the monastery than expectations in the secular world.

I’ll be making my perpetual profession of the Benedictine vows of stability, fidelity to the monastic way of life, and obedience on May 15. A few days ago, someone asked me if I was getting cold feet, and although I certainly appreciate the ramifications of making this lifelong commitment, I am ready to make these vows. For me, perpetual profession is an acknowledgment and affirmation of my vocation and a vehicle for me to be fully myself.

It's always a cause for delight when a person accepts and gives expression to her vocation, no matter the subject of her deep down, simmering fascination. I am grateful for the whole-hearted support of so many family members, friends, and colleagues who will be celebrating with me.

Knowing God By Heart

In the April 2022 issue of Give Us This Day, I was struck by this description of Sr. Margaret Brennan, IHM, by one of the novices she directed: “She knew God by heart.”

How many things do we know by heart? Perhaps the way to get home, or our mom’s recipe for chocolate chip cookies, or the lyrics to a favorite song. But God — how do we go about knowing God by heart?

First, we need to differentiate knowing God through our mind versus through our heart. The mind wants to understand God — who God is, what God does, what God wants. The heart, on the other hand, wants to experience God, to be with God, as Jesus did when he went apart from others to pray.

Knowing God by heart necessarily requires spending a lot of time with God. To learn a song by heart, we sing it over and over; to learn a recipe by heart, we make it time and time again; to know the way home by heart, we follow the same path until it is ingrained in us. We can never know the depths of anyone we love, much less God, but that isn’t necessary to know someone by heart. What is necessary is to be present and listen, day after day, week after week, year after year. When we do that with God, people will also say of us after we die, “She knew God by heart.”