More on Sisters of St. Joseph: Gathering the Daughters

"Gathering the Daughters" was quite a full meeting. I was going to write more and then received this reflection from Sarah, one of the members in Initial Commitment. That means she has professed "First Vows" and is in a 3-6 year process of moving toward "Perpetual Vows" also sometimes called "Final Vows." Some of my friends and co-workers call all this type of language "nun-speak" so I try to explain terms as I use them. Here are the reflections Sarah sent last evening.

Unable to sleep after blistering my back hunched with Sister Rani and the women in the fields of India; massaging my fingers after a ten hour day of crab picking with Sister Julie in the factories of Philadelphia; slightly triumphant after spending myself with Sister Griselda to expand the minds of children and parents in the cloistered pueblos of Mexico; I return to Ripley both exhausted and renewed. For three days, one hundred directors and newer, younger CSSJs gathered in Skaneateles, NY from across the continent and the globe to share our hearts. We told stories of the world's miseries and the mysteriously awesome way God continues to use our charism to overpower those miseries with love.

For us Daughters of Joseph who have been brought up, formed in the global neighborhood, this bi-annual gathering is a coming home, a place where our assumption of oneness takes concrete expression. It's a place where I hear myself at the table. Here it is not a single voice but a bubbling chorus expressing the desire to minister in direct service with the economically poor, to simplify our living, to live in community sharing our hearts and lives and ministries in a way that honors the energy we have as members in our twenties, thirties, forties, fifties. It is a dream we are dying to live.

As with any such experience, I cannot put into words the impact of such a gathering. I cannot reasonably share the powerful images that brought us from laughter to silent, truthful gasp in two sentence time. I can say that I am excited in my call to be a Sister of St. Joseph, excited to move into the future pleading to be birthed, grateful for the glimpse of oneness in which I walk, oneness beyond my comprehension. We are Sisters and Daughters of Joseph alive for the life of the world.

Sarah has her own blog and you can read her recent post about Gathering the Daughters on her blog called CSJ on Mission . In my previous post I mentioned that two sisters from Peru were unable to obtain tourist visas in order to come to the gathering. Sarah put an album together with a picture and greeting from everyone who was present. The picture above shows Sarah [in red] and others preparing that book.