communitas et caritas

Today we celebrate the feast of our foundress--Saint Madeleine Sophie Barat!  Happy Feast! I'm stuck on the first rite of the mass (the introductory verse that we usually skip): "Set me like a seal on your heart, like a seal on your arm, for love is strong as death ."   (Cant. 8:6) Love is strong as death.  Over the past several months, I've been pondering how love can conquer our fears, that my fears are eased when I remember the love of Jesus.  What do I have to be afraid of when I am filled with God's love--a love that is far stronger than all else! And yet, I do have fears. We all do.  Fears of failure, of disappointment, of loss, and of death, to name a few.  One of the most beautiful things about the Society of the Sacred Heart for me is the element of love.  Sophie founded a community of women who are devoted to sharing God's love with all they meet.  Women who help every person they encounter to know that they are loved.  I...

God's mercy and faithfulness shine forth in a world wounded by sin. (Constitutions 2) Our vocation arises from our wounds.   Do you ever have one of those weeks where one idea keeps coming to your attention, from a variety of sources? This week, the idea of woundedness -- my woundedness, Jesus' woundedness, the wounds of our world -- finds its way into my daily life.  I thought I could share some thoughts and quotes. Part One: On Monday, I had a class, taught by a psychologist, that discussed how our family of origin and our experiences in childhood influence our reactions and behaviors throughout our lives.  This is in the context of religious life--how does what we learned as a child affect our interactions with our community members?  He talked about how all families are imperfect, and the "wounds" are not necessarily huge things.  But our experiences do shape our beings in very specific ways--they become part of our identity.  We look to our p...

Today is the feast of St Madeleine Sophie Barat, foundress of the Society of the Sacred Heart of Jesus!  She was born in 1779 in France, and she founded this "little Society" in 1800.  I keep learning more and more about her, but I'm sure there are better biographies online than what I could provide.   What I love about Sophie is her generous heart and her recognition of the Christ in each individual.  Her letters show how she knew the needs and hearts of each individual to whom she wrote--and she addressed them with loving care, seeking to comfort those who needed comfort and gently challenge those who were too comfortable. The readings for her feast day include Colossians 3:12-17, which seems to sum up her ideals very well: Put on then, as God's chosen ones, holy and beloved, heartfelt compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness, and patience, bearing with one another and forgiving one another, if one has a grievance against another; as the Lord has forgi...

I'm sorry to have neglected the blog!  Life gets crazy sometimes, and you could say that about the last month. Today, my community is doing a day of formation centered on the life and teachings of Mother Janet Erskine Stuart, the fifth Superior General of the Society of the Sacred Heart.  She's most known for her ideas about education, and in fact, you can find her work The Education of Young Girls in its entirety online here .  (Another work, The Life and Letters of Janet Erskine Stuart , by Maud Monahan is also available as an ebook.) One quotation to share, which I find fits with my understanding of a teacher's role: "What do we want to bring up? Not good nonentities, who are only good because they are not bad. There are too many of them already, no trouble to anyone, only disappointing, so good that they ought to be so much better, if only they would. But who can make them be more?… Those who have to educate them to something higher must themselves have ...