Coat of Arms Reveals Franciscan Legacy

Posted on January 28, 2009
Filed Under Franciscanized World | 4 Comments

Looking carefully at the lower left quadrant of the Catholic Memorial High School, Waukesha, WI, coat of arms, crossed hands of Christ and St. Francis are found. This a reminder of the Franciscan Sisters of Christian Charity’s presence in this place of learning for over fifty years.

On Tuesday of the national observance of Catholic School’s Week, January 27, 2009, members of the Franciscan community were again present on campus and attended junior theology classes. Welcomed by President Father Paul B. R. Hartmann, an alumni of the school, Principal Dr. Mark Schmitt, faculty, and others, Sister Mary Ann Spanjers, OSF and Postulant Pam Peasel were invited for a vocation panel. Students were attentive, interested and witnessed to the beauty of Catholic education and its relevance in their lives.

Catholic Schools Week is a joint project of the National Catholic Educational Association (NCEA) and the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops. (USCCB) The purpose of Catholic Schools Week is to build community awareness of, and involvement in, Catholic schools throughout the country.

What are your comments regarding Catholic education in our country?

On the Road Inspirations

Posted on January 26, 2009
Filed Under Vocations / Discernment | 6 Comments

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It is said that St. Francis spend one third of his time in contemplative prayer, one third of his time living the Gospel [serving others], and another one third of his time going from one place to another. The Franciscan Sisters of Christian Charity Vocation Directors offer the first of a series of ‘On the Road Inspirations’ gleaned from their experiences. Sharings from other travelers are welcome.

Francis: Be conscious, O man [woman], of the wondrous state in which the Lord God has placed you… (Admonition V)

Scenario of the Car

When one is in one place, one is not in another place. (WI vs AZ)

There has to be movement to get from one place to another.

Life Illustration

Young woman announces that she is seeking to know God’s will if she is called to be a Sister. (Car engine is running.)

One Year Later…

Young woman is still announcing that she is looking for God’s will if she is called to be a Sister. (Engine is still running, but the car hasn’t moved.)

Why hasn’t she moved? Does she really want to get to another place? Spent time in prayer? (Is there air in the tires?) Has she spoken to a spiritual director? (Checked the oil?) Visited a specific community of Sisters? (Do the lights work?) Gone on retreat with other young women thinking about doing the same thing?(Is the gas gauge close to empty?)

Xavier High School Students Receive Vocation Inspiration

Posted on January 23, 2009
Filed Under Franciscanized World | 3 Comments

January 20, 2009 was not the first day a Franciscan Sister of Christian Charity walked into Xavier High School, Appleton, WI, to share on the call to be a consecrated religious. The truth told, when the school opened its doors September 1959, Sister Peter Stengl, OSF, principal, and six other Franciscan Sisters of Christian Charity (including Sister Xaveria Wittmann, OSF) staffed the girls’ section.

Today fify years later, Sister Mary Ann Spanjers, OSF, a proud Xavier graduate, returned with postulant Pam Peasel to inspire the over sixty young women involved in a junior class retreat day about the Franciscan way of life.

Here’s one of the student’s favorite prayer:

I have the strength for everything through Him who empowers me. (Phil 4:13)

Doesn’t that young woman’s choice of scripture text sound like the Franciscan spirit is still alive and well? Xavier High School was recognized this year as one of the top fifty Catholic high schools in the nation.

Gospel Vision: Franciscans Without Frontiers

Posted on January 21, 2009
Filed Under Franciscanized World | 1 Comment

Brother Vincenzo Brocanelli, OFM, writes in a special 800th anniversary edition Franciscans Without Frontiers:

St. Francis understood that in order to be a true disciple of Jesus he also had to be His witness. The more he advanced in faithful imitation of Christ, the more he became His living image, His impassioned voice, which cried, ‘Love is not loved.” He invited all, men and women, simple and great, citizens and leaders of the people, to conversion and penance.

The Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary Province, Franklin, WI, added a supplement to the text that chronicles the beginnings of the friars’ mission in the Mississippi Delta and their outreach to foreign missions. Find in this more personalized province section mention of the Franciscan Sisters of Christian Charity presently in Gospel witness with the friars at St. Francis of Assisi Parish and School, Greenwood, MS. Find here a new definition of missionary enfleshed:

Nowadays, the missionary arrives in the local Church that already exists, which he must respect and serve, entering a culture in order to understand it in the first place, and then incarnate within it the evangelical Word.

How are you being called to live the Gospel of life in all its richness today?

Franciscan Sister Believes She Can Help People in Belgium

Posted on January 18, 2009
Filed Under Franciscanized World | 4 Comments

NPR features Tarak McLain’s ‘Thirty Things I Believe’ essay that is part of a longer work that he wrote at the completion of 100 days of kindergarten. Tarak begins with ‘life is good’ and ‘we can help people’.

Belgium’s Daily recently headlined Franciscan Sister of Christian Charity Sister Lorna Zemke, OSF as a ‘Famous American Music Pedagog Gives Workshop’. A full-time professor of music at Silver Lake College and an expert music educator in the Kodaly Approach to music education, she, too, believes ‘life is good’ and she ‘can help people’ by sharing her own expertise even if that means flying many hours away to do it.

Invited by Guido Six, Director of the Ostend Music Conservatory (55 music teachers who instruct 1700 students) in Ostend, Belgium, Sister Lorna spent a week of concentrated instruction with the faculty at three area music conservatories also including Ieper (remember In Flanders Field poem) and Roeselare Conservatories January 5-11. Sister conducted seminars on the essentials of the Kodaly Approach to Music Education and unique music teaching techniques. Notable hallmarks of her teaching include her unique Love notes: Music for the Unborn Child program and her use of hands-on-manipulatives in teaching music concepts.

Sister Marella Wagner, OSF, chair of the Department of Music at Silver Lake College and Professor of Music Theory, accompanied Sister Lorna. Sister Marella uses and adapts the Kodaly Approach to Music in the Comprehensive Musicianship courses she conducts for music majors and minors at the college.

One of the major differences in the present method of teaching music in Belgium and the Kodaly approach is the Conservatorie system’s fixed-Do solfege vs Kodaly’s moveable -Do solfege.

Tarak McLain and the Franciscan Sisters reaching out to others in Belgium are acting on their beliefs. What are some of your hopes and beliefs during this unique week that celebrates the beginning of the Christian Unity Octave?

One Time Photo Op Friday

Posted on January 9, 2009
Filed Under Franciscanized World | 6 Comments

Picture a full parking lot of photographers focusing on a newly renovated 1797 San Xavier Mission, Tucson, AZ. Patronato San Xavier planned this dusk to 10:30 p.m. one time photo Friday op on January 9, 2009. The gleaming west tower was especially stunning.

Adding special effects was a larger than your typical full moon (which was also 30% brighter than usual.) Quite a memorable moment to share with professional as well as amateur camera-shooting individuals. The Franciscan Sisters of Christian Charity living close by enjoyed the moment. And they look forward to more whitening of the exterior of the ‘White Dove of the Desert’.

Do you have any memories of being at this highly photographed place in the southwest? Have you ever visited San Xavier Mission School?

Attentive Consideration of Poverty that Builds Peace

Posted on January 8, 2009
Filed Under Franciscanized World | 9 Comments

When walking in San Miguel High School, Tucson, AZ, one is not necessarily whacked by a special solicitude to poverty. Rather, one is immediately overwhelmed by the peace and friendliness of students, faculty and administration. Here are young people, some former students of San Xavier Mission School and Santa Cruz School of which the Franciscan Sisters of Christian serve on the faculties and in the parishes, who are enthusiastic and open to sharing their thoughts and dreams.

In fact, it is only after delving into the mission of this secondary Catholic institution and the order of a typical day that one feels like Pope Benedict XVI’s 2009 World Day of Peace Message on “fighting poverty to build peace” finds a home here.

San Miguel High School is a “Cristo Rey model” school, using a corporate internship program developed by the Cristo Rey Network, which now consists of 19 high schools across the nation, all of which serve families of low-to-moderate assets. All students in all grades work one day a week at intern-level jobs in local corporations, companies, and nonprofit groups, thus earning tuition support and becoming acquainted with the wider professional and educational community in their area.

San Miguel High School opened in 2004 in order to create a learning community where students from families of limited financial means have the opportunity to develop to their full potential. San Miguel is located in Tucson’s economically depressed south side where 50% of adult residents do not have a high school education and 42% of San Miguel’s neighbors earn less than $25,000 per year.

If this doesn’t sound like the present and past Holy Fathers’ January 1, 2009 words were taken seriously when they “warned of the need to ‘abandon a mentality in which the poor- as individual and as peoples-are considered a burden, as irksome intruders trying to consume what others have produced’. The poor ask for the right to share in enjoying material goods and to make good capacity for work, thus creating a world that is just and prosperous for all.”

The Catholic LaSallian Learning Community lives an evident respect for the transcendent dignity of the human person. Peace is found here. Students are professionally groomed and learn in an already college campus style setting. Goodness is in abundance in the heart of South Tucson.

See Sister Kay Klackner, OSF article on the Catholic Social Principles: Rights, Responsibilities and Dignity of Work. How is work a participation in the action of creation?

Begin Mission of Passion

Posted on January 3, 2009
Filed Under Franciscanized World | 4 Comments

January 3 is the third day on the Gregorian calendar. It is also the third day that Father Anthony Cirignani, OFM, is serving as the Franciscan Sisters of Christian Charity chaplain. A Franciscan Friar of the Assumption Province, Father Tony is presently serving the Franciscan Sisters while living in fraternity in a house recently established in Manitowoc, WI. A friar is “wherever people need to hear the Good News of Jesus Christ and to experience God in their lives”. A mission of passion.

January 3 also marks the first ordination by Bishop David Ricken in Wisconsin’s Green Bay Diocese. The newly ordained, Father Jason Blahnik, is a relative of one of the Franciscan Sisters, Sister Christine Stoller, OSF. And Father Jason will have his first Mass of Thanksgiving at the Sister Bay site of Stella Maris Parish, Door County, WI on Sunday. See Compass News slideshow. Other photos on Flicker.

Father Jason’s first days following diaconate ordination were ministering at St. Raphael Parish, Oshkosh, WI where Sister Anne Marie Lom, OSF, is a spiritual director and parish staff member. And where Sister Pamela Biehl, OSF, is a parish director of nearby St. Mary Parish in Winneconni and Omro, WI. (Find (pre-priesthood) Father Jason in this podcast. View his ordination podcast compliments of St. Raphael Parish.) Integrating the life of prayer and service is a mission of passion for a committed diocesan priest.

This third of January the Franciscan Sisters of Christian Charity also celebrated the Mass of Resurrection for Sister Eligius Hoolihan, OSF, who was a consecrated religious woman for eighty-four years and shared her art of teaching music until she was 89 years old. She lived to be one hundred and two years old. A mission of passion.

Do you have any stories of individuals who live life with a mission of passion? Or helpful hints on how to live with deep-down, burning charity?

January Song by Catherine MacLellan

Posted on January 1, 2009
Filed Under Song of the Month | 40 Comments

‘As winter hits’ seasonally and metaphorically in this 2009 new year, the Franciscan Sisters of Christian Charity feature Catherine MacLellan’s January Song from the album Church Bell Blues. Catherine MacLellan’s compelling voice, honest lyrics and expressive acoustic guitar are all neatly framed by the empathetic production of longtime collaborator James Phillips. (Photo: Patrick Nichols)

With this album I was just finding a way to communicate my sadness and my feelings that I couldn’t necessarily express directly to people. I wrote most of the songs in the winter or the fall, when everything is dying and really quiet. It definitely represents the mood.

I definitely write about my personal experience, and I find people seem to respond by relating it to their own personal situations. That way, the songs are not necessarily just about me, and that’s what you aim for. -Catherine MacLellan

Her music is a characteristic of the work of many of the singer/songwriters Catherine cites as influences and inspirations, artists such as Joni Mitchell, Nanci Griffith, Townes Van Zandt and Julie Doiron. As a young songwriter Catherine MacLellan did not have to look far for inspiration and insight into the creative process. She’s the daughter of Canadian music legend, singer/songwriter Gene MacLellan, the writer of such huge international 70s hit songs as “Snowbird” (the Anne Murray classic) and “Put Your Hand In The Hand” (Ocean).

Nominated for 2007 East Coast Music Award (Female Solo Recording of the Year) in 2006, Catherine picked up four awards at the PEI Music Awards including Songwriter of the Year. She is a favorite among her own songwriter peers.

Lyrics: January Song

I wasn’t expecting this, but I’m ready now

Suddenly the winter hits, there’s so much snow down

It’s not like the year before, everyone has changed their place

I’m knocking on brand new doors, everything is rearranged.

Yes, it was a crazy year, we all had so much fun

But now I feel I’m wasted here, time to get some things done

It feels so hard to begin, just want to hang around with you

Think I could fit some business in between loving you.

Now, we’re all tired and we’re all broke now we’re all anchoring

Too much drinking, too much smoke, too much of something

It is January, and I’m wide awake

Always feels like morning and I’m running late.

Purchase through True North Records.

Website: http://www.catherinemaclellan.com/

MySpace: http://www.myspace.com/catherinemaclellan

Happy Birthday Rio de Janeiro by Osmar Shineidr

Posted on January 1, 2009
Filed Under Image of the Month | 19 Comments

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Providing a complimentary vision of January in the southern hemisphere, the Franciscan Sisters of Christian Charity focus on this breathtaking photo by Osmar Shineidr.

I really don’t have much to say about the picture, it’s just a representation to the immense love I have for my city, with the many aspects that makes it beautiful: the religions, our balance between the nature that is everywhere sharing its space with buildings, poverty and richness, and yet the love for the beach and the sunny days joining them all, just like if there was no difference at all, the lovely and kind people I still find here…And the amazing Christ Renderer, that, as we say here: protect us all. - Osmar Shineidr

Portuguese explorer Gaspar de Lemos reached Guanabara Bay on January 20, 1502; hence Rio de Janeiro, “January River”. A legend is told that the mariners named the place by that name because they thought the mouth of the bay was actually the mouth of a river. No experienced sailor would make that mistake. At the time, river was the general word for any large body of water.See Flickr Site.

keep looking »

Coat of Arms Reveals Franciscan Legacy

On the Road Inspirations

Francis: Be conscious, O man [woman], of the wondrous state in which the Lord God has placed you… (Admonition V)

Scenario of the Car

Life Illustration

One Year Later…

Xavier High School Students Receive Vocation Inspiration

Gospel Vision: Franciscans Without Frontiers

Franciscan Sister Believes She Can Help People in Belgium

One Time Photo Op Friday

Attentive Consideration of Poverty that Builds Peace

Begin Mission of Passion

January Song by Catherine MacLellan

Happy Birthday Rio de Janeiro by Osmar Shineidr

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