“A Home for Peoples’ Souls: A Service of Retreat”: Words for a New Day
Have you ever experienced hearing a phrase that seemed to claim you in a special way, has stayed with you over years and that continues to inform and guide your thoughts and actions today? I first heard “my” phrase during novitiate (the time of early formation for new sisters in religious communities) some 18 years ago. When being introduced to the history of the Sisters of St. Joseph in France, where our Congregation was founded, we were told that just prior to and during the French Revolution (1780s) the Sisters became a “home for people’s souls – a service of retreat”. These words somehow lit a spark in me, and I’ve since pondered deeply their possible relevance for today.
The French Revolution took place within a context not unlike our own. Many people lived in deep poverty, disease was rife, there was societal violence and corruption in both church and state. Many lived in fear. Inequalities in society were marked. People were dejected, sick and hope was waning. Above all, people needed a place to feel valued, loved, cared about and safe, a place of momentary respite, a small glimpse of beauty, a moment of promise for a new day. And so, today as we face similar struggles, I think those same yearnings are present in the world and in our local communities, yearnings that Fr. Ron Rolheiser, OMI, calls a “holy longing”, especially a longing for meaning and belonging in a time of uncertainty and chaos.
“people needed a place to feel valued, loved, cared about and safe, a place of momentary respite, a small glimpse of beauty, a moment of promise for a new day”
As I reflect on these times in which we are living, the words that I heard and loved so long ago seem to have taken on a fresh urgency and relevance: Be, “a home for peoples’ souls, a service of retreat”. By this I don’t mean some superficial, pious interaction or a running away from reality but a being there for one another, being a listening, loving presence, recognizing the needs and vulnerabilities we all have at some time and receiving them with grace. We can all make a difference, however simple, in our own and other’s lives through encountering one another in respect, compassion and care with a deep understanding and non-judgmental approach to the stresses, suffering and anxieties of this time, our time.
In the words of some beautiful prayers of intercession that I encountered this morning: May we be:
home for the broken-hearted;
peace for the war-torn;
hope for the powerless;
wine for those who thirst for justice;
a voice for the oppressed, and
a comfort for the sorrowing.
In these ways may we become for a new day “a home for peoples’ souls, a service of retreat” - witnesses to a oneness of being and fundamental human experience, the reality of belonging, a hidden joy, and an unfolding hope.
-Sister Mary Rowell, csj
image: unsplash/Luís Feliciano