A Special Celebration

A Special Celebration This Year

There were twenty of us aged 5 to 91 years, Muslim, Buddhist and Christian gathered for the first time after COVID to celebrate being with one another again or meeting each other for the first time.  These were refugees associated with the Sisters of St Joseph Refugee Committee in Hamilton as well as members of the Committee.

We went around the circle and asked what each was looking forward to over the holiday time.  One woman said, ‘being with friends like you’ before tears began rolling down her cheeks.  Another woman and her son were relieved after becoming permanent residents seven years after arriving in Canada.  At this time last year, they had their plane tickets as they were being deported back to their home country even though they feared for their safety should that have happened. We are so thankful that those circumstances changed and we were able to celebrate together this year!

Everyone brought some food, and the variety was amazing.  Games were played with the biggest hit being the old-fashioned game of Musical Chairs.  Much laughter ensued.

I have the privilege of being included in many celebrations with family and other friends but this particular celebration will hold a very special place in my heart.

Image: Unsplash/Kolby Milton

May we all find and spread joy with being with others, whoever those ‘others’ may be.  This is truly the joy and hope that God promises.

-Sister Nancy Sullivan, CSJ

The Incarnation: God With Us

On this last Sunday of Advent, Matthew’s Gospel presents a synopsis of how the birth of Jesus the Christ took place.  It focuses on Joseph’s visit from an angel who revealed that his wife Mary was found to be with child by the Holy Spirit. This unusual occurrence came to be known as the Incarnation.  The word Incarnation, as it is known in Christianity, if capitalized, is the union of divinity with humanity in Jesus Christ.  (Wikipedia)

During an hour of exposition of the Blessed Sacrament recently, I was overcome thinking about the Incarnation.  In Spanish, incarnation means “flesh”. God has taken on flesh and is one of us. During prayer, I was overwhelmed that Jesus would put on flesh and be born a human being.  How awesome that God would find a way to send His Son, as scripture explains, by overshadowing Mary. The baby who would be born would be the Son of the Most High.

Throughout the centuries. Christmas has been associated with the birth of Jesus, Mary’s son. Is Christmas only a one-day celebration and then we let it go?  Oh no! Jesus is an ongoing Incarnation. Every time we imitate Jesus and have faith in Him, He is born again and again.  On the cusp of Christmas, Advent reminds us of the Incarnation of God’s abiding presence.  Jesus continues to be born every time His presence leads us to imitate Him.

The late Thomas Keating, Cistercian monk and noted spiritual writer, in his book, Awakenings, refers to the Incarnation:

“God has become

one of us and is breathing our air”…  Through His humanity, the whole universe has become divine… By becoming a human being, He is in the heart of all creation and in every part of it”.  (AW, 95-97)

Incarnation, what an amazing Christmas gift!

-Sister Joan McMahon, CSJ

Accounting for One’s Hope

“Always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have.” 1 Peter 3:15

We might find ourselves at times somewhat hesitant to answer this soul-searching question posed in 1 Peter 3:15. Yet, being ready to give an accounting for one’s hope has the power to ground us. Furthermore, I trust it has the potential to be life-giving for others.

Regarding hope, a newly published book by Maude Barlow caught my attention. As an avid bookworm, how could I resist adding it to my library? The writer is a well- known Canadian activist and author. She openly admits in the first sentence of the introduction that she has been contemplating the notion of hope for a long time. In her book, Still Hopeful: Lessons from a Lifetime of Activism, Barlow, without hesitation, eloquently delivers the reasoning behind her hopefulness amid global trauma.

The author relays her life experiences during her forty plus years as a social activist. She was active politically during the struggle for the expansion of women’s rights, the battle against free trade and globalization, and the global fight for water justice. Her recollections transport the reader through the twisting, slow course of societal transformation while conveying the lessons she has learned in the process. Barlow provides the reader with 223 pages of wisdom and encouragement. Woven within her engaging storytelling are eight cameo appearances of other notable changemakers who answer the question, “Where do you find hope?” Together with Barlow, they contribute an antidote to the temptation to succumb to a growing sense of universal pessimism.

At right, Maude Barlow being interviewed about Still Hopeful: Lessons from a Lifetime of Activism and here is a link to a wonderful 4-minute interview on Global News.

 -Sister Nancy Wales, CSJ

Growing Peace

As we come nearer to Christmas, we hear the music and the many greetings offering Peace and Goodwill to all.  And we all need to hear this many times over the coming weeks.  However, this is a greeting that is most welcome at this time of year, but it is also needed any time of the year.

The coming of Christ, the Prince of Peace, is what we long for during these remaining Advent days, and it is a longing that lives in us every day of the year. But we can’t make Christmas with our backs to the troubles of our world.  When we look around the world, we see war and hunger, natural disaster destroying crops and livelihoods, economic warnings and homelessness and sickness and death both far away and close to home.

Image: Unsplash/Tamara Menzi

David Steindl-Rast, a Benedictine monk, invites us to take our place as peacemakers in today’s world.  This longing that we all have hidden within our hearts begins when we can turn this longing into a movement for peace.  How you ask?  To quote Brother David, this peace will be…

• More than a truce: it is love and forgiveness and recognizes that the price of every gun is a theft from the poor.

• Saying yes to reverence, dialogue, and sensitivity, and saying yes to economic and educational security and affordable housing security.

• Saying no to violence, competition, and war, and saying no to the terrorism of poverty, ignorance, homelessness, racism, and ecological devastation.

• Saying yes to mercy, kindness, forgiveness, cooperation, and a convergence of the heart, whereby we summon the courage to stand up for freedom.

We can begin to make this path homeward to peace, when, as the poet Rumi suggest:

“Let the beauty we love be what we do.  There are hundreds of ways to kneel and kiss the ground.”

Take a few moments to consider how to see beauty around you and metaphorically kneel and kiss the ground.

If we can try living this way, each day we can grow the Peace wherever we are.

-Sister Joan Atkinson, CSJ