Sr. Rachel Terry, IHM Novice
 Rachel in Peru
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Reflection by Sr. Rachel Terry, IHM Novice
March 3, 2007
Gathering of Sisters Age 57 and Younger
IHM Center, Maxis Cafe
 What about my life has inspired passion for the religious life?
In light of this response, what will the future require of us?
In light of this response, what do we want/need to learn together?
We were asked to reflect on recent months or years and in that time what has inspired passion for the religious life. My recent years include not only living the religious life, but living as a young single person discerning the religious life and so I hope that in my thoughts today I can express what passion drew me here and what passion has stirred me to remain.
As a student at Marywood, I was blessed with the chance to be educated by many of our IHM Sisters. It was not just the professional competence of my teachers that I was drawn to, for I had many excellent teachers that were not Sisters, but there was just something about those nuns. The Sisters came to our concerts and stayed around afterward to tell us that we did a good job. They were in the dining room eating in the same place where we ate, laughing, talking, and having a great time! They came to Mass at our chapel, sang and prayed with us. And not just with us, but like us.
We as young people did not have to conform to an established formula of belief and worship, but were encouraged to be brave and try new things and discover just how much we are loved by God if we could only be ourselves enough to find out. We walked through the Marian Convent and sang Christmas carols and saw our teachers caring for their Sisters lovingly. We saw a professor that struck the fear of God in us in the classroom smile gently as she wiped dribble from the chin of one of her former teachers and then kissed her on the forehead. We witnessed those fun filled and tender moments, but we also were a part of challenging moments. We were invited to sleep outside in the cold to raise awareness for our homeless brothers and sisters, to love a child who no one else wanted to love, to write a letter to a politician that spoke to issues such as relieving third world debt and abolishing the death penalty. We were asked hard questions about our images of God and our relationship to God, others and self. Through all of these events the one consistency was that the Sisters were there, and not merely there, but truly present, participating, and empowering us as young people, young women especially to find our place in the church, to discover service to God and God's people, to embrace a God who loved us just the way we were. That was what inspired me to consider religious life.
I wanted to know more about a life that would produce such intelligent, talented, tender, gentle, impassioned, empowering, joyful, prayerful, holy and wise women. How I ever dared to believe that I could be part of that group, I may never know. Only through the grace of God and the affirmations of those in whom I had confided my desire was I emboldened to pursue this path. But, I am grateful for my daring every single day.
Once I took the plunge and entered the IHM Congregation, I was not disappointed. My year as a candidate ranks as one of the happiest years of my life. I lived in a community that was supportive of and loving toward me, and who looked beyond our 40-50 year age difference to welcome my support and love for them. We were creative in our prayer and in our fun times and challenged each other to try new things as well as respect and enter into traditions. The "everydayness" of our living was comforting and delightful to me as I struggled to live into this new way of life. We shared simple times; watching a basketball game, talking over tea at the kitchen table, having my friends over for my first feast day dinner. We shared difficult times; mourning the losses of friends and family, caring for sick and elderly relatives, discerning new ministries. Throughout all of our experiences, that presence that I was so keenly aware of as a student at Marywood never faded, it simply assumed a new face. I needed those comforting, supportive and loving experiences to foster my love for community and fan into flame my gratitude to God. The simplicity and joy of my community experience entwined with the journey toward God who is the source of all joy was what inspired passion for religious life in the very beginnings of my journey.
My novitiate experience has been a variety show of emotions, learning, stretching and deepening and culminated in an experience I had while in Peru which I would like to share with you all. Although my journey to the people and culture of Peru was incredible, the journey I faced in myself that month was not an easy one. I left the United States with, essentially, only the clothes on my back, my passport, and a stomach virus. Two weeks into my sojourn, stripped of my possessions, my health, my known relationships, my means of communication, and my peace of heart and mind, I was left only with me at my most vulnerable and God, who was all that I had in the world. I wept as I sat at the foot of my bed and spoke those words, "God, you are all that I have." My tears were not tears of joy. It was a very desolate and stark reality to face, but an experience that no novitiate program could have designed better. I had found my passion, my forever passion, for religious life. No matter what we look like, where we live, how many we are, what we are doing in our ministries, I know that religious life is viable because it is based in the truth that indeed God is all that we have. That is what unites us to one another, to our founders, to those we minister to and with, to those we advocate for, to those we love deeply and those we have trouble loving.
I know why I felt so instantly at home at Marywood and in the years following, because our charism, the tiny piece of God's truth that we call our own, was born in me long before I knew IHM Sisters even existed, and my longing to connect with that life energy drew me here. Before I could even verbalize that God was all that I had, I knew it and my spirit yearned to live in enough freedom and safety to be able to be vulnerable enough to admit it, and I was lead here.
Our dependence on the providence of God, our commitment to one another, and our gently powerful presence to God's people, both individually and collectively, have been, are now, and will continue to be that which inspires me to live the religious life.
I don't know what the future will require of us, but I believe that our presence as women radically dependent on God and willingly interdependent on one another is an invaluable gift to our church and our world. My hope is that we challenge each other to be that dynamic presence in whatever way we can be, but that we never judge one another for how each one is best able to be the light of the world. To sustain our freedom to be vulnerable enough to rely on God and one another will require of us strength of character, deep respect for the diversity among us, and a love beyond all telling. I look forward to many years of journeying with all of you, conversing with you, being transformed by you, relying on you, providing for you, and loving you very much. |
