Missionary Sisters of the Sacred Heart of Jesus

On this date, March 31, 1889…

March 31, 2022

On this date,
March 31,1889…
One hundred and thirty-three years ago, Mother Cabrini arrived in New York City to begin her ministerial work. “Their traveling expenses were paid by the Vatican Congregation for the Propagation of the Faith, Cabrini and her companions had come to New York ‘to help Italian immigrants.’”

It was specifically to attend to these neglected Italians that Cabrini had chosen to come to America. [At that time], a young woman, who soon joined the Missionary Sisters and assisted in their work for Italian immigrants, noted:
“I was seventeen years-old when I first met…[Mother Cabrini] the third day after her arrival in New York City. The first Sunday she was there I accompanied her and her Missionary Sisters to Saint Joachim’s Church…Mother Cabrini, with lively encouragement, sent me and other young people to visit the families of the parish and often she went herself. She hoped to attract boys and girls, the young people, entire families to religious instruction.”

Hearts aflame with love, Mother Cabrini and her sister companions began their parish ministry to the poorest of the poor in humble surroundings. The first sisters in New York and Missionary Sisters who later ministered in the U.S. experienced hard lives, but they prevailed. The first “Memorie” of New York, in 1899, recounts, “No one speaks of rest. Those who perhaps before were less used to doing such now clean, wash, scour…and undertake difficult and repugnant tasks without any signs of distress.” While their lives were difficult and they encountered prejudice, they were not unhappy. The sisters knew the joy of recognition and trust which came to them in the immigrant communities of New York and elsewhere. They were proud as the immigrants took heart, and elated when they frequented the church.
~ excerpts from Mother Cabrini, “Italian Immigrant of the Century” by Sr. Mary Louise Sullivan, MSC, PhD

Black is Blessed. Ethiopian Icons by Laura James

March 22, 2022

~ a reflection by Evarlyne Ndeti, MSC Novice

Who would ever think of the Ethiopian Christian artwork being displayed in an exhibit in New York City?! Being able to witness these phenomenal artworks at the Sheen Center in Greenwich Village, brought such a realization of possibilities. The uniqueness and beauty of each image was beyond description.

Reading about the artist’s life and the ideas/decisions towards the Ethiopian artwork was stunning also. Each one of us, after the tour, got an informational sheet about the artist and her artwork. For more information: https://www.laurajamesart.com/laura-james-bio/

We were in awe seeing these beautiful works of Christian tradition and features of biblical scenarios. We were also grateful to God, Laura James and to Sr. Bernadette Anello, MSC, who found out about this exhibit and invited us to go and see. Some of the featured stories included: The Call of Mary Magdalene, as someone who is very important and highly recognized in Jesus’ mission; The Sermon for our Ancestors which illustrated the African American history of enslaved people; Jesus’ Proclamation of God’s Kingdom.

In love and gratitude we continue our pilgrimage to Our Lady of Pompeii Church where we prayed before the image of St. Frances Cabrini, before returning to the novitiate.

Cabrini of Westchester Celebrates New Dialysis Den

March 10, 2022

On Wednesday, February 23, 2022, Cabrini of Westchester celebrated the opening of a new Dialysis Program with a Blessing and Ribbon Cutting ceremony. The ceremony was attended by our sponsors, The Missionary Sisters of the Sacred Heart of Jesus, several contractors that helped to implement the program, board members, staff, residents and special guest, Senator Andrea-Stewart-Cousins.

Expected to begin servicing patients by the end of March 2022, the Dialysis Program will allow residents of the nursing home to receive dialysis on site and eliminate the need for transportation to other locations. In conjunction with Dialyze Direct, the program will serve only residents and short-term patients of Cabrini of Westchester with a goal of improving the quality of life for those who need this service.

The dialysis suite will accommodate a total of 8 patients daily under the supervision of a registered nurse with special training. Treatments will be given five days a week for an average of 2 ½ hours and will be worked around meal times, rehabilitation appointments and activities so that recipients’ daily schedules will not be interrupted.

“We are pleased to add this vital service to Cabrini’s programs and services which will vastly improve the lives of those residents in need of dialysis treatment,” said Patricia Krasnausky, President and CEO of Cabrini of Westchester. “By not having to travel for treatment, residents will experience reduced recovery time allowing them to maintain regular schedules that include meal times, daily activities and rehabilitation. We are excited to implement the program and look forward to working with Dialyze Direct to ensure the best outcomes for the elders that we are so privileged to serve.”

7th Annual Catholic Sisters Week Celebrates the Contemporary Work of Women Religious

March 10, 2022

The theme for this year’s Catholic Sisters Week is “Caring for Earth, Caring for You.” Many events are incorporating an environmental focus or aspects of Pope Francis’ 2015 encyclical “Laudato Sí’ on Care for Our Common Home.”

Catholic Sisters Week also brings the final episode of “Exploring Intersections: Catholic Sisters on Racism, Migration and Climate” a project of LCWR’s Region 10. For a year, the monthly program has explored the issues of racism, migration and climate and how they are intertwined. The March 9 episode, “Navigating the Road Ahead,” will focus on takeaways from the series and suggestions for continuing the conversation.

“One of the things Catholic Sisters Week embraces this year is the concept of being engaged in the work,” said Ginny Hizer, Executive Director of Communicators for Women Religious. “It’s taking the flavor and the mission of the sisters and actually living it out.”

While lay people are increasingly involved in the work of sisters through sponsored ministries and associate programs, Catholic Sisters Week opens those opportunities to a much broader audience, Hizer said.

“Sisters are better than anybody at finding the hope and holding the hope and recognizing the abundance that surrounds our lives. If you want to experience a bit of that abundance, look to Catholic Sisters Week,” said Stacy Spitler, Chair of the Communicators for Women Religious.
To learn more, please click here

Catholic Sisters Week

March 2, 2022

Catholic Sisters Week
March 8 – 14

Catholic Sisters Week (CSW) invites all to celebrate women religious from March 8-14. CSW is an annual celebration that began in 2014 to honor women religious with a series of events that instruct, enlighten, and bring greater focus on the lives of these incredible women. It’s a chance to recognize all that they do, with the hope that as more young women learn about women religious, more will choose to follow their example.

Visit the CSW website to learn about the organization, find an event near you and join in honoring women religious, or plan an event of your own and spread the word. You

can post your event for others to see here.

Additional Resources can be found through Global Sisters Report Resources, Communicators for Women Religious, and A Nun’s Life Ministry . Check out this great video from the Pope’s February prayer intention for inspiration.
NRVC has published 77 videos centered on the theme of Abundant Hope. All the videos can be accessed directly through the National Religious Vocation Conference YouTube Channel and shared publicly to amplify hope for religious life.

During this week, please contact a religious sister who has positively impacted your life
to say hello and offer a word of thanks and appreciation.

The Blessing of Graduate Nurses

February 23, 2022

A group of 2022 Graduate Nurses were welcomed and blessed as they began their work at Cabrini Health Australia as newly Registered Nurses.

Julie Fleming, Director of Mission and Identity, spoke of Cabrini’s ethic of care to ensure that all who come to Cabrini felt loved. The new nurses were told of the vision of Mother Cabrini and the legacy they are entrusted with.

In a moving Blessing of Hands ceremony Sr Beatriz Santos MSC and Anne Zandegu, Director of Nursing anointed the graduate’s palms with the words ‘May God bless your hands and all you touch.’

In the presence of Chief Executive Sue Williams and the clinical nurse educators, last year’s graduates Julia and Vince addressed the new nurses with advice on how exciting, rewarding and challenging starting work was. They also encouraged the nurses to take care of themselves and rely on the support of their colleagues.

To the 65 graduates nurses starting work with Cabrini Australia, congratulations and welcome to the Cabrini family!

Cabrini Sisters Gather in NYC for Perpetual Vows

February 23, 2022

Cabrini Sisters Gather in NYC for Perpetual Vows

More than 50 Missionary Sisters of the Sacred Heart of Jesus from around the world gathered at St. Frances Cabrini Shrine in New York City to witness the perpetual vows of three Sisters from Ethiopia.

Sr. Asnakech Asefa, MSC, Sr. Aynalem Paulos, MSC, and Sr. Berhane Ashebo, MSC made lifelong vows of chastity, poverty and obedience in the presence of Sr. Barbara Staley, MSC, General Superior. Each asked the Holy Spirit to transform their consecration “into a commitment of love, an offering of praise, adoration and reparation in the Cabrinian spirit, so that I may bring the love of the Heart of Jesus to
the World.”

“Religious life and the missionary calling are alive and growing,” said Sr. Barbara following the Mass, “It is a blessing to welcome these Sisters into a vibrant, perpetual relationship with Christ. The world needs them, because it needs Jesus.”

The Missionary Sisters follow in the footsteps of St. Frances Cabrini, the Patron Saint of Immigrants. They seek to respond to the unmet needs of those excluded from basic human rights. Active in 17 countries, their missions include schools, hospitals and clinics, spirituality centers, low income housing for the elderly; and community-based immigrant and social services.

Sr. Evarlyn Ndeti, who entered the novitiate earlier this month, found the ceremony deeply moving. “I am so inspired to see these women committing their lives completely to Jesus,” she said.

The Mass was celebrated by Fr. Thomas Faiola, OFM. Cap, with Rev. Ambiorix Rodriguez assisting. Missionary Sisters from Argentina, Australia, Brazil, Eswatini, Ethiopia, Guatemala, Italy, Nicaragua, Russia, Uganda, and the United States joyfully welcomed their new Sisters with the pax tecum, an embrace of welcome.

Jesuit Network with Migrants (RJM)

February 10, 2022

Jesuit Network with Migrants (RJM)
~ An account by Sr. Sonnia Margarita Osorio, MSC *

I have lived a very intense month, accompanying the caravan of Honduran migrants at the Aguas Calientes border between Honduras and Guatemala, accompanying a family in the process of [identifying] the body of their son, who was in the truck that crashed in Chiapas on December 19, 2021. The truck was carrying more than 150 migrants [as they were observing] the first anniversary of the 19 migrants killed in Tamaulipas on January 22, 2021. Of those 19, 14 were from Comitancillo San Marcos. On January 20 and 21 in San Marcos we had a Eucharist and inaugurated a mural in honor of the victims and their families, the mural represents the process of mourning and hope.

“I have seen the oppression of my people in Egypt and I have heard the cries of pain, I have seen the oppression of my people in Egypt and heard the cries of their oppressors; I know their sufferings…” Exodus 3, 7

With this text of the Exodus begins the prologue of the book “The Flight of the Hummingbird” which contains the review of each of the migrants killed and burned in Camargo Tamaulipas. It also narrates the process of accompaniment of mourning with their families made by the Network. I have had the grace of accompanying these families for some months in group processes. We have also taken the opportunity to visit each family, listen to them and encourage them. Further on, the same text says:
“I have come down to deliver you from the hand of the Egyptians and to bring you up from this land to a good and spacious land, to a land flowing with milk and honey…”.

This experience of celebrating the first anniversary of these victims of Tamaulipas, has a double reality and feeling, on the one hand, the joy that gives “the lowering of God to free his people” and the certainty that they come from the Gospel, where it is not the full and satisfied who enjoy the banquet of the Kingdom, but the strangers, those of the squares, the roads, the discarded, those who, like the Master, have nowhere to lay their heads.

The other reality is the indignation of seeing how the bodies of the victims of the “accident” in Chiapas continue to arrive, in which so many migrants, mostly Guatemalans, were traveling, and where we see that the blood of our brothers and sisters continues to cry out for justice. We are all brothers and sisters and we must eat at the same table because the earth belongs to all and produces for all.

“Hope multiplies strength a hundredfold,” says Mother Cabrini and I believe that this is a reality of the RJM team extended to our families and communities where lay and religious men and women live with joy the encounter with our brothers, Haitians, Venezuelans, Nicaraguans, Hondurans, and Guatemalans who with their courage challenge us to leave the comfort and always look for something better.

Pope Francis’ February Prayer Intention is for Religious Sisters and Consecrated Women

February 10, 2022

~ by Soli Salgado, Global Sisters Report

For the month of February, Pope Francis’ prayer intention is for all religious sisters and consecrated women, for “what would the church be without religious sisters and consecrated laywomen?” he said in a video message announcing his theme for the month. “The church cannot be understood without them.”

The pope has focused on women religious before: His October 2020 intentions was for women’s leadership in the church, and his October 2018 intention was for the “role of the religious.” Now, he prays that sisters “show the beauty of God’s love and compassion as catechists, theologians and spiritual guides.”

“I invite them to fight when, in some cases, they are treated unfairly, even within the church; when they serve so much that they are reduced to servitude – at times, by men of the church,” Francis said in the video message. “Do not be discouraged. May you keep making God’s goodness known through the apostolic works you do, but, above all, through your witness of consecration.”

The pope encouraged all women religious to discern and choose what is best for their missions and to “find new responses to the challenges of our times.”

He also asked that sisters continue making an impact on the poor and marginalized, in particular, as well as those enslaved by traffickers.

Jesuit Network with Migrants (RJM)

February 9, 2022

Jesuit Network with Migrants (RJM)
~ An account by Sr. Sonnia Margarita Osorio, MSC *

I have lived a very intense month, accompanying the caravan of Honduran migrants at the Aguas Calientes border between Honduras and Guatemala, accompanying a family in the process of recognizing the body of their son, who was in the truck that crashed in Chiapas on December 19, 2021. The truck was carrying more than 150 migrants [as they were observing] the first anniversary of the 19 migrants killed in Tamaulipas on January 22, 2021. Of those 19, 14 were from Comitancillo San Marcos. On January 20 and 21 in San Marcos we had a Eucharist and inaugurated a mural in honor of the victims and their families, the mural represents the process of mourning and hope.

“Hope multiplies strength a hundredfold,” says Mother Cabrini and I believe that this is a reality of the RJM team extended to our families and communities where lay and religious men and women live with joy the encounter with our brothers, Haitians, Venezuelans, Nicaraguans, Hondurans, Guatemalans who with their courage challenge us to leave the comfort and always look for something better.

*Translated from the Spanish with www.DeepL.com/Translator