Pots and plants, sun kissed through the the Chapel skylight,

Share the joy of Easter.

Dear friends,

From the water of our baptismal renewal to the altar of communion in our Lord, we are called together as God’s people.   Born from the Water, entering into the Light, we celebrate in Joy the Resurrection.

This year, 2012, has an added luster.  It is the 800^th anniversary of the first community of poor sisters and lesser brothers at the church of San Damiano outside the walls of Assisi, Italy.  We remember particularly Clare and her companions who opened up a new path of ministry, service and prayer for women as partners in a world needing care, mutual respect and reverence.  Faced with misunderstanding, Clare lived her life with quiet conviction which resonates in the “form of life of the poor sisters which the blessed Francis founded” and a small corpus of writings attributed to the poor sisters and lesser brothers who lived gospel community there at San Damiano from 1212-1255.

In 1225 at San Damiano Clare nursed Francis who was suffering from an illness of the eyes.  During this period, the nearly blind Francis composed the Canticle of the Creatures, the song praising God through all creation from the cosmic to the incarnational, calling for peace between the bishop and the mayor, and in the last stanza of the song, welcoming Sister Death as she leads us home to God.

“Praised be you, my Lord, through all your creatures,” and that includes us all,

your Sisters

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