Archive for the ‘Celebrations’ Category

Helen Hunt Jackson was born Helen Maria Fiske on October 15, 1830.  During her life time she became one of our precious stars that used her gifts and talents to lift the plight of native peoples in California.  Busy about panning for gold not many could hear her voice at that time. Her written words come to us down through the ages, heard and worked upon by those who stop to listen.  She was indeed a good mother to California. 

Helen was also a brilliant American poet becoming an activist for improved treatment of and justice for Native Americans.  She described the adverse effects of government actions in her history book A Century of Dishonor (1881). Her novel Ramona (1884) dramatized the federal government’s mistreatment of Native Americans in Southern California after the Mexican–American War and attracted considerable attention to her cause. Commercially popular, her book was estimated to have been reprinted 300 times.

Helen intended her novel Ramona to capture people’s attention. She said, “I am going to write a novel, in which will be set forth some Indian experiences in a way to move people’s hearts. People will read a novel when they will not read serious books.” She was inspired by her friend Harriet Beecher Stowe‘s Uncle Tom’s Cabin (1852). “If I could write a story that would do for the Indian one-hundredth part what Uncle Tom’s Cabin did for the Negro, I would be thankful the rest of my life.” Helen’s novel was so successful it was made into multiple commercial films.  You can fine them on YouTube   

Helen Hunt Jackson died August 12, 1885.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Helen_Hunt_Jackson

As the spring flowers come into bloom, we too at Assisi Heights are opening up. The lovely hall of parlors, each with its own theme, is waiting for our families and friends to visit. 

Winter and Spring are leading us into the blossoming of beauty in color to speak loudly that life is vibrant and all about us if we take the moment to engage her.  

Bonnie Hardwick shares with us her image of the women at the tomb.  The woman in the blue mantel looks to be lost in her grief.  The woman in the green mantel is waiting in hope. The women with the red mantel is alive to the message brought by the angel.  Where do we find ourselves today?

Dr. Hardwick was the head librarian at the Graduate Theological Union, and a graduate of the Franciscan School of Theology. Information about one of her books on iconography can be found at https://www.dspt.edu/conversations

You can contact Bonnie at [email protected].

The Eucharist is the center of our Community life. During the Pandemic we were locked in our wing at the Franciscan Motherhouse.  After visiting sites on the Web for a Eucharistic Celebration we found our spiritual home at Sts. Peter and Paul, Portloais, Ireland. The presiding priests all speak perfect English though they hail one from China, two from Eastern Europe and one from a lifetime of missionary work in the USA.  The pastor is from Ireland and also one of the young priests whose grandfather was Jewish.  The daily Eucharistic celebration is with the local community in Portlaois, Ireland and with all of the people throughout the globe who write in with their prayers and petitions. This is truly a celebration of the “One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church.  You can meet them on YouTube.

https://www.portlaoiseparish.ie/

https://www.2911intl.org/

As soon as the doors were open again to our Sisters on Third Floor Care, we returned to “Bingo on Monday evenings.” We helpers had been shut out due to the Covid virus which is especially dangerous to our mature Sisters.

One of our delightful sisters at age 101 outscored the Sisters at other tables winning the prize twice with her good luck at Bingo.  

February’s Black History Month flows into March’s Women’s History Month coming together in the history of America’s Great Migration wherein people from the south migrated north and west as told by Isabel Wilkerson in her book titled “The Warmth Of Other Suns”.

The migration described here in this book happens between 1915 and 1970.  With great personal risk, African Americans made the passage from the southern United States to the north and west of this country.  The author follows 5 individuals and their families describing their efforts, successes and failures, as they tried to find their place in the so called “American Dream.”

The book is 622 pages long, but it is well worth the time you spend with Isabel and this great book.

Blizzards begone, we are moving into the ides of March!

March

The stormy March is come at last,
With wind, and cloud, and changing skies;
I hear the rushing of the blast,
That through the snowy valley flies.

Ah, passing few are they who speak,
Wild stormy month! in praise of thee;
Yet, though thy winds are loud and bleak,
Thou art a welcome month to me.

Bosque de Nieve means Snowy Woodland in Spanish.

Winter is a time of waiting: hoping all that is dormant beneath the snow will respond as the Earth makes its annual rotation around the Sun bringing forth the nutritious growth that will assure food security for all God’s people.