Late October
Secular Franciscans from St. Bonaventure Parish help get our yards read for winter.
Updates from the Sisters
Meet our new friends, Dr. Godfrey Mungal, dean of the engineering school at Santa Clara University, Santa Clara, California and Executive Assistant to the Dean, Christine Woodward. You notice the name of the university and the city which takes its name from the school. Santa Clara Mission was founded in 1777 by Spanish Franciscan missionaries. In 1850 Jesuit missionaries continued the work at Santa Clara and began a school. From this small beginning the Jesuits, alumni and friends have built the school into one of the premiere universities on the west coast. Sr. Diane Short from Cincinnati Poor Clares and Sr. Beth Lynn from the Poor Clares in Minneapolis were out to Santa Clara in October to prepare for a retreat for students and faculty from the University.
Easter, 2010
Easter, 2010
Peace to you and yours!
When we lose a loved one in death, it can seem as if the warp and woof of our lives is unraveling. That was what the disciples of Jesus must have felt when a cruel death had claimed the life of their Lord. But on the Mother of all Sundays, the day of Resurrection, Jesus was back among those same disciples to show them – and us – new life. His return from death taught the disciples – and us – about the eternal weave where nothing unravels, where there is hope for life unending.
This supports us in our lives, varied as they may be. We share life in its many forms; we enrich one another as we live more and more deeply into this Mystery that Jesus opens for us. Thank you for the many ways in which you share your lives and treasure with us. We join you in the prayer you make for your many needs. In the General Intercessions of Good Friday, we prayed for “the poor and disadvantaged, the humiliated and the weak, the unborn, the aged, the little ones of the earth, the homeless, the hungry, those without work, the sick and dying with their caregivers, those imprisoned in any way, the dehumanized and abused, the bereaved.” These are only some of the prayers we make as we gather many times each day to pray with and for you, for our world and Church.
This year’s early springtime in Minnesota enriches our “alleluias” of the Easter Season. The tulips, forsythia, daffodils, hyacinths, plus the returning birds of many songs and colors join us in the praise of our great God who fashions us all. Be abundantly blessed in all your comings and your goings, in your days and in your nights. And please keep us in your prayer.
Your Poor Clare Sisters in Bloomington
Fifth Sunday in Lent
Fifth Sunday in Lent
Sister Ann with her some of her great grand nieces and nephews.
The spiritual joy intensifies as me move closer to Palm Sunday and the Easter Triduum.
Our beautiful celebration of Eucharsit with family and friends highlighted the themes of the Sacriptures of the day.
St. Clare of Assisi at Santa Clara University, CA
- Poor Clare Sisters speak with university community on how Clare of Assisi can be a light to our world.
Sisters Dianne Short from the Poor Clare Monastery in Cincinnati and Beth Lynn from the Minneapolis Poor Clares were on campus at Santa Clara University to speak with Dr. Jean Molesky-Poz’s class on the Life and Spirit of St. Ignatius of Loyola and St. Clare of Assisi. 
The Sisters also spoke to the University community from 4-6 PM in the St. Clare Room of the Library.http://media.scu.edu/rel/Molesky-Poz/MP012910b.mp3 http://media.scu.edu/rel/Molesky-Poz/MP012910b.mp3 http://media.scu.edu/rel/Molesky-Poz/MP012910b.mp3 Listen to audio of the conversation.
Father Gerry McKevitt, S.J. author of The University of Santa Clara: A History,1851-1977, invited the Sisters to lunch at the Jesuit residence on campus. The conversation was witty and brilliant.http://webpages.scu.edu/ftp/houseofclare/retreat2010.html
Winter
WINTER
The moon sheds silver shadows on the sky,
blue shadows on the snow;
the house-beams crack all night
startling us with the news
that it is colder than we thought.
“Winter is closing in,” we say,
but winter moves us outward in imagination
to learn how cold it is to be exiled from the sun,
how lonely the darkness,
how welcome the light of any approaching star.
Sr. Kate
Scheduled Events
January 3, 2010, Feast of the Ephipany at the Monastery. David Haschka, S.J., the founding president of Christo Rey Jesuit High School in south Minneapolis, was our presider. Sister Gabriel made the beautiful stole contructed from the fabric one of our Sisters brought to her from Guatemala.
Clare and Jeremy Biedny with their dad and our long time friend, Jay, joined us for the Eucharist.
PEACE VIGIL AT THE MONATERY, December 31, 2009: adoration with readings, song and prayer, open to all, 7:00 to 8:30 PM. You are invited to stay as long as you choose. Office of Readings at 8:30 PM.
Advent
ADVENT
These are the days when the whole pattern
is spread before us: the long intricate past,
the wars and wanderings, prophets and kings;
and the future as well, the vineyards and orchards
of the age to come, the safe and happy children
playing in the streets, the high road to peace.
And our eyes are drawn to the center,
to the jewel at the heart of the plotted web,
to a girl in a village and her ordinary life,
to her willing response to mystery
when it came seeking her,
to the answer she gave
and the light it poured
over the whole story.
KM
Our Advent Chapel: a place for remembering and longing…
O WISDOM Ansgar Holmberg, CSJ
O WISDOM!
You are the Source of this love-enfolded universe,
life-breath of its inmost grace.
This is what we breathe: your joyful plan
that we receive our life from yours,
and play and make and dream
in you and from and unto you.
O WISDOM!
Breath of Life in all that is!
You are our imagination and our gasp of wonder.
When we whisper words of tenderness
we are your gentle respiration,
when we sing or sigh or pray
we are your voice, your energy, your intent.
O WISDOM, divine Pattern of all that is,
wind for the weather
fragrance for flowers wild and gardened,
earth for the potter, color for the artist’s eye,
sound and rhythm for the piper and the violinist.
And love for lovers, Holy Wisdom, you are love for lovers.
O WISDOM!
These manifest your presence and so do we all.
In everything you make you make yourself known.
Come! we say, and when you come among us,
it is the truth of who we are meant to be, that is revealed.
Kate Martin, osc
Ansgar Holmberg, CSJ
O ADONAI
Suppose that Moses rose before first light
And saw the unexpected glow,
the incandescence, where on other mornings
Only darkness waited .
Mountains, desert, storm clouds in the background;
night, reluctant to depart;
and there, alive and dangerous with holiness,
a bush on fire,
growing its ruby flames like leaves,
bearing an awesome seed,
a saving Name.too holy to be spoken.
O ADONAI! O LORD OF ALL
Who are we to name Your Name, recite Your covenant,
proclaim Your boundless love for us?
Your Name, when we attempt to speak it, turns to fire in our mouths,
so we contain it in a title: LORD! ADONAI!
and take the fire inside to purify our hearts.
When you entrust us with your Name
you draw us near until,
in the flames that cauterize our dry assumptions
You reveal Your Name enfleshed:
O SAVING LORD!
The burning bush will bear its fruit
wherever seekers wake to the illumined night,
and, stumbling barefoot toward the Holy One,
reach toward the fire
and call upon the Name. Sr. Kate
O Key of David! Sr. Ansgar
O Key of David, Liberator, come!
From his great heart erupts a tide of tenderness
rushing to sweep away the barriers,
all the blocked and burdened places on this planet:
To every home shut up in sorrow,
To every fortress built of loneliness and guilt;
To every dank cave of shame and hopelessness,
O Key of David, come, come in!
He is the Free One, and his freedom bursts upon our shadows
like the lightning.
He holds the key releasing every heart sentenced to darkness,
rescuing the fettered imagination,
opening the clenched fist.
O come, Key to the Kingdom; unbind, unshell, untangle us.
Those in the half-light sense the changing climate of their prison
when his love breaks in,
they recognize a sudden light and air and movement.
He grasps their hands and leads the way to liberty.
O Key of David, interrupt our long captivity;
free us from the limits of our love.
Sr. Kate
The Sisters with our dear friend, Jill Geoffrion, following Sunday morning prayer. To learn more about Jill and Tim, and their ministries see: www.fhlglobal.org, www.jillgeoffrion.com.
Christmas
CHRISTMAS
If he came in the night, then nighttime is blessed forever.
If it was at dawn that he made his way into our midst,
then dawn is eternally hallowed. When his mother
pressed him to her breast, every mother, every child,
was suffused with the light of grace, sweeter than morning,
and the cherishing strength of her husband was a sacrament
of love for all spouses, all times. All that is made,
that is born, stirred at that coming of his and was changed,
lifted into the possibility of its original self.
Come to the manger and stay awhile in its silence,
and know why songs of angels haunt us in every moment of joy.
See that the humble regard of shepherds is the wondering prayer
of the universe, the awe of the soul of the world.
Greetings to all of you, dear friends, at this beautiful holiday season.
A few days ago we hosted a “Nun Run” here at the Monastery. This is not a sponsored athletic event but an occasion for young women to visit and pray with the Sisters here at the Monastery. Four religious communities collaborate to offer a rounded experience of different ways to commit one’s life to service among God’s people. We are the third stop on this religious pilgrimage around the Twin Cities. As we all know, in our time large numbers of young people are not entering religious life. However we do see great enthusiasm among God’s people in married and single life to commit time and treasure to prayer and to service of others. Ours is a wonderful time!
The twenty-first century has much in common with the thirteenth century and the beginning of the Franciscan “movement.” We call it a movement because in the beginning many types of people from various strata of society were involved. It was a lay, not a monastic or clerical, movement. Ordinary people were drawing near to Christ as they heard and met him in the gospel readings at Mass, and saw the scriptures portrayed in sacred art and enacted on the street as “mystery plays.” Francis and his brothers went around Assisi and the near-by towns preaching conversion and penance. Conversion had the sense of turning one’s life around, and penance was “doing mercy.” The Father of Mercies had sent His Son among us as Mercy Incarnate. And the Spirit of Jesus was enacting mercy within and among God’s people.
One of the first things that happened when people heard the Good News of salvation as preached by the early Franciscans was that they wanted to go on pilgrimage. They wanted to see and feel the holy places where Jesus was born, lived, died and rose from the dead. They wanted to get closer to Jesus by being in the same places made holy by God’s Son. Palestine was very far from Umbria. It was a long and expensive journey that placed great hardships on the pilgrim’s family. Francis was a man possessed of great mercy for the people. He and his brothers believed that the Spirit of Jesus was right there at home with them. So to celebrate the Nativity of the Lord they set up the Christmas scene at Greccio and invited the people to come and celebrate Midnight Mass in the woods. Ever since the 13th century Christians have been placing Christmas cribs in churches and we know that all of heaven is with us there as we celebrate the Christmas Eucharist. Come, let us worship.
Your sisters of St. Clare 
The Chapel is ready for Christman night Eucharist.
Choristers from St Odilia’s School get us in the spirit.