“Words of Acknowledgement”
Sisters of St. Mary of Namur 200th Jubilee Reception
November 11, 2019
For over 70 years, as individuals and collectively, SSMN’s have been a consistent occasion of grace for me and my family for four generations, since I was 2 months old and my sisters enrolled at Our Lady of Good Council and St. James schools in Dallas. My parents, my siblings, our kids and their kids – like my wife’s family and many other families represented here today – continue to thrive under their leadership and kindness.
To crystalize my appreciation for the Sisters on their 200th birthday, let me tell you about my 7th grade year at St. James in Dallas. It was “The Year of Three Nuns, Three Life Lessons.”
1st lesson from S. Theresa Marie Payne. I didn’t really know her well because around Thanksgiving, her sister became gravely ill and S. Theresa Marie took a leave from teaching at St. James to provide care for her sister. Her unprecedented action – nuns never left their post! – embodied this community’s instinct for generous service, expressed in humble, hands-on, foot-washing care.
2nd: from S. St. John Begnaud. She was serving in provincial leadership and teaching at the University of Dallas, and – amazingly -- she added to her “to-do” list teaching a bunch of 12-13-year olds in South Oak Cliff in Dallas. She was a miraculously engaging teacher who approached us from the conviction that we were both interested and interesting, capable of serious study. She imprinted me with the Namur appreciation of learning as an attractive adventure which was central to being Catholic.
After Christmas, our permanent replacement arrived. S. Maria Clark was a young sister brimming with confidence, was a creature unlike any we’d ever seen. She was an energetic and demanding teacher like many of the sisters – but she was a working artist as well. She frequently invited many of us kids to experience art first hand on Saturday morning trips to the art studios and galleries of the University of Dallas where she had studied, and to the Cistercian Abbey to see the compelling work of Fr. Damian, one of her mentors. So my 3rd big lesson came from the glimpse S. Maria gave me into the transformative power of inclusion to help us see beauty in our midst.
Those three notes – of generous service, adventurous learning, and beautiful belonging – continue to sing in the way this community of women serves and teaches and welcomes friends and strangers, families and individuals, students and colleagues and countless others for two hundred years.
My dear sisters, you continue to give us gifts of open welcome and soulful friendship, of safe space and bracing challenge, of exuberant joy and quiet wisdom.
You have been pioneers from the start, not just in coming to the raw and uncertain plains of north Texas, but perhaps more bravely, to the borderlands of ecclesial life, expanding the range and reach of Christ and his Church. You’ve developed new models of catechesis and social ministry, innovative approaches to family support and tribunal work, pastoral care, music and liturgy, and leadership of all sorts. You continue to be exemplars of prophetic collaboration, listening attentively to the presence and beauty of Christ in the ordinary lives of ordinary people.
The face of the SSMN community is changing. Its voice speaks in new languages, with unfamiliar accents. Its ministry embraces new partnerships, its communal life seeks new models. Change is afoot, no doubt. As daunting as change is, I – and I’m sure all of us here –rest confident that the constants of your generous service, your eager learning, and your beautiful inclusion will remain for another 200 years and beyond.
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