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For more information on any of these news articles contact Angie Connolly, Director of Communications, at 563.588.2351 or by aconnolly@bvmcong.org.

BVM Reflections Available for Lent

REFLECTIONS FOR LENT AVAILABLE: Stations of the Cross offers written reflections by BVM sisters that foster personal spiritual encounters with the passion of Christ.  Each reflection is accompanied by striking mosaic artwork that adorned the chapel walls at Wright Hall, a BVM retirement home in Chicago that closed in 2011. In tribute to BVM life at Wright Hall, Stations of the Cross was published as a keepsake of a treasured time and place, and as a resource for reflection during the season of Lent. Consider purchasing this booklet for personal lent reflection, prayer groups or a gift for family or friends. Cost $5 each. Email: Office of Communcaitons at communications@bvmcong.org or complete this online form: http://bit.ly/wZI8DE.

Quantities are limited so purchase this Lenten resource today!

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Celebrating a Lifelong Relationship: The BVMs and the Archdiocese of Dubuque

Mary Ann Zollmann, BVM- President
Mount Carmel, December 5, 2011

On Sunday, November 20, during a special celebratory liturgy at the Cathedral, Archbishop Jerome Hanus proclaimed a year of jubilee:  

The Archdiocese of Dubuque was established July 28, 1837.  I announce to you a year of celebration of 175 years of God’s favor….Our observance is an opportunity to recall in gratitude the heritage of faith given us by our ancestors who built churches and established parishes, schools, hospitals, and charitable organizations.

Following the reading of the proclamation each of us representing parishes, institutions, and religious communities received a copy.  As the scroll passed into my hands, I felt as though I were holding the whole of our BVM community and history.  And, indeed, the story of the Archdiocese of Dubuque and the story of our BVM Community have been intertwined for 169 of this Archdiocese’s 175 years.

In 1843, when the relationship between the Archdiocese and the BVMs began, we were a young community just ten years old and Dubuque was a young Archdiocese six years of age; siblings of an uncommon sort, we grew up together.  It has made a difference to us BVMs that we came of age in this Iowa pioneer territory; and, we like to think it has made a difference that the Archdiocese grew up in companionship with us. Three images from our pioneer beginnings point to the significance of our life-long bond: a boat, a log house, and a piano.

On June 5, 1843, Bishop Mathias Loras, Margaret Mann, Eliza Kelly, Joseph O’Reilly, Francis O’Reilly, and Patrice Caniff boarded a boat for the journey from Philadelphia to Dubuque.  It was a rocky start, not so much due to any rough Mississippi waters, but because the Bishop would have preferred the Sisters of Charity of Emmitsburg; and, to make things even more unsettling, we were not canonically approved.  Yet we were in the boat together bound by a common mission to serve the people of the new frontier diocese.  As testament to what a three-week river journey can do, by the time the boat docked in Dubuque Bishop Loras was ringing the bell he had brought with him, letting the Angelus sing out our welcome as the first community of women religious in the Iowa Territory.

In the person of Bishop Loras and Mary Frances Clarke, a strong Church figure met a strong woman of the Church.  Mary Frances resisted any form of patronization by the Church.  When, upon their arrival, Loras gave the women his own home, they moved out from under his roof to their own unfinished home after three short weeks; when the Bishop offered them money for their financial stability, Mary Frances refused insisting the fledgling community support itself. When Loras wanted to divide St. Mary’s Academy into the “select” and the “poor,” Mary Frances informed him that she was closing the school.  Loras and Mary Frances Clarke negotiated; the school continued without the class distinctions as together they made the necessary adaptations to serve the mission of the Church in Dubuque.

This spirit of tenacity and elasticity characteristic of Bishop Loras and Mary Frances Clarke endures in the relationship between the BVMs and the Church of Dubuque today.  Being in the boat together has been and is good for us and for our Church.

The BVMs first home on the frontier was that of a log house, a space way too small to contain them comfortably.  From the beginning they were a community whose boundless affection overflowed confinement in any single home.  The uniqueness of their spirit was noted by Bishop Loras almost immediately.  Just a little over a week after their arrival, he wrote to Terence Donaghoe inviting him to come and bring with him the 14 sisters remaining in Philadelphia.  Loras wrote:

          Our sisters are very much pleased and are in perfect health, they sigh after nothing else but the arrival of the principal colony….I expected to receive some borders, but I shall not do it in order to leave all of the space for the balance of the family.

Shortly thereafter, Joseph Cretin, Vicar of the Archdiocese, wrote a letter to Bishop Loras carrying a similar expression of appreciation:

The Sisters are happy.  It proves how good they are, and it is this goodness that I admire in them and that can do very much to make their establishment effective for the good of the diocese.  I have confidence that this house will one day be your greatest consolation.

To Bishop Loras the spirit of this community must have been made visible in Mary Frances’ care that the sisters not go to new missions unprepared but rather accompanied by their more experienced community mentors; and in the steady peace of the sisters to go on calmly amidst public rumors that could have divided them.  When Loras first came to the Iowa Territory, he was, with his European sensibilities, immediately affected by the violence and squalor of the frontier; he felt like a poor exile at the end of the earth and doubted whether the diocese would survive the winter.  In the heart of such a desolate landscape the genuine warmth emanating from a log house helped make the whole Iowa Territory a home, not just for Bishop Loras but for a frontier people yearning for the human touch of authentic affection.

In the years since then our little log house has taken on the form of a Prairie home and this Mount Carmel home on the Mississippi bluff; almost 5000 women have become part of what Loras first identified as family, most of us getting our start here in Dubuque, and most of us finding our way back here in our later years. Our Motherhouse, our family home, is here; the affection of this Archdiocese helps to make it so.

At the request of Bishop Loras, there it was—a piano traveling the Mississippi from Philadelphia with Terence Donaghoe and the remaining BVMs.  Ostensibly superfluous to the radical material needs of the frontier and out of place in its rugged landscape, it was lyrical, artistic, poetic, promising liberating music and song wherever the wind’s breath might carry it. The piano was a harbinger of the freedom these pioneer women were bringing to Iowa as they joyfully anticipated their loving service among the people. 

However they soon discovered how problematic it would be to find a way to use their gifts to the advantage of the area.  Possibilities for a school in Galena and ministry with the Native Americans did not materialize; a school in Potosi was short-lived when Wisconsin became a separate diocese.  As they met with one obstacle after another, Mary Frances wrote to Loras stating her guiding conviction:  all that mattered was the will of God for the future of her dear community, even if it meant that the community be dissolved.  Such interior freedom must have resonated in Loras’ own spirit because he kept finding ways to help the sisters succeed: absenting himself from the diocese when tensions between the Irish and French parishioners at St. Raphael’s escalated; and going with Donaghoe to seek a location outside of the immediate environs of Dubuque for the new Motherhouse.  Perhaps, most significant of all, is that, on August 15, 1845, thanks to the spiritual support of Bishop Loras, this first band of sisters made their vows and were accordingly officially approved.  They had found a ministerial home.

In the years since then, the freeing spirit alive in us BVMs and sustained by Bishop Loras has been released into the Archdiocese through our ministry as teachers in schools, parish religious education programs, and classes for lay ministers; as school principals, superintendents, and university presidents; as parish administrators, home visitors, liturgists and music ministers; as staff in the Archdiocesan Office.  And, from its original launching place in Dubuque the spirit of the piano has been unleashed into the world.

The proclamation for this anniversary year concludes:       

May this year of celebration help us rededicate ourselves to continue building upon the legacy we have received so it can be celebrated and embraced by future generations.

Moving together into that future, we BVMs and the Archdiocese of Dubuque have all that we need:  a boat, a log house, and a piano. 

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‘Dubuque’s Got Sisters’ Offers Spring 24-Hour Tour

Join ‘Dubuque’s Got Sisters’ for an inside look at religious life March 30–31, 2012. This event is sponsored by the Sisters of Charity of the Blessed Virgin Mary, Sisters of the Presentation of the Blessed Virgin Mary, Dubuque Franciscan Sisters and the Dominican Sisters of Sinsinawa, Wis.

The 24-hour tour features a visit to four area Motherhouses to share life through praying, dining and storytelling. Local transportation is provided and there is no fee to attend.

The weekend begins at 5 p.m., Friday, March 30, and ends at 6 p.m. Saturday, March 31.

Click here to view the DGS flyer.

To register or for more details contact:

Sr. Rita Cameron, PBVM
Vocations @dubuquepresentations.org
563-588-2008

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BVM Sister and Donor’s Gift Improves Lives in Ghana

Thanks to a generous donor, micro-loans were given to several women in Ghana, Africa. Laurene Brady, BVM, who administers the micro-loans, says Thank You to this donor in the following letter:

As Christmas 2011 passes and 2012 becomes a reality, I become more acutely aware of the many blessings we BVM sisters have received. Your gift to be used for micro-lending here in Kumasi, Ghana, West Africa, has indeed been a blessing for Kumasi women. Since arriving in Ghana, I have been involved in the educational endeavors. One phase of this is adult education. Statistics show that 40% of adult women in the Ashanti region cannot read or write. I decided to teach them!

Along with basic reading and writing classes, I have been able to give new hope to women by offering them a micro-loan. Your donation gave new hope to Evelyn, Julie and Mary, plus several other women. The loans were truly micro and each has her own story and uses the money differently.

Evelyn travels on a bus overnight to purchase yams and charcoal at a low price so she can sell quality merchandise at a lower price. Thus, she keeps her children in school by using the profits for tuition. Your loan has enabled her to purchase in a greater quantity and thus make fewer trips.

Juliana sews and sews. Her works speak of creativity, accuracy and just plain beauty! You name what you want or show her a drawing of it, and Julie will produce a masterpiece. Julie and her husband, Stephen, are the proud parents of four children.

Mary is the proprietor of a small store which sells candy, phone cards, bottled water, etc. Within the store there is a copy machine, always in need of repair. Now Mary has the resources to pay for repairs quickly, purchase paper at greater quantities, and keep customers happy and coming back again and again.

These are the stories of three women. You donation had also helped several other women. The women pay their loans in small amounts but I am happy to say, all pay something monthly.

On behalf of all the folks whose lives you have become a part of, I say THANK YOU.

Laurene Brady, BVM

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Silver, Golden and Diamond Jubilees Celebrated July 31, 2011, at Mount Carmel

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