CSJ Associate Autobiography

I am applying to be an Associate of the Congregation of St. Joseph of Cleveland, and they asked for an autobiography that answers some specific questions about why you want to be an associate. Anyway, I think it's always useful to reflect and write your own story once in a while to check up on yourself and see why you do what you do. So here it is:

My religious education began in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania when my family joined the South Hills Unitarian Universalist Church a.k.a. Sunnyhill. I was in second grade and enjoyed learning about monks in orange robes, lighting the chalice (and sometimes melting crayons in it), and imagining life in other cultures. We learned about the major world religions and considered moral issues. At home, I was taught by my parents to enjoy and protect nature, to practice social justice, and to value diversity. I was deeply involved in the UU church until high school, when people around me began dying: my church mentor, my neighbor, my best friend’s mother, a friend from school, my pediatrician, one of my youth group leaders, my grandfather. Faced with death, I felt a deep emptiness and hopelessness that developed into situational depression. I sought not only to discuss religion, but to find meaning in life, so I followed my friends into their various religious practices. Despite my searching, therapy, educational and economic opportunities, and all the people who supported and loved me, I found myself one day with a knife in my hand, considering the pain of depression not worth facing any more. In that moment, God showed me the deep injury I would cause, not just to myself, but to all the people who loved me and would later be impacted by my life, and I felt an even deeper pain that could only be the grief of God. Until that point, I was not sure there was a God, but afterwards I knew with deep conviction that it was Jesus who revealed God’s heart to me that day…full of love for me and all creation, and suffering when we suffer.

Through my time at Oberlin College I developed my Christian faith by joining Oberlin Christian Fellowship, learning to pray, and becoming a Religion major (though I studied a variety of religions…more like a continuation of my UU heritage). I experienced in the Oberlin Christian Fellowship a community that became a medium for God’s grace, through prayer, Bible study, worship, service, retreats, but most importantly our deep friendships. That grace opened me to a greater maturity in faith, one side effect was a desire to commit myself as a member of a Christian church. I attended a variety of churches, but realized that I had been baptized Catholic as an infant to please my grandparents, and I was intrigued and baffled when I began attending Mass. After intellectually wrestling with the mystery, beauty, and challenges I found in the church that calls itself Universal, it was a physical hunger for the Eucharist that made my decision. In my Senior year, on Easter 2004, I was confirmed as a Catholic. During “Senior Week” between finals and commencement, I joined some friends on a mini-pilgrimage weekend through Cleveland that planted seeds that have since proved spiritually fruitful (although I had no idea at the time I might be living in Cleveland just months later). We stayed at St. Andrew’s Abbey and participated in the Liturgy of the Hours, and I learned about the cloistered life and also about their program for Oblates. Over that summer, I read Cloister Walk by Kathleen Norris and further contemplated becoming connected to a religious order. On Sunday morning, we visited St. Agnes + Our Lady of Fatima (SAOLF) where we met Sr. Donna Wilhelm, who discussed African American Catholicism and gave us each a Tau cross from Assisi that I wore as an anklet. Next we experienced a children’s mass at St. Andrew Kim…in Korean! This variety of cultures, languages, and lifestyles that find common ground in the Eucharist is one of my primary reasons for becoming Catholic, because it witnesses to the fusion of humanity and divinity that unites across all of our differences.

It is a solid belief in this common humanity that motivated my desire to serve those suffering from poverty. That Fall, I began a year of service in Cleveland with the Sisters of the Humility of Mary (HM Service) at the West Side Catholic Center (WSCC). That year, though frustrating and difficult in many ways, proved to set the foundation for the commitments I have made and that continue to remake me. Remembering the wonderful experience of worship, I became a member of SAOLF. I have shared my gifts there by participating as a liturgical minister, recruiting volunteers for the Homeless Stand Down, and teaching Children’s Liturgy of the Word. At church, through HM Service, and at the WSCC were my first intimate encounter with religious women, including several CSJs. Of all the duties I enjoyed at the WSCC, the most powerful was tutoring with Seeds of Literacy. I became a part time employee, and eventually became a full time Site Coordinator as the organization has grown. Educating adults has become a passion of mine, and I now realize that illiteracy is a crisis that can only be solved with the awareness and action of all the segments of our community. I’ve also seen barriers broken and prejudices dispelled through this work, producing compassion and joy. But most importantly, I was given my commission by our founder, Sr. Kathleen Kilbane, who charged me to “keep Christ at the center.” My mentor and coworker, Christine Lee, along with our tutors and students have taught me through word and deed that our activity in the world cannot be separated into work, church, family, etc…all things are a ministry through Christ.

I also met a man at Wednesday evenings at the Catholic Worker storefront and Sunday mornings at St. Agnes + Our Lady of Fatima church. He said he fell in love with me at a Halloween party because I was wearing the Tau cross. Evan, who spent a year in seminary and heavily considered life as a Capuchin, has become my sacrament. We found our religious vocation in each other. We were married at SAOLF (with kilts and a Gospel choir) in July 2006 and in May 2008 we shared the birth of our first child, Sean. This family is my gift from God, and our relationship is our gift to God. Our home in Hough is our cloister, and our life as minorities in the neighborhood is just another way we witness to our common humanity and need for Solidarity. It is because of this belief in the sacramental nature of our lives that I have decided to focus my energies on our new son, and the siblings we plan to join him. Sean has brought out my best and worst qualities, and challenged me to grow into the struggles and joy of motherhood. I have discovered a deep patience, as well as an explosive temper, through our trials of learning to nurse. Also I discovered that despite my anxieties about vulnerability and social inadequacy, we have a generous and broad social network of people who are supporting us, including a whole host of Sisters of St. Joseph.

Ever since leaving the Oberlin Christian Fellowship at college graduation, I have still hungered for that deep experience of community with whom to share faith, prayer, and justice. During a five day retreat in March to prepare for the birth, I immensely enjoyed the fellowship of the sisters, and had a long conversation with Sr. Mary Frances Harrington about the Associates Program. I feel strongly drawn to the charism of the Sisters of St. Joseph, which I would describe through two main characteristics: listening, and unity. The sisters take time to listen first to God, to other people, to those who suffer, and to all of God’s creation. Based on what they hear, the sisters then act to share wisdom, pray, meet needs, advocate, and much more. It is this combination of listening and acting that creates unity, and helps people experience the spiritual bonds that cannot be broken, the ones that tie us to the Infinite, the Corporate, and the individual. I know this is also my charism, because it has been recognized by friends and mentors who sought to find and develop my spiritual gifts, who dubbed me a “bridge person.” In my experiences with the CSJ Cleveland community and its individual members, I hear the same language being spoken: the language of people and angels, the language of love.