Author: Texas OP Nuns

Happy 80th Birthday, Sister Mary Annunciata!

We do celebrate birthdays in the monastery…very quietly…not like we celebrate feast days and other special days! Usually you just get a chorus of \”Happy Birthday to You\” at the end of recreation in honor of your day. But when you reach 80, we figure it\’s time for a more spectacular celebration. And this is just what happened last night for Sister Mary Annunciata\’s 80th birthday!

Sister Mary Dominic lights the candles…
Wow!
A real blast for her 80th birthday!
Blowing out the candles…actually, she couldn\’t, because someone used those candles you can\’t blow out! We had to put them under water to extinguish them!
Sister had two cakes. One was a gift from friends and the other was made by Sr. Bernadette Marie. Both were delicious, especially when accompanied by ice cream!
After all, you\’re only 80 once! Enjoy!
We wish Sr. Mary Annunciata many, MANY more years and good health to go with them! Hopefully next month we will bring you another birthday…this time someone who will be 90!

Solemnity of the Assumption and St. Dominic

There\’s a legend that all twelve of the apostles were present when Mary was assumed into heaven. After her Assumption, they went out again to preach the Gospel to all corners of the known world. 

In a similar way (so to speak) it was on the 15th of August, 1217, that St. Dominic sent his brethren out to begin their preaching mission. They didn\’t want to go! Everyone said it was a bad idea to send the brethren out–so young, not well-educated, not trained in the ways of preaching. Dominic listened quietly to all their protestations and then, gently but firmly, insisted that they were going out into the world. \”Grain that is stored, rots,\” he explained. He had a tremendous vision of his brothers sowing the seeds of the Gospel throughout Europe and even beyond, to all the ends of the earth. And so they went. Almost eight hundred years later, they\’re still on the road!

Blessings on all our Dominican family and all who receive the word of God, whether from a Dominican or from a modern-day apostle! Know that we are praying for you in a special way today, that Our Lady will intercede for more preachers and apostles to carry the Gospel to the entire world–even to the universe!

Our Holy Father Saint Dominic

Today we celebrate the solemnity of our holy father Saint Dominic! We\’d like to share some aspects of Dominic with you in honor of this special feast day.
 St. Dominic had nine different ways of praying, and probably more! This is one anyone can try for private prayer:  standing up, arms outstretched, remembering Jesus crucified. 
Many people are familiar with the story of Pope Innocent III\’s dream of St. Francis supporting the falling Church, but few perhaps realize that he had a similar dream about St. Dominic! Apparently he had a lot of prophetic dreams…

 St. Dominic often participated in disputes with the Albigensian heretics. On at least one occasion they decided to settle the dispute by throwing their books and other materials into the fire. The one whose books escaped the fire would win the argument! As you can see in this painting, St. Dominic\’s books always flew out of the fire unscathed, while the books of the Albigensians burned to a crisp.

Holy Father St. Dominic, pray for all your children today and every day!

You might also like to check out our previous posts on St. Dominic: 

Check Out Our New Website!

We\’re happy to announce our new website is up and running! We\’re still adding a few pictures and other things but we hope you will come check it out–our new address is www.lufkintxnuns.org. We have many new features and more coming, including a new and improved donations page and hopefully soon some videos of the nuns! We are very excited about this new website and hope you will find it informative and enjoyable. Please do come visit us!

A Gift of Peaches

We have been really blessed by our benefactors this year, especially in gifts of food! Yesterday we received 23 boxes of very ripe peaches. We gave a few away, and started to take care of the rest.

The kitchen sisters hard at work…
We were able to freeze a lot of the peaches, and of course we ate a great many, too! They are so delicious!
We love to receive donations! 
We are so grateful to the many people who donate money or food or other things to our monastery. Your donations help us to continue our life of prayer, praise and sacrifice! May God bless you all abundantly for your generosity!

A Visit from the Master of the Order–Fr. Bruno Cadore, OP!

Today we are filled with joy as we were able to spend a short but spiritually enriching time with the Master of the Order–the head of the international Order of Preachers, or as we are better known, the Dominicans!

Fr. Ed Ruane, OP and Fr. Bruno Cadore, OP on either side of Sr. Mary John, our prioress–and oh yes, all the rest of the community, too!

We are so grateful that Fr. Bruno and Fr. Ed were able to stop at our monastery for this visit, on their way from Houston and to Irving, TX as part of Fr. Bruno\’s visitation of the Southern Dominican Province. It only lasted about an hour and a half, but it was quite a time! We asked many questions and received Fr. Bruno\’s thoughtful (and thought-provoking) responses.
Sr. Mary John welcomes Fr. Bruno and Fr. Ed
Fr. Bruno considers a sister\’s question…
A close-up of Fr. Bruno
All the sisters gathered in the community room to hear Fr. Bruno speak–and it was wonderful!
Fr. Bruno has a nine-year term as Master, and since he was elected in 2010 he still has a few years to go. We hope and pray his travels will bring him back to Lufkin sometime!

A Fantastic Fourth of July

In the United States, we celebrate our independence on July 4 every year, and in the Monastery, this means a special picnic day! We always continue to pray the entire Liturgy of the Hours and keep adoration on picnic days, but instead of working we fill in the time with fun, games and extra recreation.
We began our day with prayers and Mass, followed by the solemn raising of the flag.
After the flags were raised, we all sang patriotic songs and said the Pledge of Allegiance.
Whew! It was pretty hot outside so several sisters went back inside to play an intense game of Sequence.
Meanwhile, some of the sisters played beanbag Tic-Tac-Toe. This was Sr. Irma\’s first Fourth of July in the United States (you may recall she is visiting us from Mexico)! Other sisters just enjoyed sitting around and talking while they enjoyed a rare privilege: snacks outside mealtime!
In the cool of the evening some of the sisters went for a ride on our golf cart. 
Of course, we had to stop and pay a visit to St. Dominic at his shrine in the woods!
It was truly a fantastic Fourth of July and we all went to bed that evening tired but happy, refreshed and ready to return to work this morning!