Sr. Mary Christine, our Novice Directress, recently returned from a meeting held at Corpus Christi Monastery, Bronx, NY. She met several other novice directresses from other monasteries, had discussions, and shared ideas.
Sr. Mary Christine tells her story while the other nuns listen, working on handwork
Lots to tell!
The novices missed Sr. Mary Christine a lot, even though they had Sr. Marie Augustine to watch over them and the rest of the community to keep them company. They made this beautiful sign to welcome her home:
The novices carried it as a banner to meet Sister’s car as it came up from the gate to the house, and then hung it outside the novitiate.
Our Constitutions permit meetings of this kind to be held, especially in monasteries of our Order, so that the nuns can exchange ideas and mutually benefit both from expert speakers and from discussions among themselves. We are glad Sr. Mary Christine had this opportunity, but we really missed her, and we’re happy she’s back home again!
Fr. Reginald Baconin had something else on his Texas bucket list…he wanted the chance to ride a horse! He already had two cowboy hats (no boots, yet) so he was raring to go. Our workman David has a lot of horse connections and one warm Sunday evening in August, a horse appeared at the monastery!
David Bomer, our workman, with his daughter Rebecca, and her husband Jaime and their horse.
Fr. Reginald was thrilled! He mounted, and rode around the front driveway of our monastery.
Ride em, cowboy!
Most of us looked on with delighted enjoyment as Father put the horse through its paces.
Gradually, we lost our shyness and began to make friends with the horse.
He was just a big sweetheart really.
And some sisters decided to try riding the horse themselves!
Sr. Mary Giuse
Sr. Mary Rose
Sr. Mary Christine, our novice mistress, rounds up the novitiate sisters.
Sr. Mary Rose, Sr. Mary Jeremiah, Fr. Reginald, and Sr. Mary Margaret
In case you’re wondering–yes, David brought the horse inside the enclosure so we could visit with it. Who would have ever thought a horse would visit us, and even give rides!
Just a couple of days after this momentous event, Fr. Reginald had to leave us and return to his home province of Toulouse in France. But before he left, we gave him a Texas-sized sendoff–including his own honorary Texas citizenship and a Texas passport so he can return someday.
Don’t leave home without them!
In fact, Fr. Reginald is already planning to return to East Texas next summer, when he will preach a mission at one of our local parishes. We look forward to seeing him again. His father will retire in about five years, and Fr. Reginald hopes to bring him to East Texas to experience all the wonders of the Piney Woods. (They’re also planning to see the Alamo and some other Texas sites, naturally.)
We are always happy to welcome Dominican visitors–indeed all visitors–to our monastery for prayer, for Mass, and for silent adoration of the Blessed Sacrament. We cannot guarantee a horseback ride, however!
Hey, all y’all! It’s been a long time since we’ve had a chance to catch our breath and write something for this blog! Today we have some time so we’re bringing you a good old Texas roundup of some of the various events that have made our summer exciting (and busy).
Not long after Sr. Mary Veronica’s jubilee celebration, we welcomed Fr. Reginald Baconin, O.P. to our monastery for a couple of months.
Fr. Reginald comes from the province of Toulouse in France, but has been studying in Rome at the Angelicum. He is working on two licentiates at the same time–one on Trinitarian theology and one on Islamology. He speaks English beautifully, with almost no accent, and we were delighted to have him celebrate Mass for us–and give us some classes.
At the end of June, we had a farewell recreation with Fr. Ian.
Sr. Martin Marie crocheted this classic-looking scarf for him, which he was happy to receive.
We also gave him a Dominican coffee mug:
We are sad to see Fr. Ian leave, but know he is needed at his new assignment, which is much more challenging than the one he had here. We are proud of Father for finishing his doctorate and getting his degree. Hopefully he will come back someday, to give classes or even a retreat!
On June 30, Sarah Larmore entered as a postulant.
Sr. Mary Pauline, Sr. Mary Christine, Sr. Marie Augustine, Sarah, Michelle, and Sr. Maria Goretti
Sarah could hardly wait to begin her life as a cloistered contemplative nun!
On July 1, we had our 4th of July picnic. We like to have our picnic celebration on Satursdays if possible.
Here we are, all decked out for the traditional flag raising after Midmorning Prayer.
We had a joyful day of food, fun, games, conversation, and patriotic fervor.
As is our custom on the Fourth of July, we sang “My Country ’tis of Thee” from the Summit Choirbook at Vespers. While we were all filled with love for our nation, Fr, Reginald (joining us for Vespers in the outside chapel) was perplexed. He asked us later, “Why did you sing ‘God Save The King’ to celebrate July 4?”
And as it happens, July 4 is Fr. Reginald’s birthday! We had a special recreation with him that night.
Fr. Reginald has been a big Texas fan for many years, thanks to his father’s love for John Wayne movies (especially “The Alamo”), and various people in our community took him on many Texas adventures, including visits to a Native American reservation, Nacogdoches TX (the oldest town in Texas), the San Jacinto battlefield, and, yes, the Alamo! He bought this hat for himself soon after his arrival, but we had some gifts for him, too–especially this one:
A T-shirt that proudly proclaims, “Texas–Bigger than France”! He loves it!
A few days later we had a visit from our Southern Province novices. We’re happy to say all five of them made profession! Please pray for them, and for the upcoming novitiate class.
We have even more news to share with you, but this is enough for now. We plan to post the rest of the recent news soon. For now, we hope you enjoy this glimpse inside the boring and monotonous life of the cloister! (And yes, we always keep our prayer schedule–even on holidays.)
We recently got s new phone and internet system! The good news: The reception is crystal clear and our internet is much faster. The bad news: We’re still working all the bugs out of the phones.
The old phone.
The new phone.
As you can see, in many ways the phones are similar. But you will also notice how many more buttons the new phone has, giving us more opportunities to be in contact with people–and also, more ways to drop calls! We hope you will be patient with us while we continue to work on learning how to use the new phones and also get all the technical issues worked out. We’re really very excited about this–our first new phones in about 20 years–and we are so grateful to Javier and his team at Innovative Office Systems, all of whom have been so kind about coming out to help and give tutorials and fix problems.
Please note that we only have one phone number now–the one listed here on our blog and on our website.
Thank you for your patience! We hope these upgrades will make it easier for all of us to stay in contact!
We came out of retreat this morning! Out of the woods, and back into the clearings of civilization (or something).
We had a fantastic retreat preached by Fr. James M. Sullivan, O.P., currently stationed at St. Pius V Church in Providence, RI. Father jokingly said the theme of the retreat would be, “All I Ever Needed To Know I Learned in the Novitiate”, and it truly was a most excellent review of the basic principles and foundations of Dominican life. There were conferences on the evangelical counsels (poverty, chastity, and obedience), the theological virtues (faith, hope, and charity) and trust in God. Father also gave wonderful homilies every morning. We’re so glad we recorded everything and can listen again some time!
Father giving a conference in our chapel
Father is very animated, so it was a challenge to get pictures during his conferences. So…
…he allowed one of the sisters to snap his picture during a session of private direction.
Thank you for everything, Father Sullivan! We hope to see you again some day!
It’s that time of year again! Today we’re beginning our annual community retreat, and we’ll be in retreat until June 14. We’re delighted to have Fr. James Sullivan, O.P. as our retreat master, and we look forward to everything he will say to help us grow in our spiritual lives!
You may be wondering–why “into the woods”? Don’t we usually describe retreats as a desert experience? This is much more common, but here in East Texas we’re short on deserts and long (or tall) on pine trees, so we decided to embrace our situation. And after all, the woods can be every bit as wild–if not more so–than the desert. We have all kinds of critters roaming our property, raccoons, opossums, foxes, snakes, bobcats–not to mention the numerous species of birds and some bats! So do keep us in prayer as we go out into the wilderness of the retreat woods, and know that we are all praying for you, too!
Sister’ funeral Mass was held on February 27, 2023. It was a moving ceremony presided over by Bishop Joseph Strickland, and many of her remaining family members and a few friends were able to attend.
Before the funeral, Sister’s body lay in state in our chapel. We kept vigil with her all day and most of the night. We pray the Psalter as we stay with Sister–starting at the beginning and continuing on until time for the funeral, repeating as necessary.
After distribution of the Holy Eucharist, the funeral ceremonies begin:
Praying and incensing the casket.
Then we begin the procession to the cemetery, which is located on our property. THe cross bearer and acolytes (holding candles) go first, then the sisters, followed by the clergy and the Bishop. Then comes a car carrying some of the elderly sisters who can’t walk as far as the cemetery, and finally the hearse.
As the sisters move into the cemetery, the pall bearers bring in the casket.
Sister’s family in the front row.
And at the end, the prayers at the graveside and the final commendation.
We sang the “Magnificat” at the end, which is our custom, and then processed back to the monastery. It is hard to say goodbye to Sr. Mary Annunciata, but we hope and pray that we will all be reunited one day in the glory of heaven. As we have mentioned before on this blog, we go out to the cemetery for eight days following the funeral to pray a decade of the Rosary at the grave and sing a hymn, usually one that had special meaning for Sister. We can’t be certain, of course, but it does seem like Sr. Mary Annunciata has been interceding for us already!
Eternal rest grant to her, O Lord, and may perpetual light shine upon her. May her soul, and the souls of all the faithful departed, through the mercy of God, rest in peace.
Dominican Life on Lotus Lane 