by Sr. Helen McKenna MMM Ireland/Tanzania 21.05.2024
Puskins is his name
He’s no more than a growing baby
gone from spoon-feeds to killing rats.
But there’s something special about our cat
He loves to contemplate.
I decide I’d like to pray
I position my cushion,
Sit cross-legged, armed with Bible and pen,
And in no time at all
Puskins has got the message.
Up he jumps, twists and turns,
Finds a comfortable position and curls up.
To be recollected he requires a few strokes
And a help with the scratching of his
pure black, shinny and now healthy coat.
He may even find a button
He’d like to kill and eat!
Then he settles down – just one more
Manoeuvre and he’s ready
He starts his mantra – one long continuous
Purr – rr – rr – rr.
This can go uninterrupted for quite some time
Then the sight of a big stray dog
or the sound of a passing fly
brings Puskins back to full alertness.
He has a look around, decides it’s not worth it
and returns to his restful purr.
I’ve watched this process now for
several weeks and I marvel at it.
How I’d love to contemplate so easily.
And I am to Puskins,
what God is to me:
The constant one, protector:-
“I sit in his longed-for shade.”
“As a child has rest on its mother’s knee…”
“Come to me, all you who are overburdened…”
“Be still and know that I am God…”
Lord, teach me to purr
To purr in the joy of your Presence
To come to you unarmed, just pawed.
Give me a greater longing
To sit curled up in your Presence
Lord, teach me to purr.
by Mary Essiet Nigeria 19.05.2024
Recently, I enrolled in a listening course as one of the requirements to join a listening group where people can just sign up to talk to someone. And it has been one of the best decisions I have made.
It reminded me of when I had tried to offer solutions to a friend’s problem, when in fact, she only wanted to talk. Poor me, I had even gone ahead to tell her to hope and trust in the Lord. But for someone who felt God didn’t love her anymore, I should have been listening more actively rather than passively with the aim of a response.
Severally, I have ranted to God and he never interrupted me. He is never about chastising me or suggesting a way forward, he allows me to go on and on with my complaints and that is in itself relieving and therapeutic. I believe that God wants us to let this healing of having a listener pass through us to others. It would make so much difference if we all consciously worked towards being great listeners.
In our world today, with so much noise around, active listening has become such a rare, yet powerful gift. Listening seems like a simple act yet so impactful. It gives room for connections and allows you to walk through the path of others, feeling the emotions in their whispers/words or even the absence of both making you better equipped to show empathy and compassion.
Today, the majority seem eager to speak, but few are willing to truly listen. However, I know we do, we wish to hear and understand others, the emotions in their eyes, fear in their voice, the increased heartbeat, we want to connect with it all. We want others to know that when they wish to speak, our ears are open and our attention undivided. We probably just needed a reminder.
Are you wondering how I knew? Haha… because there is so much we can achieve through it.
Listening is hearing without judgment
Understanding without interruption
Observing in silence
With compassion and zero pretense.
It means stretching out a hand
To those in darkness that they may hold
So that together we may walk the dark path with an open heart
Climbing the hills and valleys, crossing the bridges until we see the light
All these can be achieved by first, a strong resolve to listen with intent. Let us take one communication at a time, Poco a Poco we will make the world a more compassionate place.
Mary Essiet is a native of Akwa Ibom State, Nigeria, and a medical student who heals through writing.
by Sr. Rita Kelly MMM Ireland 17.05.2024
My first reaction on seeing this photograph was “I hope no -one will steal those poor man’s sandals.” This poignant picture was taken in Mount Street, Dublin. It is a photograph that has stayed with me. I wonder who is person inside the tent? Where did he come from? Has he a family in Afghanistan, Syria, Africa.? Wife and children? Did he leave his home, with the hope of a better life in Europe? Who and how much did he pay to cross borders of hostile countries and oceans? Is he still hoping or is he in despair to find himself in this country, at the western edge of Europe. Does he feel welcomed?
Coming from our own Irish history of emigration and at the same time a desire to be a land of a “thousand welcomes”, there is a sense of being overwhelmed. There were two protest marches in Dublin on the first Monday in May, a Public Holiday. One was an anti-immigration march, and the other pro-immigration. On 16th March when I saw on RTE news the big machines removing the tents on Mount Street, all I could feel was disbelieve. The last time I saw such images was in Nairobi and the Kenyan government breaking up the shanty towns. I did not think I would it happening in Ireland. How did we come to this state of affairs?
Immigration is complexed; there is no easy answer. I am living in Drogheda. Some months ago, the one and only main hotel in the town was destinated to be a centre for Ukrainian refugees. The local people were upset. There was no communication with them from the government. Post Covid, the local politicians, businesses and community have worked hard to improve the town to encourage tourists. The question was asked why were we not part of the consultation? There are many empty buildings in the town which could be upgraded. Sixty empty buildings were counted!! Another good point was made that if Refugees and Asylum Seekers were spread throughout the town, they would integrate quicker with the local people.
Difficult conversations are required at all levels. In many communities in Ireland there are already big issues in the lack of houses, health, and education facilities. Naturally then, there will be tensions when immigrants appear to get houses before local people who have been a long time on waiting lists.
I do believe in the good will of the Irish people. The Tent City has moved from Mount Street to the Canal. I am heartened when I hear the asylum seekers being interviewed and they say the local people and volunteers are kind. However, tensions and anti-immigrants feelings will grow if IPAS (International Protection Accommodation Service) has not the capacity and support to respond. The number of immigrants coming is unprecedented, but we are a rich country and have the resources.
Each person who comes to our shores is a human being with their own hopes and fears. I think of this man who put his sandals outside the tent, and I hope we will treat each person with dignity and not get lost in our conversations and debates.
Exodus 23:9
God of Love, I pray that You fill Your people’s hearts with even more compassion. I pray that the refugees and asylum seekers are not oppressed by those around them. I pray that people do not oppress the foreigners because we all know how it feels to be a foreigner or someone who does not neatly fit in their environment. Let Your people’s hearts be filled with empathy, let those seeking refuge be blessed, Amen.
by Sr. Margaret Anne Meyer MMM USA 15.05.2024
In a few days, the 10th of May 2024, will loom up. It will be the 60th year celebration of our Final Medical Class. Where did all those years go since MAY 1964? As I write this blog tender memories lurch up of what it was like to undergo those final months of preparing for our examination. I remember trying to re-study all we had learned in previous years and store it in my brain like a computer would do these days. Yet at that time a thing like a computer was only in the birthing stages.
Thank God we had beautiful Christmas celebrations to recharge, relax and enjoy. So many secondary schools invited us to Guilbert and Sullivan plays. They were so enjoyable, and how Blackrock College managed to have such exquisite female voices coming from male students was a tremendous feat of delight.
Mid-January arrived all too soon and attendance at clinics, tutorials, and lectures; giving medical and surgical presentations, and intense study continued. Prayer, that God would get us through to serve Him in Africa, was always on our lips.
We had a little sampling of what the exams would be like by taking the ECFMG exam. The initials stood for Educational Commission for Foreign Medical Graduates. The exam started in the morning and lasted a long time. It was an American based exam of multiple choice, true and false, and little or no direct questions that we were used to in writing for30 minutes. Two of the five choices seemed correct and sometimes it was difficult to make a choice. There was a test for English attached to it and it was the most difficult I had ever seen. Thank God we all passed. We took the exam as a basis of being allowed to practice in the USA upon further internships and taking American Boards
Soon it was time for our own exams in Medicine and Surgery. We could be asked anything pertaining to Anatomy, Physiology, Pathology Pharmacology, and other subjects we had studied throughout the 5 years. Somehow, I did not find them too difficult and had studied the material. The clinical presentation and oral examinations followed. I recall one Doctor questioning me on the treatment of congenital neurological disease. He asked me what was the cure for these diseases? I vaguely remembered them from Pediatrics, but I told him there was no cure. He told me a good glass of Guiness would help. We smiled.
I can remember the details of my medicine and surgical presentations when we had 30 minutes to examine the patient and make a diagnosis. One patient had renal hypertension with retinopathy. I could not make the surgical diagnosis until the last minute when the patient told me that he had gone to a wedding a few weeks previously and was unable to pass urine. I felt extremely fortunate when the examiners came in several minutes later and the diagnosis was clear. We were taught that if you listened well enough, the patient would tell you what was wrong with them.
The one I do not remember is my Obstetric exam, The examiner was the brother of our President, Eamon de Valera. Professor de Valera asked me what class of a nun I was? I was very troubled. I did not like to say first class, but I did not think I was second class and definitely not third class. I told him I was a Meical Missionary of Mary. He seemed pleased with that. I was wearing a brown speckled colored suit and yellow blouse. I did not tell him I was a nun, but we wore no makeup or high heels as the other female students did.
Even today, I can recall our gratitude to God for coming through with flying colors. Doctor Maura Lynch received first place in our class of seventy with honors in Medicine and Surgery. Sister Doctor Martha Collins received second class honors in Surgery. I passed my exams.
There was great rejoicing in Rosemount. We stayed around for a while encouraging the younger students not to be afraid and to continue their studies.
Our intern year would commence on July first and conferring would be on July 14th. And that is ANOTHER STORY.
by Jo Doyle Ireland 13.05.2024
Recently a friend of mine from Kenya strikingly said to me,
“Is the world trying to eliminate Christ?”
My thoughts about that where, how can we eliminate Light?
During this time from the Easter Resurrection to Pentecost, we really should be asking such vital questions of ourselves. Saying that, I was left wondering more than I was able to answer. I’ve scratched my head and said to myself,
“What is the Way of Resurrection?”
I was stuck, maybe I could look up some theological answer, but would that change my heart?
I tended to constantly go back again and again to looking at,
“The way of the wound.” Surely that path directs us to Resurrection?
Today’s vocabulary tells us of how we are wounded, but we need a vocabulary to tell us how we are healed. PTSD. Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. PTS Post Traumatic Stress. PTSR Post Traumatic Stress Reaction. CPTSD Complex Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, depression and addictions. Healing from all these initials and titles is in spiritual terms an invitation to,
Die with Him and also an invite to be Resurrected with Him.
Our wounds either make us or break us and the deeper our wounds pierce us, the harder we have to work to find healing. Our healing journey cannot be grounded in platitudes but in the search for love and finding those who know how to do just that. There may simply be a living flame of love that heals. The Spirit joins us both in our suffering, our encounter, and our healing. Plainly put, love is the answer.
What gives me hope in looking for Resurrection is firstly that we are all wounded. We all have a touch of something.
What gives me hope is the slow acceptance of our vulnerability and in our owned fracturedness we transform to become compassion. Life is rarely the same after a wounding, we all know that, and after being broken open I have to stop and ponder who am I now, what is my identity, what has been my identity from the very beginning.
The Book of Revelation is not the last book in the Bible for nothing, but we do need to have the courage to walk through this revelation door. This is where God will show us our new name, identity and calling.
Is this Resurrection?
What happens if Resurrection comes from our woundedness and weakness?
How scary is that!
Where will this take us?
Surely our woundedness calls us into a greater participation in life and living.
I believe that this is the call of the wound.
So what happens if we ignore this way.
Will we miss it? Our own Resurrection that is?
Is that why the apostles were so frightened because they knew the depth of transformation and spiritual growth inherent in every wound. Is it because they knew the depth of transformation which is needed to let love burn within them.
In Resurrection I find my name. I find Christ, the Light, within me and outside of me. Is my heart not burning?
Maybe I need to pray,
Come Holy Spirit fill the hearts of your faithful and enkindle in me the fire of your love.
Jo Wardhaugh Doyle is farming in Kildare with her husband Matt. She has worked in Uganda, Ethiopia and Kenya, but more recently has worked with Sr Rita Kelly MMM doing the REAP programme in the Irish Missionary Union (IMU).
This is the season in Ireland for meeting politicians at the door. Local and European elections are coming soon and the hopefuls are calling with promises, leaflets, requests for a vote; all are ready to talk!by Sr. Sheila Campbell MMM Ireland 09.05.2024
Next Sunday we celebrate the Ascension of the Lord. In some countries it is celebrated today. When I was a child, I believed in this in a factual way and would look up at the sky and imagine Jesus zooming up like a supersonic rocket. It was easy to believe this as the Acts of the Apostles says, “He was lifted up, and a cloud took him from their sight”.
Now that I am older, I wonder if the main point of this story is not, in fact, the cloud. In the Bible, the cloud often symbolised the divine presence. It was the pillar of cloud that guided Moses out of Egypt. It was a cloud that covered Mount Sinai when Moses went to speak with God. Even during the Transfiguration there was a bright cloud.
Clouds come and go, scatter, reform themselves, vary in intensity and yet their very essence is to cover over. Maybe that is what is important in the Ascension Cloud. It is telling us that we don’t know the whole story, things will still be uncovered, revealed, in God’s own time.
“It is not for you to know times and seasons.” often we try to manipulate situations to suit our own ends, the cloud reminds us that God is in control, not us!
In the late 14th Century, an English mystic encouraged his pupils to run with the cloud metaphor as they tried to pray. Accept that God is fathomless mystery, he said, and enter ‘the cloud of your unknowing’! There, even though you can’t see, you’ll have a better chance of glimpsing God.
What do we make of all this cloud-talk in context of our troubled world today? That nameless author of ‘The Cloud of Unknowing’ lived in uncertain times. As well as war and social unrest, he lived in a time of pandemic. In his youth, the Black Death had raged across England, killing maybe half its people. And it kept coming back. His response? To long for God. To turn to contemplative prayer in his ‘little soul-room’. To accept the limitations of reason and embrace mystery. To glimpse God lovingly waiting for him in the cloud of his unknowing. It seems a perfect approach for Ascension Sunday. Perhaps for the wider times in which we live too?
Thank you, Susanna Gunner, for encouraging me to think of this!
by Nadia Ramoutar MMM Communications Coordinator Ireland 07.05.2024
Perhaps one of the hardest things about being human is overcoming the hurt and harm that other people create for us. Whether this is when we are children or when we adults, forgiveness is an essential part of being able to grow up and to move on with our lives. Sometimes we are looking at forgiving something minor and sometimes we are being asked to forgive something major. No matter the size, being willing to forgive can be a huge ask.
What is forgiveness really? According to the American Psychology association involves wilfully putting aside feelings of resentment toward someone who has committed a wrong, been unfair or hurtful, or otherwise harmed you in some way. Forgiveness is not merely accepting what happened or ceasing to be angry. Rather, it involves a voluntary transformation of your feelings, attitudes, and behaviour, so that you are no longer dominated by resentment and can express compassion, generosity, or the like toward the person who wronged you.
Simply put, forgiveness involved letting something go that hurt. Or you could say that forgiveness is about overlooking something that hurt but not forgetting it necessarily.
When we look at Jesus’ perspective on forgiveness, we see that we were not expected to forgive a person once or twice. No, a lot more is expected of us.
In Matthew 18:21-22, Jesus tells Peter that he should forgive his brother who sinned against him, not seven times, but seventy-seven times. Is this forgiving the same person that many times or multiple people seven times I hear myself asking for clarity. Basically, we are being asked not to keep the score.
We are asked to turn our cheek and to keep going. Not overcoming a hurt or way a person harmed us can be damaging not only to the relationship but to us too. Someone once told me that resentment is taking poison and thinking the other person is going to die. An inability to forgive works the same kind of way. We forgive at some point because not forgiving hurts us so much.
Research now indicates that there are significant benefits to forgiving someone. According to the Mayo Clinic there are many benefits.
• Healthier relationships
• Improved mental health.
• Less anxiety, stress and hostility.
• Fewer symptoms of depression.
• Lower blood pressure.
• A stronger immune system.
• Improved heart health.
• Improved self-esteem.
Some researchers are going as far as to say that the inability to forgive can create illness or disease for us which is literally a dis-ease, lack of ease. So, as we move through the world, perhaps we need to think who or what else we might need to forgive? It does not mean we have to reconnect with people or have to be close to them again, but it does mean that we let them off the hook, or seventy-seven hooks for that matter.
So let’s get unhooking!
by Sr. Helen McKenna MMM Ireland/Tanzania 05.05.2024
Hammers and nails were so much a part of your life
The smell of sawdust greeted your nostrils every day
Often you’d have helped your father maybe with the plane or lathe
How did you manage the handsaw?
Did you delight in making a table or chair,
You who created the world?
As I sit here in Africa amidst the wood shavings
Enjoying the Sabbath, all is still.
And as I look at the carpenter’s bench
And homemade ladder, it strikes me …
Hammers and nails were so much part of your life
And yet they were the tools that put an end to it.
How the young lads love to carve their name on a piece of wood.
Jesus, the King of the Jews, they wrote.
The wood, they didn’t bother to prepare
No shaving or cutting, no planning
Just as it was, maybe still growing, they used it.
How often you’d enjoyed joining the wood together
At the bang of a hammer.
Here now it’s you that’s being joined – hands to wood – for me.
Mary was the carpenter’s wife but queen,
You were the carpenter’s son and Messiah.
by Sr. Margaret Anne Meyer MMM USA 03.05.2024
The summer vacation went quickly. At times we were overjoyed when visiting Drogheda to see the four students who had just qualified and left us, bustling around the hospital in their white coats, caring for the patients. It was a wonderful feeling to think it would be our turn next. Then we would realize it was a tremendous leap to be able to study and retain five years of knowledge which our examiners would expect from us. Our love for the people of Africa kept us focused and each day brought new challenges. Our studies became more interesting as we watched each other give medical and surgical presentations. All was beginning to click into place.
September came and with it was an assignment to spend two months in Holles Street Hospital to learn how to deliver babies. Martha Collins. Maura Lynch and I shared the same residence. It was exciting for all of us. We had a registrar who would give us lectures and show us the various departments. An obstetrician would ask us questions and demonstrate various procedures. I had asked to see a baby being born in the Maternity Hospital a few years before and was in awe of the mother working so hard to have her first baby and the incredible joy on her face after her safe delivery. It brought to mind the words of St. Paul,’ I am in Labor until Christ is formed in you.” Galatians 4:19 I prayed that I would not become a selfish old maid as a nun but spend myself for souls as OUR FOUNDRESS Mother Mary inspired us to do so.
Well, the blessed day came, September 8th, 1963, when it was my turn to deliver a baby under the midwife’s direction. John Paul Kelly was born, and I have been praying for him since. I was so filled with joy and so was his mother.
With every delivery we were each assigned a stage of labor. We even had a fourth stage which was called the cleanup stage and the one who did that had the privilege of taking the baby down the stairs to the mother who eagerly awaited him or her. I loved that stage too.
It was the first time to live outside the convent and we had some enjoyable night recreations playing table tennis with the other students. Sometimes we helped the women in the kitchen dry the dishes. They liked a chat and told us how we Medical Missionaries of Mary were so free that we could ride our bicycles all over town. It might have looked like being free but sometimes our legs got numb on the frigid days.
We could forgo lunch and travel to the Mater Hospital by bicycle to attend a Pediatric lecture. An apple and a chocolate bar would do.
There was a hostel nearby, Marie Auxiliatrix, where we could visit and pray. Marie Reparatrice Convent was nearby, too. They had Perpetual Adoration.
One night the male students decided to have a little fun and called all the women to go to the Labor ward at 1 AM to see Siamese Twins being born. Of course, we did not like the joke, but the men had a good laugh seeing all the curlers in our hair.
Of course, there is a sorrowful side of Obstetrics which we saw a few things go wrong. A beautiful young woman who had rheumatic heart disease delivered her baby very easily but, in the process, suffered a clot to her brain which made one side of her upper body paralyzed. Another died suddenly from an amniotic fluid embolism. One woman had severe hypertension and eclampsia. She had complete bed rest for several months and delivered her baby without any complications. She was incredibly happy to have a live child. We learned a lot about the swiftness of life and death and how to be attentive in decision making. and pray for a good outcome for mother and child.
Soon our two-month experience ended, and we were back to Earlsfort Terrace, attending lectures. We would soon be taking our Final Exams in Obstetrics and Pediatrics.at the end of November. Thank God we all passed and looked forward to celebrating Christmas in Rosemount and the return for our Final Semester but that is another story.
