by Sr. Marian Scena MMM U.S.A. / Tanzania 17.05.2023
“What colour is its eyebrow, Marian?”, asked one of my MMM Sisters – with a bit of humour and just the slightest touch of sarcasm! Little did she realise how important that eyebrow might be in identifying the bird I was trying to observe. The misunderstandings that one suffers in the call of duty as a Birder!
From the time I was a child we always had a bird feeder outside our kitchen window and my mother used to point out various birds that visited it. I was always interested in birds but didn’t get seriously involved until I came to Tanzania where the beauty and variety of birds is amazing. Once I acquired my first set of binoculars or “bins” I was hooked forever! Then, in 1991, I met a Welsh couple who were working in Singida and they introduced me to Liz and Neil Baker, an English couple living in Tanzania, who were compiling a Bird Atlas of Tanzania. I met them and was introduced to the system of observing and reporting on all the birds I see every month. means noting down where I see them, how many, what species, and whether they are breeding or not. Like me, many other ’Birders’ from all over the country report monthly, so that the entries are accumulated for the ever growing data base of the still-to-come Bird Atlas.
Birding is great fun – without any other motive except wonder and appreciation of God’s feathered friends. But the fact that I am contributing to a yet-to-be-published Bird Atlas gives me added incentives. I have found birding a wonderful complement to my doctoring ministry which is often so absorbing and time consuming. Even if I don’t have a few minutes to sit down with my “bins”, I can see various birds just as I am walking home from the hospital at the end of a busy day. I think being a doctor and having developed my powers of observation to a fairly high degree has helped me in observing the various aspects of a bird that are essential to its accurate identification.
I find birding a great feeder of my prayer. In fact, it is like prayer; I spend time in waiting, not knowing if and what I will experience of God, but grateful for whatever visits God might grant me. When I am birding, I am quiet and waiting, not sure what I will see. Sometimes, like dryness in prayer, I see nothing. But many times, I get wonderful surprises and see a new bird for the first time or some new bird behaviour. And I always find myself praising God for the beauty of creation around me and in God’s feathered creatures. Prayer and birding just go together. Wherever I go I am alert and looking for birds. This makes the time on long safaris on bad roads go more quickly and enjoyably. There is a lot I miss as I rarely ask the driver to stop so I can have a look with my “bins”. But I still manage to identify approximately 25% of the birds that I pass while driving. Once a month, on my day off, I try to walk to nearby Mianji Dam. It takes 5-7 hours to do a thorough walk at a contemplative pace. On such a day, I usually see over 50 species of birds around the Dam and 10-15 more species on the way there. So far, I have seen 498 different species in Tanzania. Of these, 122 have been in or over Makiungu Hospital.
I am amazed at the wonderful variety of birds even in our own compound. I haven’t yet had time to total my entire Life List of species I’ve observed in other countries where I’ve been. Anyone who can see or hear can be a birder. The very energetic, adventurous person will see more, but it doesn’t have to be energetic. Even if you happen to be confined to a wheelchair you can enjoy the sight and sounds of birds. It can be an occasional hobby or can become a daily one. I hope that I have whetted your appetite to discover the beauty of God’s feathered friends.
Editor’s Note: First published in MMM Yearbook 2000.
by Nadia Ramoutar MMM Communications Coordinator Ireland 15.05.2023
There are two sides to almost every situation but when we are in it, it is hard to see both of them. The excitement of a new adventure and going to a new place also involves leaving behind a home that is both familiar and comfortable. It requires a leap of faith into the unknown.
The MMM Sisters go forth from their homes and families and after many years of preparation, enter into a new life in an unknown place with new people. I know working with the MMMs that they would NEVER make a big deal of what it means to leave and make this type of commitment. They would also not make a fuss of what they leave behind when they go.
Each MMM carries a unique story of where she is from, why she entered MMM and what she left behind to go. You can’t carry much when you go to live in a remote area of the world. The MMM Sisters are not only brave to do this but they are also resourceful in making this lives work in a brand new place.
Being able to make such a change is something to be admired regardless of the circumstances. Giving your life to serve people who are most vulnerable living in remote areas of the world where there are very few resources mean they have to leave behind aspects of identity and expand the meaning of “home”.
For many of our MMM Sisters they spend decades and decades away from their birthplace. Many of our MMM Sisters are active into their 70s and 80s. They then come “back home” to a place that is very different from where they left. So in going home they are now back in an unknown space – again.
The ability to adapt and to get on with life is really notable with the MMM Sisters who provide services of healing and sharing the healing charism wherever they go. They do so modestly, unable to bring parts of their life together at one time. It is often a mutually exclusive set of expectations at one time.
Many of us are creatures of habit and comfort. We like things to be a certain way. Imagine just putting all that aside and entering into a new space that you don’t know the language, the culture or the people. You are thrust into a new situation with trust and faith to guide you. While the MMM Sisters are well prepared for these things in their training years, facing it for real must take huge growth and courage. It is so admirable to see how much they give to follow their calling and spread the healing charism with the world.
So much grief in the world comes from limitations like borders and politics. The idea that “home” is a much bigger place than just where you are born could really serve our world. To see other people as our brothers and sisters, mothers and fathers, aunts and uncles. To expand our hearts and minds to know that we are all one family. Beyond demographics, the human family is one.
by Sr. Margaret Anne Meyer MMM U.S.A. 13.05.2023
For the last 20 years people have been telling me I should get my hearing tested. I thought I was hearing well so I agreed to go with an older Sister for a hearing test. Lo and behold, I was found to have some high frequency hearing loss, but not enough to require a hearing aid. I was greatly relieved. However, every few years people continued to ask me to get a hearing test and the same result would occur. Several members of the Community at that time wore hearing aids, and the television was loud, which suited me very well. Then these Sisters went into assisted living facilities and younger Sisters came who lowered the television. I could not hear very well unless I used a battery device headphone, and even then, I missed a lot of words. The hearing test this time showed I had reached the level where no more testing was of any use, and the time had come to get a hearing aid.
It took me time to deal with the shock. Had the time come when I would be considered an old lady? Well ,to my amazement, and thanks to a recent upgrading of the hearing aids, I have come to consider the betterment of my hearing as having ‘ear buds’. The aids are attached to my phone as to a Bluetooth device, and I can regulate the volume and direction on my phone. I can receive phone calls directly into my ears. If I had enough dexterity, I would not have to touch my phone at all. I could control the answering with small buttons on the earpiece. However, I am happy with holding my phone, placed automatically on speaker, so I can talk to myself like the young people walking along the street who appear to be talking to themselves. This also applies to listening to YouTube and podcasts while walking around. There is also a place on the phone Sound Apps which measures my steps and daily activity. There does not seem to be a limit to new possibilities discovered every day.
It was such a joy to take a walk and hear all the birds singing. The sound of the wind rustling through the leaves, children laughing in the school playground, was a touch of magic to my ears. As I am writing this I can not help thinking about the recent Gospel of the Good Shepherd. How Jesus leads His sheep with His voice. Is this a wake up call for me to get out of the couch-potato rhythm of the elderly and join the wonder of the young in listening to the promptings of the Spirit as to what God wants next of me. Holy Spirit, please send me a Bluetooth device into my heart that I can dance to your tune for me.
by Sr. Raphael O’Connell MMM (1925 – 2022) Ireland 11.05.2023
It was to be the last voyage of the Llangibby Castle, the elderly ship of the Union Castle Line that had once carried Edel Quinn to Africa. Sr. Kieran Saunders was returning to Tanganyika (as it was then, now Tanzania). She was returning from home leave and accompanied by Srs. Eileen Keoghan and Sr. Raphael O’Connell. Sr. Raphael had qualified in medicine a year earlier, and this was her first overseas assignment. She recalls the reason she was invited to dine with the Captain before they docked!
“We sailed from England on New Year’s Day in 1954. We had no storm crossing the infamous Bay of Biscay, but there was a mighty storm after we entered the Mediterranean. So we were very happy when we entered the calm waters of the Suez Canal. While cruising down the Canal, we were at siesta one afternoon when there was a loud knocking at our Cabin door. A ship’s officer was there, saying that the Ship’s Doctor was asking for assistance. A young female passenger, en route to South Africa on honeymoon, has developed acute appendicitis. He had hoped the patient would make it to Mombasa, but the abscess had perforated. Could Doctor O’Connell take care of the anaesthetic while the Ship’s Doctor operated on her?
The children’s play area was scrubbed down and sterilised, while the Captain steered the vessel into the two-way bypass in the Bitter Lakes between El Qantarah and Al Ismailiyah and dropped anchor.
When the surgery was finished, Srs. Kieran and Eileen, now dressed in their white nurses’ uniforms, took over the special care of the patient in her first-class cabin. She made such a good recovery that when the ship docked at Mombasa, the surgeon who examined her there felt there was no need for her to be admitted to the hospital, which would have interrupted her honeymoon voyage to South Africa!”
First published by MMM in 1997
by Sr. Mary Doonan, MMM Ireland 09.05.2023
Mother Mary Martin, the founder of the Medical Missionaries of Mary, was a woman ahead of her time. She saw the need “to start our General Training Hospital which is a crying necessity for our missionary work and the people of the district”. The building of the International Missionary Training Hospital in Drogheda (IMTH) commenced with the turning of the sod and blessing by Cardinal D’Alton on the 8th September 1952. Soon after that, the building contractors moved in and work began.
Having a great business sense, Mother Mary realised the first section of the hospital to be build should be the boiler house and the new laundry, rather than the wards and other areas. From the beginning, out of necessity, there was a laundry attached to Our Lady of Lourdes Hospital in Drogheda.
Wishing the new laundry to be run properly, Mother Mary employed an experienced English Manageress, Miss Adams, to oversee the project. The equipment was purchased and installed, staff recruited and trained and all the regulations for the protection of the staff was put in place. The installation of the boiler, which had to be in place before the walls around it could be built, took place on 16th March 1954.
As well as serving the IMTH, the laundry served the people in and around Drogheda, as well as some big institutions like Butlin’s Holiday Camp, colleges, and hotels.
Over the years both the old and new Our Lady of Lourdes Laundry gave employment to many in Drogheda. The Laundry initially employed women of all ages according to their ability. The women spoke of how they enjoyed the companionship they had, the sharing of stories at break times, and of course, the payment. They had money in their pockets every week that was their own to spend. The younger women remembered that when they were getting married, Mother Mary gave them their wedding cake, baked and decorated in the convent.
Sisters who had also worked in the laundry wrote from the missions grateful for their laundry experience in Drogheda. When they went on mission, they wrote home “it is good to get started; my own experience, in the Laundry in Drogheda is coming in very useful now, with a Washer, Hydro and Drier”.
A statue of Mother Mary Martin is to be unveiled on 27th May this year, across the road from where Our Lady of Lourdes Laundry was situated and close to the Hospital Entrance.
by Nadia Ramoutar MMM Communications Coordinator 07.05.2023
Recently, something unplanned and unexpected happened that caused a little minor earthquake in my plans. I have a book in which I write a daily plan of what I will accomplish that day. Anything unfinished, goes on to the list for the next day. I do not like to have to write that task over again, so generally I get things done. My whole life has been a series of lists with boxes checked.
So when there is “a plot twist” I am generally unamused.
Almost childlike in my approach to life, I like to believe that good things happen to good people. I want to believe that hard work rewards us with a positive outcome. But, this is a massive oversimplification and I am seeing that it is also damaging. Recently, I changed approaches and I would like to share it with you.
A book that really moved me and I have reread several times is Victor Frankl’s “Man’s Search for meaning.” In it, Frankl somehow manages to create a very generous and curious approach to facing tragedy as a Holocaust survivor. He offers us a balanced approach to avoid ‘toxic positivity’ in which we pretend things are great , when they are clearly not and a fatalistic view that we are all doomed. He also managed to not be bitter or to let suffering define him.
Now, as a writer I know that conflict is an important part of a good story. I know that an interesting character needs to have a quest and want something that they cannot easily get. I realise that life’s “tests” can be an opportunity for us to grow in ways a perfect existence will not encourage. If I really want to increase my capacity to love in the world, I need to stop avoiding them and start welcoming the diversions.
It seems like it is time for me to question my beliefs and to expand my values to involve a wider turning lane for the vehicle of life. The trails of life are not a distraction from spiritual life, they are part of it. This brings me to reflect on a popular metaphor from the Gospel of Peter:
“These trails will show that your faith is genuine. It is being tested as fire tests and purifies gold – though your faith is more precious than mere gold.”
Delays, disappointments, and even betrayals are part of life’s journey. We can expect the unexpected and be certain about the uncertain We don’t help ourselves in being a person who espouses toxic positivity or who allows bitterness to take root and grow a vine in our veins.
We do best to know our values and our worth so when things go wrong we can stay rooted. If we can stop seeing things as good or bad we can an open a brand new page for a new story to be written. In our efforts to be prepared and to stay safe, we miss golden opportunities to show our faith. In letting go of control, we can co-create reality rather being dragged down by feeling over responsible for everyone and everything around us. I still love a good plan and a nice list but now I leave space between the lines for the interesting plot twists.
by Sr. Rita Kelly MMM Ireland 05.05.2023
Recently, I was asked what influenced me to write the thesis “Towards a Transformative Spirituality: Exploring Stress and Trauma among Missionaries in Ministry.” (See link below) The following are the threads that led me to write the thesis.
In 1998, I returned to Ireland after many years on mission. Adjusting back to Ireland was not easy. It is like adjusting back to a whole new country and culture. The Irish Missionary Union (IMU) sent out an invitation for a meeting of Returned Missionaries. From this meeting, there was a recommendation that a Returned Missionary Desk to be set up. After a few weeks I received a phone-call inviting me to set up the Desk.
I was aware of the organisation, Comhlámh, an association for returning development workers. I attended a few of their events. I did not want to reinvent the wheel and wondered where I would start? Meetings were facilitated and a survey carried out to explore the expectations for the new Desk. There were several issues raised such as transitions and reverse mission, but one issue continually surfaced was the whole area of stress and trauma.
Many spoke of their experiences such as the living in conflict areas, famines, and natural disasters; but one conversation that stayed in my mind was the stories that were shared about the Biafra War. The Biafra War, now called the Nigerian Civil War, occurred in the late 1960s. This conversation was taking place in 1999, thirty years after the war. The effects of the war were still very alive in the memories.
Over the years, with the support of IMU, many programmes were put in place such as addressing transition and reverse mission. Also, it was a resource for individual counselling and spiritual direction. Many were returning home, but gradually more members were coming who were just on home leave.
Addressing the area of stress and trauma continued to be a challenge. There was a sense that missionaries found it difficult to admit that they could not cope. A team was formed of skilled and trained members in the management of stress and trauma. IMU-REAP team was gradually formed. The aim of the team was to take a wholistic healing approach, that is mental, physical, spiritual and social. Each of us experience stress and trauma and react differently, even in a similar incident. Seminars and workshops were offered in awareness, education and training in stress and trauma.
From this experience I wrote the thesis as part of a M.A. in Spirituality (2006 – 2008). Academic Papers – Medical Missionaries of Mary (mmmworldwide.org)
“Nobody escapes being wounded. We are all wounded people, whether physically, emotionally, mentally or spiritually. The main question is not “How can we hide our wounds?” So, we don’t have to be embarrassed but “How can we put our roundedness in the service of others? When our wounds cease to be a source of shame and become a source of healing, we have become wounded healers”. (Henri Nouwen: Ministry in Contemporary Society).
by Paul Brian Campbell SJ U.S.A. 03.05.2023
I was only 11 years-old when my sister entered the Medical Missionaries of Mary. Some of my memories of that time are fuzzy, but I seem to remember Sheila explaining to the family that, although Hugo Kelly, who assisted Mother Mary Martin at the time of the Congregation’s founding, was himself a Jesuit he thought it would be better for the Medical Missionaries to adopt a Benedictine spirituality rather than a Jesuit [Ignatian] one.
More than 50 years later and now as a Jesuit, I don’t understand Fr. Kelly’s reasoning because I know many congregations of sisters based in Ignatian spirituality that are thriving. Having said that, the Benedictine focus on hospitality has been especially beneficial to the MMMs and is at the heart of everything they are.
I have enormously enjoyed MMM hospitality in Ireland, the United States and Brazil. Wherever in the world you meet them, their welcome is always delightfully warm and gracious. You never feel like you’re going into a stranger’s house. You are embraced by the community from the moment you arrive.
If you have yet to experience MMM hospitality in person, you’re in for a treat!
Sheila’s Version:
As usual my younger brother has things wrong! Fr. Hugh Kelly was Mother Mary’s spiritual director and she relied on him for wise advice. But the main influence on Mother Mary choosing Benedictine spirituality was her own lived experience in Glenstal Abbey, Co. Limerick.
During the years when she was discerning her way forward towards founding a medical missionary congregation, the monks in Glenstal offered herself and her companions a welcome to their monastery and a spiritual formation in return for housekeeping duties. She was impressed with their rhythm of work and prayer, the simplicity of their lifestyle and, yes, their hospitality. God was to be welcomed in each person that crossed the threshold.
So, in a way, we had both influences in the early years of the Congregation and have benefitted from both!
by Sr. Noeleen Mooney MMM Ireland 01.05.2023
“Where is she going with that? I said, silently, because we were waiting for Mass to begin.
It was the feast of Saint Joseph the Worker, May 1st, and we had come to sing and ask his blessing on our work. But here was a Mama, with a baby surveying all from the snug security of her back, carrying a jembe (a hoe), right up to the front of the Church.
It seemed to be the start of a procession. Soon there was a complete row of jembes, all pointing heavenwards. A squeaking sound announced the arrival of another Mama, complete with tin bucket. It too, was placed solemnly in line.
And suddenly it seemed so right, to bring symbols of our work. So, I watched fascinated while the procession grew, and variety increased.
The student nurses brought their precious textbooks and pens, carefully wrapped in beautifully embroidered cloths, a craft in which they excel. The medical assistant brought his stethoscope; the cook brought his baking tins; the tailor brought his scissors; the midwife brought her foetal stethoscope, (the small children were fascinated, it looked so much like a horn that I’m sure they longed to blow it!).
So, all kinds of signs appeared of human efforts in building up the Kingdom. They were duly blessed and sent forth in many hands to continue the task of planting, building, reaping, healing. All part of the glorious call to be human.
What did I bring myself? Well you might ask. Only myself, I ‘m afraid. Had I known in time I think it would have been the microscope. But there is always next year!
by Sr. Sheila Campbell MMM Ireland 29.04.2023
I am sitting waiting for something to start. Something I am responsible for, and I am nervous. I can’t concentrate on anything else and I invent small tasks to pass the time. Did I re-arrange the furniture in that office I used yesterday for an interview? Did I check if any mail came in today? Is there enough milk in the fridge for the staff?
You know how it is. Your mind goes racing to pass the time and suppress the panic.
For some reason today it made me think of our patients all over the world. The ones who are facing tests, awaiting test results, waiting for surgery, anticipating the birth of a child. I think for them also the time also goes incredibly slow. I wonder have I always been patient with my patients! One of the Sisters in the house is waiting for hip surgery. She has the date and is organising herself to be ready for it. But you can see the odd flicker of worry, even though she declares she is not afraid. Still, I assured her that the prayers of the rest of us would be behind her and carry her along.
I am thinking that Mary also must have been anxious waiting for the birth of Jesus. “How is this going to turn my life around?”, she must have been saying to herself – and not having an answer to her question. What mother does not go through anxious periods during her pregnancy. I can imagine the questions are endless. How will the birth be? Will the baby be all right? Will the father accept the child? How will I cope? Those of you who have been mothers can probably add a few more ponderings to this list.
And what about Jesus himself in the Garden of Gethsemane? Wasn’t that a terrible agony of waiting? Thinking about this I realise I have little to complain about.
Waiting only demands of us an openness to the future. It mirrors back to us our lack of control and that is what causes the panic, I think. So today, as I wait, I just want to reach out and take God’s hand. I am asking him to keep me company in my time of waiting.
