FOUNDERS' DAY
1822- 2008
John 20: 19-31
In a few days we will celebrate Founders
’ Day so it is only right to go back to the year 1822.
She is
27 years old and she and her newly widowed Mother and siblings recently migrated
from Maryland to the Kentucky frontier along Cartwright Creek. In the volume,
Dominicans At Home In a Young Nation, we learn that as Mariah Sansbury and
her family arrived in Washington County, the most imposing sight to greet them
was the cluster of buildings high on a hill known as St. Rose Church, St. Rose
Priory, St. Thomas College and Seminary, a mill and a farm.
Little did Mariah and her sister Elizabeth, as well as the parishioners of St. Rose Parish, know that from January through April in the year of 1822 they would witness a series of historical events occurring in their tiny, little church.
In January, Edward Fenwick, a Dominican, was consecrated Bishop of Cincinnati in St. Rose Church by Joseph Flaget, Bishop of Bardstown. Imagine the jubilation and excitement in the young parish!
In February, the Dominican provincial, Samuel Wilson, who was one of the founding members of the 16 year old parish, issued a pulpit invitation to the young women of St. Rose to establish a Third Order of Dominican Sisters who would live as a religious community and provide schooling for the young females in the Cartwright Creek settlement. Imagine the questions, the excitement and apprehensions of Mariah and her 26-year-old sister, Elizabeth, who were surrounded in the pews by lots of cousins with Central Kentucky names like Boone, Carrico and Johnson.
As the March lilies broke through the winter chill the parish family gathered on March 2 when Bishop Fenwick ordained four young men as Dominican priests. All four men accompanied the bishop to their new mission in Cincinnati. The trip in the raw, March weather was marked by hardship especially the fact that the five men had to swim the half frozen Kentucky River as part of their arduous journey.
On Sunday, April 7, Mariah Sansbury entered St. Rose
Church and accepted the Dominican habit from Father Wilson. She was given the
name Sister Angela and several months later her sister, Elizabeth, we
re
given the habit. They received the constitutions translated from the Latin by
Father Wilson. The introduction of the constitutions compared the sisters to the
deaconesses of the early Church.
Mariah and Elizabeth, we know them more commonly as Angela and Benven, are kin to, or in the words of today
’s gospel ‘twin’ to Thomas the apostle. In the account from John we see the stubborn refusal of Thomas. "Unless I see the mark of the nails in his hands and put my finger into the nail marks and put my hand into his side, I will not believe." The narrative goes on to reveal the fact that the Risen Lord was truly Jesus of Nazareth. Thomas was placed in a position where unbelief became impossible……his combination of courage and ignorance led to his dramatic proclamation of faith, "My Lord and My God."Angela and Benven, though quite familiar with the nearby Sisters of Loretto and the Sisters of Charity of Nazareth were not drawn to the security of a more established sisterhood, but rather chose to follow a ministry worthy of their passion. They cast their lots with the courageous and soon to be tested efforts of the young Friars Preachers.
Angela and Benven never had the benefit of the contemporary poet, Mary Oliver, whose poem, The Summer Day, concludes with the piercing line,
"Tell me what it is you plan to do with your one, wild and precious life?"Surrounded by the faith-filled community of the St. Rose parishioners and the budding new life among the Dominican brothers, Samuel Wilson
’s pulpit challenge could well have been paraphrased in the words, "Tell me what it is you plan to do with your one, wild and precious life?"Angela, in the company of eight other young women from St. Rose Parish, responded whole-heartedly by each offering their one, wild and precious life. They knew that in the beginners
’ mind there are many possibilities. They had a heart-felt sense in 1822 just as Timothy Radcliffe said in 1997, "There are ways of being a Dominican we haven’t even dreamed of."Just as Thomas needed courage and ignorance in order to utter his dramatic confession of faith in the words,
"My Lord and my God." So, too, it was a combination of courage and ignorance that led Benven, in 1848, along with 21 sisters from Kentucky and 17 from Ohio, to sign a petition to the Holy Father. The letter was a joint request asking to be dispensed from the cloister and the recitation of the Divine Office so as to adapt to their duties as teachers and the hardships of life on the frontier. Incidentally the letter was never answered.Just as Thomas is our brother in faith we learn from him that there is no strength where there is no struggle. Through him we are given the freedom to express our own disbelief, to know that some days our fear overtakes us and we trust only in ourselves and not in God.
Angela and Benven are the cornerstone of our sisterhood. They did not seek refuse
"behind closed doors" like the disciples in today’s gospel, but rather they embarked on a collaborative and spontaneous response to the needs of their day.In the post Easter days of 1822 Angela and Benven
"came to believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that through this belief they would have life in his name."
These two courageous, pioneer women teach us in the words of T. S. Eliot that whatever happens in the past presses hard on the future. They teach us that fidelity to the Gospel does not consist in merely imitating the past, but believing in the words of today
’s responsorial psalm, "God’s steadfast love endures forever."In a short while we as a community will celebrate Founders
’ Day, born on this Kentucky frontier 186 years ago and interwoven with Dominican sisters, friars, nuns, brothers, volunteers, and associates throughout the world in over 102 different countries. Today as we gather around this table to break open the Word of the Gospel and break the bread of the Eucharist we pray that we may be inspired by the example of Angela and Benven so that fear and doubt never hold us back and keep us locked behind closed doors of entitlement and isolation.Mary Louise Edwards, OP