—FROM OUR FOUNDERS AND FRIENDS

Late Autumn – colors blaze, leaves fall, days grow shorter, the cycle of life continues. We celebrate our communion with saints named and unnamed. We give thanks to the God of the harvest for fruitful lives and a fruitful earth; we pray that all may share in God’s abundance.

From centuries ago, the words of our founders still resound, full of wisdom and insight for today. As autumn days stretch before us, the saints and holy ones invite us to meet our grace with gratitude in the time and place that God gives us.

ST. ELIZABETH ANN SETON

Oh! when shall I with thy Saints behold thee in thy glory – they now rejoice with thee forever, whilst I must still love thee under the veils which hide thee from me—but what they believed I believe, what they hoped for I hope for, where they are gone I trust through thy grace to arrive, and through all my life while waiting the coming of thy glory, I will rejoice to adore thee, My Lord and My God.

…in life, in death, in time, in eternity
in the hour of death, defend me,
call me to come to thee, receive me
with thy saints, in glory everlasting.

ST. VINCENT DE PAUL

I am asking Our Lord to be Himself, your strength and your life, as He is to all who nourish themselves with his love.

All of us make up a mystical body, but we’re all members of one another….Every part of us is in such sympathy with one another and so interconnected that the pain of one is the pain of the other.

St. LOUISE DE MARILLAC

God almost always gives me the grace to acknowledge and appreciate the opinions of others even when they are completely contrary to my own.

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WISDOM FROM OUR FRIENDS

Today, and everyday, I would ask each of you, whatever your capacity, to care for one another. Be close to one another, respect one another, and so embody among yourselves this organization’s ideal of a united human family, living in harmony, working not only for peace, but in peace; working not only for justice, but in a spirit of justice. (Pope Francis to U.N. staff workers, 9/25/15)

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I was thinking how, as one gets older, we are tempted to sadness, knowing life as it is here on earth, the suffering, the Cross. And how we must overcome it daily, growing in love, and the joy which goes with loving. (Servant of God Dorothy Day)

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[Pope]Francis evoked spontaneous applause when he expressed his esteem and gratitude to religious women of the US: “What would the church be without you — women of strength, fighters with that spirit of courage — which puts you in the front lines in the proclamation of the Gospel?” (Sister Mary Ellen O’Boyle, SC)