Best regards and prayers to all-

I enjoyed listening to Sr. Sandra since I’ve never heard her speak, but I find it sort of odd that she distances herself from her community. She “makes clear that she’s speaking for herself, not her order…” Why does she do that? I always thought religious life was about a whole identity, a whole sense of being from which the doing ( ministry, action, speech, etc) then flows. As a religious, is it ever really possible or desirable to step outside the charism of your religious identity and speak just for your self? I guess I’m curious because I have been hoping to enter religious life and, as I understand it, everything I do will be fundamentally different once I have entered because I will be living in the collectivity and communion of something bigger than my current individual self. And I want that. I want to live the Communion of Saints, where saints stick by each other through thick and thin because it is their identity consists of unity and blessed togetherness.

Sr. Julie, you’re part of the IHM congregation as well… do you think Sr. Sandra is speaking as an IHM sister when she writes/talks, or just as “Sandra” with the IHM stripped away? Is it a protective thing…. perhaps she’s trying to avoid dragging the rest of IHM in with her since this whole Visitation debate can get pretty snarky? Or is it that some IHM sisters don’t want to be associated with the perspective she’s taken?

I guess any congregation with individual sisters in high profile ministries has to deal with these questions.

I finally listened to the interview. I thought it was very good. I especially like Sr. Sandra’s comment “all interpretation is personal.” She hit the nail on the head. dee

I think you “sell yourself short.” By all appearances from your posting, you, too, have the very considerable skills you admire in Sr. Sandra. Those skills are a real gift- and cast a blanket of blessings well beyond just the skilled individual.