Jubilee

Sister Julie tackles her task of creating a prayer service for a jubilarian -- and hits the wall. Then two remarkable things happen.

It's difficult to put into words fully what the experience was like personally. For me, it was both an experience of intense sisterhood and also an encounter with God. It was at once deeply communal and deeply personal.

This is one of my favorite weeks of the whole year which I affectionately call Nunapalooza because all of the sisters and associates in my IHM Community come home to Monroe, Michigan, for Community Days and Jubilee. Community Days is the few days before Jubilee where we gather to pray, reflect, and be with one another. Together with Jubilee, it is like a total immersion into the very heart of the community and of our mission in God. What's so amazing about Community Days is it's like a snapshot of the contemplative stance we try to live day in and day out as Catholic sisters.

So it's Christmas time or you know a Catholic sister who is celebrating her Jubilee or a special day. You're thinking to yourself, What in the world do I get for a nun?

It happens once a year — the greatest party ever! At the end of every July my nuns get together to celebrate Jubilee, that is, milestone anniversaries of becoming an IHM Sister. Here’s more one what the Jubilee mass is like and a little Jubilee video I took a couple years ago on Jubilee. The video features a chance encounter with a Jubilarian that year, Sister Anita.