Christmas Newsletter 2022
What a year it has been: three prime ministers; violence in many places, including the Democratic Republic of the Congo, which affects our Sisters in Goma; war in Europe; the escalating climate crisis; frightening price rises. The year has been shaped too, by the Church’s “Journeying Together” Synod, an exercise in listening and discerning as the People of God, where the Holy Spirit is leading us. How much we need the silence and hope of Advent and the faith, hope and love that come to us in Christ at his birth in Bethlehem.
For our community it was a year marked by departures and new beginnings, a year of many “returns”. However, Sr. Maria did not return, but remained as our Prioress after our General Chapter, a decision with which we are delighted. Sr. Mary Philippa has been particularly pleased to return to a more full-time role as guestmistress, now that we are able to offer hospitality almost as we did before the pandemic. Sr. Michelle Marie returns to the kitchen whenever extra help is needed or she has a spare half hour to peel apples - we were given generous quantities of apples this autumn and our own little tree produced some delicious fruit early in the season.
At the end of 2021 COVID was still dictating and orchestrating many aspects of our lives. Nevertheless, we were able to receive some guests for Christmas, which was a great joy. They used the new video-link to the conference room from Chapel to join the community at times of prayer.
The celebration of the Paschal Triduum is always the highlight of our year, and it was a real joy to be able to offer hospitality to 12 guests after two Easters with an empty guesthouse. It was rather poignant, as it was Father Peter Craddy’s last celebration of the Paschal Triduum as our Chaplain. In Easter week he returned home to Mount St. Bernard Abbey in Leicestershire after nearly 17 years with the Bernardines. We are extremely grateful to him and to his community for his generous service, his many spiritual and practical gifts, his monastic wisdom, all the faith and love he devoted to help to build up our Monastery. He made a valuable contribution too, to the life of the Diocese of Clifton. Bishop Declan Lang presided at a Mass of thanksgiving for Fr. Peter on March 22nd and several priests of the Diocese came to concelebrate and to say farewell to their brother priest. Upon his return to Mount St. Bernard Abbey his brother monks promptly elected him to be their new superior! This led to another return.
Fr. Peter was back at Brownshill in late May when the superiors of the Cistercian communities of the Region of the Isles met here for some days of pastoral sharing. Among them was Sr. Elizabeth Mary, a few days after her election as Prioress General of our Order, and Dom Bernardus Peeters OCSO, the new Abbot General of his Order.
Our new Chaplain is Fr. Ted Wildsmith, a Missionary of Africa. He made contact and asked to come and meet Sr. Maria and the community when he was nearby, visiting relatives in Bristol. It turns out that Fr. Ted has numerous relatives and friends in the area, including a cousin in the village! We are very grateful to have Mass each day, and Fr. Ted has made friends quickly among those who come to Mass here on a Sunday. We wish him well in his new ministry as Chaplain to a monastic community after his decades of service as a missionary in West Africa.
Fr. Ted returns to his own community in London for 6 days each month, and we thank all the priests who have come to supply cover in his absence. Among them was Fr. Joseph Whisstock, who came in September, giving Sr. Maria the twin pleasures of having a priest to say Mass and her brother’s company to enjoy.
Our General Chapter of 2022 was like no other. Normally Sisters from each community of the Order meet at our Generalate House in Lille, France. In 2022 the capitulants stayed at home and met virtually, between 8 am and 12 noon GMT –afternoon meetings were impossible because for our Sisters in VietNam it would have been the middle of the night! Normally the process of electing the Prioress General and the four members of her Council takes a few days. In 2022 it took 4 months! Elections were by postal vote from our 6 communities on 3 continents, and 4 of the five elections required a second round of voting. One other, more welcome, change was that the whole Order participated in two preliminary conferences, given by Dom Mauro Guiseppe, Abbot General of the OCist. Order. This was very enriching and it brought us together in a way that we could not have foreseen at the last General Chapter in 2014. A most welcome return resulting from the General Chapter, was that of Sr. Mary Helen Jackson to England after 14 years as Prioress General. She is now Prioress of the Monastery of Our Lady of Hyning in Lancashire.
Another return was that of each member of the community to the GP’s surgery 2 or 3 times over the course of the year to be vaccinated against COVID-19. Unfortunately, this did not make us totally immune and in June we succumbed to the virus. No one of us was seriously ill, but we did have to close the guesthouse and cancel bookings. Sr. Maria was not able to go to Hyning, as planned, to help out while Sr. Elizabeth Mary made her first visit to France as Prioress General to begin to settle in.
A sad return for us, was that of Sr. Mary Gabriel (Julia Schroeder) to Germany at the end of August. She discerned that the Bernardine life, and indeed religious life, is not what God has planned for her. The decision came after months of serious reflection. As she left us, she was looking forward to being closer to her family and using her professional skills in catering and house-management in a children’s home. We thank Julia for all that she contributed to our community and to our Order, and we know that you would like to join us in wishing her every blessing in her new life.
The biggest, and most final return was that of Sr. Mary Lucy to the Lord, whom she served so faithfully for 65 years as a Bernardine. She had been increasingly frail, but the end was very rapid, and somehow almost perfectly co-ordinated and timed. Sr. Elizabeth Mary, by September resident in Lille, was visiting England with two French Sisters, who are part of our community in VietNam. One of them, Sr. Christine Marie, made profession with Sr. Mary Lucy and Sr. Mary Anthony Levi. Sr. Mary Lucy found photographs of their profession to show to us just days before she was taken ill during the night of 28th September. She died between Lauds and Mass on Saturday 1st October, surrounded by her Bernardine Sisters. Sr. Mary Lucy knew what she wanted. She wanted to die at home and she never liked to make a fuss. The community is very grateful for the excellent care she received from her GP and District Nurses, and to each one who sent messages of condolence and shared memories of her.
Sr. Mary Lucy was greatly loved, and it was no surprise that so many people came to her funeral on 20th October. Three generations of her family were represented and they almost filled our Chapel. Fortunately, the video-link to the conference room allowed us to double the number of people at her Requiem Mass. Bishop Declan presided and Fr. Peter gave the homily, despite being prevented, at the last minute, from coming in person. Sr. Mary Philippa read out his text. Most of the Brownshill community with Sr. Elizabeth Mary, as well as Sr. Mary Lucy’s nieces Melda and Maura, great nephew James and great nephew Steven with his family, travelled to Hyning for the burial in our cemetery on Friday 21st October. They were the first guests in Hyning’s newly refurbished guesthouse. Several members of Sr. Mary Lucy’s family had enjoyed visits to Brownshill earlier in the year, which gives us all much comfort.
Sr. Mary Lucy was the second former Prioress General of our Order to die in 2022. On February 16th Sr. Josephine Mary died of the cancer, with which she had lived so bravely for 5 years. Sr. Michelle Marie who had known her since childhood, Sr. Mary Philippa, who was her companion in novitiate days, and Sr. Maria, who had Sr. Josephine Mary as her first novice mistress, and later served as her Assistant for 12 years, with Sr. Mary Gabriel, for whom Sr. Josephine Mary was an important influence in her Bernardine life, went to Hyning for her funeral. The whole Order mourns the loss of this most gifted and wise Sister, who served as Prioress General for 18 years. She was a member of the General Chapter of 2022 and gave valuable contributions in pre-Chapter meetings. Her presence was greatly missed at the Chapter itself.
Our first in-person community retreat since 2019 began on Ash Wednesday. This was only 2 days after Sr. Josephine Mary’s funeral. The experience of her illness and death coloured the retreat, especially for our Sisters from Hyning, who had shared those last months and weeks with her. Fr. Luke Jolly OSB, who gave the retreat, was sensitive to this and gave a series of insightful and spiritually nourishing talks.
Fr. Luke is a monk of Worth Abbey in Sussex, which was instrumental in the beginnings of the Wellspring Community in Brighton. Two women, who are considering making a commitment as consecrated members of the Wellspring Community, had been asked by their Bishop to spend a year of formation with a contemplative, monastic community. Thus, Jo Gilbert and MaryAnn Enriquez went to live at Hyning in June 2021. Jo spent the last four months of this formation at Brownshill, beginning at the time of our annual retreat. We appreciated her prayerful, practical and pleasant presence among us. At the end of June she returned to Brighton. Now we look forward to welcoming her back and continuing our association with Wellspring.
Unfortunately, Sr. Audrey had to go to France as the community retreat began, in order to renew her passport. Appointments for renewals in England were impossible to obtain before her passport expired. It seemed best for her to be in France, to speed up the process. However, what should have been a 3 week wait turned into six weeks, because her first application got lost. It is not only UK bureaucracy that goes awry! Our community of Notre Dame de la Plaine in Lille appreciated her lively and generous spirit and got her involved in activities with groups of young people.
Sr. Mary Philippa and Sr. Audrey together had planned a Lent retreat for our guests. Being in a different country was not going to stop Sr. Audrey from playing her part. She joined the participants to give her input by Zoom! Sr. Audrey was back with us just in time for the Paschal Triduum.
A very welcome return was that of in-person “Junior courses” for monks and nuns in initial formation. In October Sr. Audrey went to Roscrea Abbey in Ireland for a week-long course given by Margaret Daley Denton, entitled “Listening with the Ear of an Earth-Caring Heart: Reading the Gospel of St. John in the Context of the Ecological Crisis”. It was transferred at the last minute from Mellifont Abbey due to an outbreak of COVID in that community. These occasions provide an opportunity to witness the life of a different Cistercian community, to study and reflect with others at a similar stage in their monastic life, and to relax together.
Meanwhile Sr. Hilda was in Hertfordshire at the conference of the Association of Provincial Bursars, enjoying the opportunity to meet other Religious bursars and learn about current trends and pit-falls in finance and administration.
We celebrated with our community in Goma at the solemn professions of Sisters Marie Cecile and Marie Denise on the feast of St. Benedict (11th July) and with our community in Bafor in Burkina Faso at the first profession of Sister Lucie on 8th September.
Encouraging and supporting those in initial formation, and those who are discerning a vocation, is very important for us and for the Church. Sr. Maria is active in vocations ministry. She is a member of the Diocesan Vocations Group, and she stays in touch with national initiatives. We can be sure that Sr. Mary Lucy, who has always prayed particularly hard for Bernardine vocations, will be continuing these efforts in heaven.
Our Oblates enjoyed days of formation and fellowship at Brownshill in May and October. New enquiries about being a Bernardine Oblate keep Sr. Catherine pleasantly occupied. Sr. Catherine had visits also from her sisters and their children and grandchildren. In November she met the youngest member of the family for the first time, 1-year old Heather, with big brother Joel, now 3. Earlier in the year, nephew David brought his fiancée Sarah to meet auntie Catherine. They are to be married in the Holy Land in January 2023. We wish them every blessing.
Each year Sisters at Brownshill and Hyning are allocated a class of “prayer partners” from St. Bernard’s Preparatory School in Slough, which was run by the Bernardines until 2019. Letters and news are exchanged throughout the year. On 27th May the oldest pupils spent a day at the Monastery, to find out more about our life and to meet the Sisters. We were particularly pleased to welcome the new headteacher, Mrs Asha Verma, whose induction Mass Sr. Maria attended on 5th May 2022.
At the beginning of this newsletter we mentioned the Synodal Process, “Journeying Together”, in which we have tried to play our part. We contributed to the submission of the Conference for Religious and Sr. Maria facilitated a meeting of our regular Mass-attenders, for them to share their joys and sorrows, and to feed into the Diocesan report. Sr. Hilda and Sr. Audrey went to Clifton Cathedral for the launch of the diocesan report, which Bishop Declan read out in a liturgical celebration.
In September Sr. Maria and Sr. Michelle Marie went by double decker bus to Clifton Cathedral. Fr. Gary Brassington, Parish Priest of the Church of the Immaculate Conception in Stroud, had invited us to go with the Parish to lead the rosary during the veneration of the relics of St. Bernadette. It was a memorable and moving experience for the numerous faithful, who filled the Cathedral, and our Sisters felt privileged to have been there.
We extend our heartfelt thanks to our volunteers. Vicki helps with varied administrative tasks and she seems to have a season ticket at the recycling centre (formerly known as the tip) on our behalf! Mary and Robert render all sorts of services with great sensitivity, simplicity and generosity. They were among our Easter guests, and Robert produced a splendid Paschal Fire. Sr. Maria, Sr. Audrey and Sr. Michelle Marie continue to tend and beautify the gardens, but Robert and Mary do a great deal too to keep the place in good condition, not forgetting Tim Ruggles, on whom we rely for all sorts of maintenance jobs.
We are very grateful for all that the Lord has given us this year, a year of change for our community and for the world, and we invite you to pray with us that the Lord may come and be born in us anew this Christmas, and that we may cherish the life He entrusts to our care.
Sr. Maria, Sr. Catherine, Sr. Michelle Marie, Sr. Mary Philippa, Sr. Hilda, Sr. Audrey
