Happy “95” in Covid Land

Celebrating birthdays during COVID-time calls for some ingenuity.  Special friends of Sister Eileen Foran arrived, flowers in hand, at our residence with a novel idea for her 95th birthday.  “We can’t get in to visit Sister, so we’ll serenade her under the balcony.”  The always spry celebrant stepped out into the fresh air at 2:00 p.m. She was delighted and happy, coat clutched against the light wind.  A group of Sisters joined the partyers on the ground below and all sang a rousing, “Happy Birthday” to a wonderful woman who has been a Sister of St. Joseph for over 70 years. 

Sr. Eileen’s smile was as bright as the spring sunshine as she waved joyfully to us and received our best wishes with her hallmark joy and effervescence.  The message on one of her birthday cards sums up the beauty of our young at heart ninety-five-year-old:  Ninety- five years look terrific on you!  You don’t seem a day past “amazing.”  You light up a room with your wonderful smile. You’ve made “young at heart” your own wonderful style.  So, no holding back, let the big day arrive – and wish on each candle – yes, all 95!”

Blessings on you, our wonderful Sister and companion.

-Sister Jean Moylan, csj

Please Release Me - Refurbished version for 2020

Please release me, let me go

For I just don't love you anymore

To waste our lives would be a sin

Release me and let me love again

I have found a new love dear

And I will always want her near

Her lips are warm while yours are cold

Oh, release me, my darling let me go

Please release me, let me go

For I just don't love you anymore

To waste our lives would be a sin

Release me and let me love again

Let me go, oh release me, my darling

Let me go

(written by Eddie Miller and Robert Yount)

  REFURBISHED for 2020:

Please release us, let us go,

For we can’t stand you anymore

To take our lives is such a waste

Release us, Corona, let us live.

We don’t like this life we live

And yearn to have our old ones back

Your bizarre antics make us sick

Oh, Corona, release us, let us live.

Please release us, let us go.

We just want to see the back of you

To take our lives is such a waste

Release us, Corona, let us live.

Let us go, oh release us, Corona,

Let us live.

- Sister Magdalena Vogt, cps

Sheltering in Place

In our midst

A virus with a mace

But barely a trace

Such shocking disgrace 

Sheltering in place

In this place of grace

Lost in time and space

Shrouded in a haze 

On my couch I laze

Living in a daze

Through this lonely phase

Moving at slow pace

I lift my weary face

Here within this maze

Where I yearn for grace

To survive these days

When this is the case

Covid won’t deface

Nor its steps retrace

Then hands will we lace

All of us embrace

As one human race

On God we will gaze

All our voices raise

To God whom we praise

-Sr. Magdalena Vogt

Strength Amid Sorrow

This week our home is washed in spring solitude and silence after a weekend of heavy hearts and dampened spirits.  Our dear Sister Patricia Hanlon has gone to God after being diagnosed with the coronavirus two days earlier. Twenty-four hours after we Sisters were tested for the virus, three positive diagnoses appeared.  Although the other two are doing well, Sister Pat suffered breathing distress which worsened quickly and ended in her death two days later.

We who mourn her passing wonder silently and aloud, “What more could we have done to prevent this tragedy?”  Each weekday morning, we receive updates from our Director of Care as to the latest security measures from the Ministry of Health. The staff underwent testing and wear masks. Our temperatures are taken afternoon and evening, we practice social distancing, we wear masks when necessary, we wash our hands frequently and sanitize high touch surfaces several times a day.

Sometimes we think that given enough effort, we can control forces beyond ourselves but often we must bow in silence when our best efforts fail to bring us desired results.  By now, COVID -19 has had a lasting impact upon most people on the planet. It might be in the form of losing a loved one, caring for a family member in the long process of recovery, watching essential service providers head off to work.  People wait anxiously to see if there is money to pay rent, buy food and other necessities.  There doesn’t seem to be an end to our anxieties and fears for the future.

The wages of COVID -19 can literally bring us to our knees and maybe that’s the best place to begin to put our lives into perspective.  From a position of surrender, we look up to see what is around us, above us and beyond us.  We look up to God to uphold us and stretch out our arms to family to enfold us and friends to ennoble us.  Together we join with our communities, countries, and continents to face the future and embrace a communion of love and new beginnings in a brighter, more collaborative, renewed world.

-Sister Jean Moylan, csj