Goodbye Filled With Gratitude: Srs. Julia, Sara, & Ellen

Dear Friends,

Still unknown or having gotten to know you over these twenty-two months at service of the Ignatian Spiritual Life Center and the Jesuit Urban Center. We have encountered such wonderful people, some being parishioners of Saint Agnes, some from the neighborhood walking into our prayers, retreats, activities and events, some parishioners at other parishes. What a gift! We also look back on our work at the juncture with Saint Agnes parish and all the former and current people there who just were so important for this journey: George who invited us, Alejandro who explained it all and the ever wonderful colleagues at the parish office without whom nothing would have been possible: Aline, Antonio, Chris, Dorenda, Franca, Frank, Marco, Maureen, Teresa, and not to forget Mo Ping!!

What an amazing time having gotten the Ignatius Prep, the Lane center at USF and the ISLC together for preparing our unique proposal for the Synod gathering over eight months just coming out of COVID and handing it in directly to the USCCB and the Vatican, and to follow up with a survey and qualitative interviews led by Dr. Erin Brigham and Dr. Julia Prinz, whose work on it has been partly published and distributed already and partly is still in preparation for academic publication. What an honor to have hosted people like Prof. Martha Zechmeister, systematic Professor from the Universidad de Centro America (UCA) holding Jon Sobrino’s chair and being his closest colleague, Prof. em. Janet Ruffing from Yale forger and visionary of Spiritual Direction, or Prof. em. Sharon Thornton from Andover Newton, one of the central players in pastoral counseling as we know it nowadays, Prof. em. Bill O’Neil, SJ a social ethicist who combines 30 years of academic work with his dedication to the Jesuit refugee services in Eastern Africa, or Prof. Kevin Burke, SJ who as Vice-president for Mission at Regis University, Denver has a heart for poetry so well known, that he drew the biggest crowd we had in these twenty-two months: 46 people at ISLC.

Then there were all the awesome people sharing from their experience and mysticism: Dr. Ellen Hess, VDMF on Hildegard of Bingen, Brent Otto, SJ on his experience in India as an Anglo-Indian, Sara Postlethwaite, VDMF on Celtic Spirituality especially rooted in local expressions, Pamela Prime, with her life journey discovering Sophia as the Female face of God, Prof Sophia Park, HNJM on Shamanism and grief and the many events that were showing the diversity of people in the society surrounding us: Two retreats focused on Yoga pulling in a very different crowd, watching together a movie on the Berrigans and having testimony of witness challenging all of us, having another evening of sharing our personal stories through words, art or music, a regular spiritual director’s hub to get to know each other in that ministry between Saint Agnes and Saint Ignatius and boosting the Young Adult Community with a prayer service of Taizè, which is very close to our own identity and heart as Verbum Dei. If you would like to read through some of the spiritual inputs we prepared for each of the ISLC weekly over these months go to the ISLC webpage where you can find them and if you want to find an old recording for one of the events look there as well.

Truly, we leave with our hearts full of gratitude for the synodal process and the availability of all these great minds and big souls presenting at the ISLC and for all of you who have grown close in different ways, especially Frank Uranich with whom it was a pleasure to prepare the Lenten and Advent prayers and work in collegiality! Also a very special thanks to the committed and inspiring advisory board members that have been thinking with us regarding the ISLC, Erin Brigham, Luke Hansen, Annette Lomont, Megan Pryor-Lorentz, and for some meetings Tim Cunha and for ALL the over the top devoted volunteers (you are exceptional!!) and Dan Nghia Do, SJ our intern who all made the work at the ISLC a delight.
 
Well, just you know don’t celebrate too much our departure!! The Verbum Dei sisters are NOT gone!! Teresa Malave, VDMF continues enthusiastically with her commitment to the religious education at Saint Agnes and Julia, Ellen, and Sara will remain in San Francisco!! We still live across the hill on the eternal sunny side of San Francisco, in “the Mission,” @ 3365 19th street! We hope to see you there sometime. As we say: the best kept secret in the city, “The Verbum Dei Sacred Space.” For staying in touch, or wanting to know what’s going on over the hill: Send us an email at [email protected] and if you still don’t know who we are visit our website verbumdeiusa.org !!!

With the most beautiful mystery of the Corpus Christi we will hold you in our prayer as we end our work at ISLC June 30th and sending peace and blessing upon Saint Agnes and the ISLC. 

Warmly, 
Julia, Ellen and Sara