← Flourishing Sisterhood
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A
What is flourishing and how might one flourish in religious life and beyond? That is precisely what the Flourishing Sisterhood podcast explores as we capture the rich stories of Catholic religious sisters to amplify their unique voices. Their powerful experiences have inspired many and deeply transformed the church and the world. Supported by the Conrad N. Hylton Foundation's Catholic Sisters Initiative and recorded at Loyola University New Orleans, this podcast offers opportunities to consider the changing landscape of sisterhood and of the life of faith today. Join us for these stories of spirituality, resilience, innovation, resolve, and faith in action.
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Today's episode is a special one, our finale. Through the Flourishing Sisterhood podcast. We have asked 30 religious sisters from the Gulf coast region to share their stories of vocation, community and ministry, and have had the privilege to listen to their joys, cheers, challenges and experiences of transformation, both in their own lives and in the church and the world. We would like to thank all of those who have taken the time to listen to the sisters stories and who have reflected on the impact of religious sisters in the church and the world. As this is the final episode, we're changing things up. Today, we have brought back Sister Beth Fitzpatrick to reflect upon the podcast. In her original episode, A House of A Conversation with Sister Beth Fitzpatrick, she spoke about her love of Carmelite prayer and her experiences in education formation and as the Archdiocese of New Orleans Vicar for Religious Life. In the latter role, she served as a creative visionary for the Flourishing Sisterhood project, and her wisdom and guidance helped to make the project and the podcast the great gifts that they are.
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Claire Gallagher.
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B
I'm Claire Gallagher, the manager of the Flourishing Sisterhood project, and I am so excited to welcome our special guest today, Sister Beth, do you wanna say hello?
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C
Who is so happy to be here today, not because the program is concluding, but because it is such an example of sisters flourishing.
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B
Amen to that. Yeah. So let's get started. It's so good to have you here and to have this opportunity to think about the beginning of the project and, you know, the inspiration and the dreaming up of the project, I guess you could say, and what was hoped for, what was intended, you know, and then to be able to sit down a couple years later and say, okay, here we are. It's not complete, but at least this podcast portion is coming to completion, which is so exciting. So if you would, would you share with us what were your initial hopes and aspirations for the Flourishing Sisterhood project and the podcast and share a little bit about why this project in general was important to you. So when it first began, you were still in your role as the vicar for religious life. So just to give our listeners a little background.
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C
Well, when this began, I was winding down my time in the office of Religious. Nine years of great joy. I loved being in that office, but it was time to go. And this seemed to give a little extra life to me at the end. The idea of this project, I think the sisters have such wonderful stories to tell, and this was an opportunity to tell those stories. Most of the women religious in New Orleans, in the archdiocese in New Orleans. I know, I know. Well, what delighted me was the ones from the Gulf coast region that I didn't know to hear their stories. So, you know, to me, it was just an opportunity to do what we. One of the things we do best. And we tell good stories.
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B
That's right. You sure do. And I'm so grateful for that.
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C
Yeah, yeah, we have good stories to tell, and we have the capacity to articulate those stories. And that. That's a wonderful gift.
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B
No, it really is. And it's been really, really incredible to see that kind of come to life as you said. You said. You were saying it kind of brought life for you, but it's been really beautiful as a interviewer, as a host of the project, and as a. Just a bystander, a witness in some way. Yeah, Witness. Yeah, that's a great word. To see. Some of the sisters, as they share their stories, you can see, reflecting back on those experiences, you see them come to life as they're. As they're sharing it. And so many of them have been grateful for the opportunity to do that. And they talk about how beneficial story sharing is, not just for the listener, but for the storyteller. You know, getting to share your story does something for you, you know, as. As the teller. So I think that's really beautiful. So. Yeah. So, Sister Beth, I'm curious if. If there are any maybe specific episodes that you listen to or, you know, you don't have to give a direct quote, but any specific episodes that you listen to that were particularly moving for you based on your relationship with the sisters. Right. Because. Because of your experience and your time here in New Orleans, especially as the vicar. I know you know many of these sisters, and you know them well, and so I'm just curious to know if listening to their stories maybe brought back any memories for you or. Or even gave you a new perspective, maybe on something that you hadn't heard before.
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C
Well, the stories brought back many, many good memories of my whole life, my whole religious life, which has been an Inter community experience. Religious in New Orleans have been an integral part of my life from the very beginning. So there's that gratitude. I mean, there was something specific in everybody's. I really hesitated hesitate to name any of that. Any one particular thing. What came through to me in all of them was the enthusiasm and the joy with which the sisters tell their stories and the joy that that gave to me. I was listening in July to the first segment, and July was a particularly difficult month for me. I had surgery and I was pretty isolated. And to hear those stories from women whom I know and love just gave me energy and joy. And, you know, I kind of laughed my way through the trips to the emergency room because I had that backup of stories of God's grace working in and through us in some very happy times and some very difficult times. Always there was the presence of the spirit of God and one another.
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B
That is so beautiful. It sounds like you're listening to their stories during that time was almost. It was almost like you had this virtual community of sisters who were holding you in hope and healing. Yeah.
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C
They will put. Those stories were part of my healing.
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B
Yeah. That is so beautiful. And who could have planned that that way? The timing other than God himself. Right.
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C
You know, and then the last set of stories I'm just listening to now.
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B
Okay.
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C
And those are from, for the most part, not entirely, but younger members are members who I don't really know so well because they're not from the Archdiocese of New Orleans.
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B
Right.
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C
They delighted me as well. It filled me with, you know, with some good energy. I'm so pleased that we were able to do this. I cannot tell you how much this means to me to hear the stories of these friends.
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B
Yeah, no, it's obvious. It comes through in your. In your. I think even for the listeners who can't see you, it comes through in your voice and your. You know, it's so authentic.
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C
And that's what came through in the voices of the sisters. Joy, enthusiasm and authenticity.
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B
Yeah.
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C
I could see many of their faces because I know their faces, but I didn't have to. It's all in the voice.
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B
Yeah.
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C
All in the voice.
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B
Isn't that amazing how God works through that? You know, we can. And even for people who don't. Who don't know the sisters and don't know what they look like, you know, it's a different experience than what you have as a listener, but I'm sure their imagination can be formed by that, you know, and it's just really. Yeah. I think it's such a gift that we can share. The sisters can share a part of themselves that way. Right? And it's accessible to anybody. You know, like, literally anyone in the world could stumble upon these. And, in fact, I'll share this story. It was so, so beautiful. Over the Mardi Gras break, I received an email from a young woman who I believe lives in California. Just out of the blue, she sent me this email, and she said, I'm so grateful that I stumbled upon this interview that you conducted with. It's one of the sisters of the Holy Family. And this sister that we had interviewed, she was a dear friend of this woman's grandmother, and she had played, like, a vital role in this woman's upbringing as a child. The sister did. And she said her grandmother passed away about three years ago, and they've been trying to reach this sister to get in touch with her. And she said, every now and then, I go on the Internet and I just search her name and hope that I can find her. And she said, I was so happy to hear her voice and know that she was well, and it brought me so much peace. And I thought, oh, my gosh, you know, another thing that. It's like, we never could have planned that, oh, this podcast is gonna bring people together who have lost touch and haven't spoken in years, you know, but it was just such a beautiful. So she said, could you please give her my contact information and, you know, and ask her to call me if. If she's able to, so that we can talk? Who would have thought that that would come from this, you know, But. But again, I think it points to the power of sharing stories, but also the gift of. Of hearing the voice, you know, and for her, in a very different way than for you and I, but that it does something for people, you know, that they can. We have this platform where voices can be heard. And that was one of our goals of the project. We wanted to amplify the voices of these sisters. And I think we have.
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C
I think we have.
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B
I think we have. If I can say so. If I can dare to say so myself, I think we've done a good job.
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C
Oh, excellent.
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B
And I remember when I first started in this position, you know, meeting with Tom, the director of the project, and, yeah, we're gonna create a podcast. And I remember thinking, how are we gonna do that? I don't know how to create a podcast. You know, Like, I just remember being so overwhelmed. Not in a bad way, but just, like, this is so exciting. But also, I Have no idea how this is gonna happen, you know, But I just trusted that God would make a way, and he. He surely did. Yeah, God, he makes a way, you know, and then he surprises us with the fruit that comes from it. So what about for you, sister Beth? How did it feel? Cause we did interview you and you had an episode on the podcast. But how did it feel to be the subject of an episode, but also a listener of other sisters episodes? I know you've spoken about the great gift that it has been to listen, but were there similarities or differences between yourself and other sisters or anything else that struck you as a listener?
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C
Well, I think the gratitude that we all feel for this wonderful life that has been entrusted to us, not without strain and sorrow and frustration, but overall, you know, this is. This is a gift. And I heard that gratitude come through over and over again. I think my way of being in the world since the time I was a little girl is more to see the similarities, the connections between people, than to focus on the differences.
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B
Absolutely. Yeah. It is really beautiful to hear when you listen episode after episode after episode, just the common themes, you know, of gratitude, of beauty and suffering, of the good that comes from suffering, you know, and, yeah, I think the generosity of God's love that all of these sisters feel through their vocation, even though the stories are all so unique and different, you know?
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C
Yeah, yeah.
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B
What about for you, as. As a. As an interviewee? What did that do for you? To have that opportunity to kind of reflect back on your own journey and your own experiences? And did that bring any new perspectives for you or.
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C
I think I could see as I kind of reflected on my life, not only in the interview itself, but in practice preparation for it, it was how it's all part of a piece, all connected and not in isolation from the lives of the other religious in New Orleans. We are a family. There's the individual communities, and then there are the ways the communities have intersected and overlapped and helped one another and continue to do that. I don't think there was any great Aha. I never thought of that before, but it was just more of a gentle step by step awareness of how God has worked in my life. I think I might have started with that passage from the Old Testament that is like a foundational scripture in Carmelite spirituality. God lives in whose presence I stand. And that was true throughout the whole thing. God lives in whose presence I stand or sit or lay on my bed in pain or throwing up or whatever. God lives in whose presence I am
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B
that is so beautiful.
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C
Well, it's true.
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B
Yeah. To see God in the other before you, you know, that reminds me of something that believe it was Sister Lillian Flavin said in her interview when she was talking about her experience of living in the projects. You know, she said, how can I serve these people and then go back to my home and my three meals a day? You know? And so she was talking about how she chose to live in the projects, which I know many sisters have, and I just thought that was so beautiful. But she said, because I was. Because I did that, I was able to see the poor through the eyes of God and God through the eyes of poor, of the poor. And I just, I think about that quote all the time, you know, because it's constantly calling me, especially as a. Not as a religious sister, but as a. As a consecrated woman. Like, it calls me to constantly reflect on, like, who are the poor in my midst, you know, and just in my everyday. It's not just the people who live in the projects or in, you know, economic, economically defined poverty. Right. But just to constantly be able to see the person in front of me through the eyes of God, you know, and God within that person. So beautiful. And I think each of the sisters stories, in their own way, did that for me, reminded me of that.
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C
Yeah.
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B
You know, kind of, I guess. Looking into the present and the future, what do you hope the church and the greater community can receive from this podcast? Like, why should people listen to it? What do you hope can be received from this great gift?
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C
I think people. Will see and hear witnesses to truth and love and goodness and beauty. And when you are witness to that, you can't help but be transformed and do what you can in your life. We are not all called to be women religious, but we are all called to know and to love and to follow Jesus and to serve Jesus people. And that would be my hope, that people hearing these stories will be more aware of the way God is present in their own lives, particularly through the poor and the suffering, but in other ways, too. Through the wealthy and the happy.
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B
Sure.
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C
And respond in generosity.
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Just the little bit of feedback that we've gotten from some of our listeners so far, I think that's happening. And I think my hope is that it will continue to. The podcast will continue to flourish in the sense that it will continue to be discovered and people will continue to listen and pass it on. And I've been so grateful for so many people who have said, I listen to every episode. I can't wait for the next set to come out. And somebody recently, I said, well, we just released the last set of episodes. And they said, oh, that's it. I said, I know, I know. I wish we could keep going, too. I could just keep doing it forever. And I think that's really beautiful. I love what you said about how we're not all called to be religious sisters or religious anything, or priests or deacons or whatever it might be, but we are all called to participate in this mission somehow. Right. And I think in a way, it also. Hearing these stories and hearing the sisters perspectives and the way that they approach ministry and the way that they have witnessed their experience of God through other people, I think it also, in a really beautiful way, extends an invitation maybe to. To certain people who don't feel, you know, they say, oh, I'm not Catholic, so I'm not a part of the church. Right. Or I'm not, you know, I don't go to mass every Sunday. I'm, you know, I'm not perfect. I'm not holy, whatever it might be. I think so many of their stories, through their approach in the way they see things, it. It extends an invitation, you know, a welcome.
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A welcome.
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I hope.
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Yeah.
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I hope that. Yeah.
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And I hope, too, that I still continue to believe there are a few women who would feel called to this way of serving and loving God. And so I hope it opens up to them the wide variety of possibilities that are in front of young women today, and that this is one of them. It's still a viable, loving, happy way of life.
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B
Yes. Yes. Yeah.
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That involves a great deal of suffering.
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Sure. But is there any way of life that does not involve a great deal of suffering?
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C
Exactly.
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We can try to avoid it all we want, but that's always.
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But it comes because it's what draws us closest to God.
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Absolutely.
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C
You know, this time of illness in my own life has taught me about the nearness of God and the nearness of God in others who are sick and suffering in a way that I never would have known without it. I'm grateful for those months of not being myself or I was myself, but not the self I used to be. I'm great. It was good for me. Sometimes the only way I could pray. I have A sketch of St. John of the Cross's sketch of Christ crucified hanging at the foot of my bed, which has been there since I was a novice in one bedroom or another. And sometimes the only way I could pray was just to look at that. And it was enough. It was certainly a little disorienting, but it was enough.
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B
Sure. Jesus is enough.
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C
Jesus is enough, more than enough. And the suffering Jesus is enough. And I don't want to live a life unconscious in my own self of the suffering of Jesus and the suffering of Jesus in people today. I don't want that in the distance. I want to know it in me.
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B
Yeah, I think you do.
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C
Well, I know a little bit better than I did two years ago.
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B
Sure. Yeah. It really is beautiful to hear you speak about it that way, because I think. I do think so often people encounter suffering in their lives and they don't know what to do with it. They can't make sense of it, you know, and not that as Christians or as a religious sister, we. You have it all figured out, you know, but to help people find meaning and purpose in their suffering, you know, and to have to be in a place where you can see Christ accompanying you in that suffering is. Is so beautiful. So I think that's what your story of suffering can do for others as well,
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C
hopefully.
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B
Yeah. I think also one of the gifts that I've seen that was, you know, thinking about what. What this podcast could do for the church and for the greater community. And this was kind of a surprise. Like, it wasn't something that we could. That I would have ever thought of or planned. And I was sharing a little bit about this with you on the way up was. And just for our listeners who maybe. Who probably don't know this, a handful of our. Pretty big handful of our episodes were the interviews were conducted by undergrad history students. And so we had a class on campus, an oral history class that typically each spring, would learn the art of empowering others to tell their stories and to preserve those stories. And they. This class in particular, would do it through podcasting and documentaries, you know, capturing stories in that style. So when we were getting ready to kind of launch this project that the history professor, Dr. Justin Nystrom, who teaches that class, typically, he heard about it, and he reached out and said, hey, I heard you're trying to make a podcast. And, you know, I have some. I have some students who. I need a project. Yeah, they need a project. And to be honest, Tom, my supervisor, and I, who work on this project together, to be honest, we thought, great, we'll get some free labor, you know, because we have to conduct 30 interviews, and that's going to be time consuming. And how are we going to do that, you know, logistically? So we're like, oh, that would be great, you know, and it was, and it was, you know, very helpful to have the students practical help in that way. But it was so beautiful. You know, we set up these days, a couple days last spring where we invited about, I think we had about 13 or 14 sisters who over the course of a few weeks came on campus during the students class time, and they basically transformed their classroom and a couple offices into these very professional recording studios. And it was so beautiful again to witness that because I think most of these students had never really seen a sister or much less spoken to one for an hour, you know, and I think many of them were expecting something very different than the sisters who came. You know, they had kind of the, the Hollywood portrayal of religious sisters in habits with a ruler and, or cloistered and a. Whoopi Goldberg or. Yes, or that, you know, our sisters in New Orleans might be a little close, sir. So Whoopi Goldberg. Actually, I like to think so, anyway. No, exactly. And I think almost every single one of them had that remark that like, that was not at all what I expected it to be, you know, And a couple of our students have stayed in touch with the sisters that they interviewed. And I know Layla, who's our producer, who edits our podcast for us, she, she and Sister Bonnie, who is one of the sisters she interviewed, they, they still write letters to each other. And it's just, I just think that is an example of what this podcast has done, even in, in the, on the behind the scenes, you know, in the background, that there are these intergenerational friendships that are forming, you know, that, that probably more than likely would not have been formed if it wasn't for this, this podcast opportunity. So again, I just, I'm blown away at the generosity of God and the surprises that he sends, and I'm sure we'll continue to send and the gift that this podcast will be for so many. So any other final insights or thoughts that you have?
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C
Yes, I would like to share passage from Pope Francis most recent book, Hope autobiography.
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B
Yes, yes.
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C
He quotes an American writer, George Saunders. I think this is pertinent, but like, wonderful advice for all of us and a way to continue to flourish. He says, and this is quoting George Saunders, find out what makes you kinder, what opens you up and brings out the most loving, generous and unafraid version of you. And go after these things as if nothing else matters. That's my closing message and my closing piece of like, how we might flourish. Look back, find out what has made you kinder, what opened your life up and brought out the most loving, generous, and unafraid version of you and go after that as if nothing else matters. Because nothing else does matter.
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B
That's right.
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Nothing else does matter.
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B
Well, thank you so much, Sister Beth. It has been such a joy to have you here today, but also just to have you kind of intertwined into this project throughout and to have your feedback and your support. I mean, your support has just been incredible, you know, and your.
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C
That you will always have.
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B
Well, I'm very. We're very, very grateful for that. So thank you so much for coming back to do this. This final episode to offer your. Your insights and your. Your beautiful, beautiful reflections. I know for our listeners, they'll be another great gift to listen to, so. And, yeah, we say thank you again to all of the listeners, all the sisters who have contributed their stories, all the listeners who who have heard and have. Have reflected and. And maybe have been inspired to act because of what they've heard and maybe in ways that we'll never know, but we trust that they continue this mission of flourishing and this journey of flourishing.
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C
Thank you, Claire.
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B
Oh, yeah.
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C
For your shepherding of this project. You, Miko is the one who interviewed me, right?
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B
Yeah. And so many of our sisters.
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C
And so many. Yeah. Tom, Ryan, Layla.
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B
Yes.
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C
And then all the members of the history class who helped to conduct the interviews. I'm so grateful for each of you. And particular thanks to my sisters who were willing to share their stories. Particular thanks to them. Sam.
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A
This has been an episode of the Flourishing Sisterhood podcast. Thank you to the amazing sisters for their contributions to our project. We're also grateful to you, the listener, and hope the sisters stories encourage you to reflect on what flourishing means in your own life. If you enjoyed today's episode, consider subscribing or leaving us a review on your favorite podcast platform.
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C
Platform.
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A
The Flourishing Sisterhood podcast is produced by Loyola Institute for Ministry and retained by the university's Digital Humanities Archive.