The Visitation ...by Sr. Dorothy

Have you ever had a dream so strong you were determined to make it come true? Maybe you worked hard for a while and then little by little you got distracted by things that happened, people you met, the little irritations of your work, all the busy-ness of everyday life. Does that mean your dream is dead or has disappeared? Not if it’s something you really care about. At some point you will stop and say to yourself, “What am I doing? How is this helping me reach the goal I so long for? I need to think about making some changes to get back on track.”

Sometimes, in the midst of day to day living, people and things can slip ever so slightly sideways. It’s not an easy task to stay focused on what our ideals are and what we mean to do and be—even in the monastery. This is common knowledge among monastics and especially among Benedictines. Our monastic congregations have developed ways in accordance with canon law to circumvent this problem of being distracted from our aims and purposes, and to prevent us losing the path we desire and have chosen to pursue.

The principle way we do this is for each monastery to have regular visitations by other monastics. In our congregation, a visitator must have special education, and should be a current or former prioress of a community. The number of visitators depends on the size of the community, and the president of our congregation also attends visitations. Ours is usually every 4 years, but Covid put a kink in our schedule, so we had our visitation in September of 2024 instead of prior to our last (2022) election of prioress.

Sister Tonette, Visitator; Sister Angela, our Prioress; Sister Nancy, Congregation President; and Sister Andrea, Visitator

When the visitators arrive, they are welcomed and they soon go to work reading our records, e.g. minutes of our Chapter and Council meetings and financial records, etc. There’s a lot to take in and they work hard to absorb it all. After that they interview individuals, groups and committees in our community who have various responsibilities, and later they are open to chat with any Sister who wishes to have a conversation.

After all these meetings—it’s back to working in seclusion for them! They now have to integrate all they have heard and seen in order to write our visitation report, which consists of a description of what happened, and of commendations and recommendations. We are always on pins and needles to see what the report will contain! On the final day, the whole community meets and the visitators & congregation president deliver the report.

We listen intently as Sister Tonette, Sister Andrea and Sister Nancy deliver their report

Visitators are generous with honest commendations about our life together. They are also straightforward about where we need to make some changes, and generally there are no huge surprises, because we usually have a pretty good idea about how we’re doing. It’s especially good for us to hear how we are doing well—sometimes it’s easy to miss the positive things that are so close to us; and also helpful to hear how we need to improve in order to stay true to the religious life we have chosen.

We are grateful to these women from other communities who take time out of their own lives to serve as our visitators. It takes a lot of energy and good will, and they give generously. Many thanks to Sister Andrea Westkamp of Bristow, VA, to Sister Tonette Sperando of Cullman, AL, and to our Congregation president, Sister Nancy Bauer of St. Joseph, MN. You have given us lots to think about and to act on in the coming months and years.

Our community sings a traditional blessing for our guests as our Visitation ends