JOY TO THE END

A lot of activity going on in the monastery these days with many young helpers on the horizon. Our prayer remains the anchor which keeps all in balance so there in stability in our lives.  This month I would like to dedicate to some amazing women religious who made a difference in their life time, which while perhaps hidden, ripples on today.

One of our Oblates, who was born in England, loves to visit  the Benedictine Abbey of St Cecilia’s at Ryde on the Isle of Wight.  Founded in 1882, it  belongs to the Solesmes Congregation, a family of monasteries in the spiritual tradition of Dom Prosper Guéranger, noted for his work with the Gregorian Chant.  The nuns live the traditional monastic life of prayer, work and study according to the  Rule of St Benedict.

I recently came across an interesting nun, who though American, joined this Abbey at the start  of a promising career in academia.

SISTER MARY DAVID TOTAH  was born March  26,1957 in Philadelphia to Catholic Arab parents from Ramallah, Palestine.  She grew up in Louisiana and attended Holy Savior Menard Central High School. where she was the first female student president.

She studied English literature at Loyola University in New Orleans and obtained an M.A. at the University of Virginia, and in 1980 she became one of the first women to study at Christ Church, Oxford, where she obtained a D.Phil. in 1985 from University of Oxford. Her thesis title being  "Consciousness versus authority: a study of the critical debate between the Bloomsbury Group and the Men of 1914, 1910-1930."   The term "Men of 1914" was used by Wyndham Lewis to refer to himself, T. S. Eliot, Ezra Pound, and James Joyce. 

She began an academic career with a tenure-track appointment in the English Department at the College of William & Mary in Virginia.

 After having spent some time in retreat at the  Benedictine St Cecilia's Abbey  , she decided to leave William and Mary and join the enclosed community there. “I was drawn to it like a magnet.” Flying into Heathrow in May 1985 she was asked at passport control: “How long do you plan to remain in England?” “For ever, I hope,” she replied, only to be ushered into a group of suspected illegal passengers. “I said for ever,” she later explained, “not because I thought it would all work out, but because love is like that.”

Sister Mary David  was novice mistress for 22 years and the prioress for eight years. She was a loving and perceptive mistress of novices. She encouraged and sometimes challenged the young coping with doubt and darkness and difficult personal relationships.  With great compassion, she shared with them a joy that was deeper than the problems they encountered.  She was  down to earth but with a range and clarity and breadth of reference to the great monastic writers and to Scripture.

She had the idea of starting a website to promote Benedictine ideals. “It is a way of life that is very ancient, but is made new with each generation.”

In 1996 she published an edition of the writings of Prosper Guéranger, Cecile Bruyere and Paul Delatte, from St. Cecilia's Abbey, Solesmes, entitled "The Spirit of Solesmes".  She also published works on prayer, fasting, the consecrated life, and confirmation. A collection of her writing was published posthumously in 2020 under the title "The Joy of God".

Sister Mary David died on 28 August 2017 after suffering from bowel cancer for five years.The third part of the book, "The Joy of God", tells of her five-year battle with cancer as told by the abbey’s infirmarian, who relates how sister followed the path she  taught right to the end.  “It’s hard. . . but it’s good. . .because it means I can be strong with His strength and not my own.”

(Photo: St. Cecilia Abbey nuns at prayer)