Guest blog by Sister Maxyne Schneider, President of the Sisters of St. Joseph of Springfield, who is currently visiting missioning Sisters in Africa.
Tuesday, October 13, 2015
There are so many things that can be said further, even
by someone who has been here just over a week. It is time to touch the surface
of many things, realizing that the reality is deeper, broader, and more complex
than what meets a visitor's eye. This is true of the Kenyan geography, flora
and fauna, political and social interactions, the ministries of all our sisters who have served
in East Africa, and Pat's gifts that she has used here. Here are a few random
observations in no special order:
Pat speaks fluent Kiswahili and is an amazing bargainer
in the marketplaces, which are filled with scores of stalls and tarps laden
with goods, mostly secondhand materials from the West.
Everywhere we have gone we have seen remarkably beautiful
fresh produce -- fruits, vegetables and tea from the plantations close to Kisii
-- being sold from roadside stalls or in special marketplaces.
Not just the young sisters in formation, but older
sisters, brothers, priests and other laypersons spoke to me of how Pat has
accompanied them spiritually, sometimes through hard times.
Security measures are evident everywhere, including at
the Nairobi supermarket, where security guards check car trunks and the
underneath part of the car and where handbags are searched upon entry. This
follows upon terrorist incidents of the past few years.
Pat has spoken often of the violence that occurred after
the 2008 Presidential election and how deeply people have been effected by it.
She herself needed to remain for some days at the Jesuit retreat house where
she had just finished directing a retreat. The Divine Word sisters at the
conference and retreat center where we were this past weekend sheltered workers
and others from the region amid the violence. Effects of the violence linger.
The extent of poverty and the rigors of life for the poor
can weigh on the soul even from a distance. Pope Francis will visit one of
Nairobi's largest slums during his upcoming visit.
Today we visited Tangaza University here in Nairobi, established with the collaboration of 22 religious congregations. We met Sr. Pat Kane's former student, Jeff, who now heads the communication department that Pat established. On the wall hangs a picture of Pat as first Director, sent by Sr. Mary Quinn in 2010 after she visited here and received a request for it from Jeff. With this visit today Pat Smith and I completed our pilgrimage to at least one site where each of our sisters has served.
It has been a remarkable privilege to be with Pat as she
completes this mission that has encompassed most of her adult life and has
fulfilled the early sense of God's call that she felt for the African mission.
It has likewise been a gift to visit most of the places where our sisters have
lived and ministered in Kenya, being reminded of what richness they have
brought to our Congregation as well as to the people of Kenya. I have been
aware all through this time here that, much like my predecessors in such
visits, my purposes are to express congregational support for those who are
here, to honor the past ministries of our sisters, and to be "eyes and
ears" on behalf of the congregation in relating what I have experienced.
I leave with a sense of gratitude and admiration -- for
Pat, for our sisters who have been in East Africa before her, and for the many
people I have met in these past several days. There is a vibrancy in their
faith that, to use Pat's words, appears to be integrated with the whole of
their lives. Among the missioners, lay and religious, I feel a sense of warm
community and an almost palpable sense of mission. Is it the urgency of the
needs that are here in Kenya as well as in neighboring countries like South
Sudan?
I have been enriched by this experience and will need
time to let its effects deepen in me. We in the Community of St. Joseph are all
enriched through the ministry of our sisters who have been here, knowing that
where they have been, there we are. Let us welcome Pat back to her U.S. home
after 42 years of mission in Africa and support her in her time of transition.
Let us thank her and all those who preceded or
accompanied her in ministry here. We are blessed.
Sister Maxyne Schneider
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