In this Issue:

Franciscan Mission Service 

Anselm Moons Award

CSW 2024 Food Drive

House of Prayer for All People 

2023 Annual Report

New Equipment for St. Joseph's Hospital

March Birthday List

Happy Retirement Doretha!

Tara Lapinski Remembers Sister

St. Elizabeth Mission Society 

Easter Mass Cards

Cards for Jubilarians

Send Us Your News

Franciscan Mission Service will be honoring the Franciscan Sisters of Allegany with its Anselm Moons Award in recognition of their “tremendous and consistent” partnership.

Maggie Conley, interim executive director of FMS, shared a few examples of why FSA was chosen for this honor.

She said FMS is grateful for the generosity of the sisters, who have supported their work with regular financial support.

Conley added that FMS has consistently benefited from sisters who have served on the board of directors including Cathy Cahill, Pat Reid and Margaret Mary Kimmins. 

She also said, in recent years especially, the lay missioners in Jamaica – and FMS as a whole – “have benefited greatly by walking alongside the sisters in continually evolving ways.” 

“We are so grateful that as you continue to see what is next with the Franciscan Sisters of Allegany, FMS is still seen as a valuable partner,” Conley said.

Joleen Johnson, who is currently serving in Jamaica, is the latest missioner to be connected with the Franciscan Sisters of Allegany.

The award is named for Dutch Franciscan friar Fr. Anselm Moons, who served as a missionary in Pakistan for 25 years and also traveled around the world as a member of the General Council of the Franciscan Order in Rome. In 1985 he came to the U.S. to help prepare friars for overseas missions. In 1989, with the support of the North American Franciscan friars, Fr. Moons started the Lay Mission Formation Program to offer lay Catholics the opportunity to serve overseas in the spirit of Saints Francis and Clare. The first FMS class was commissioned and sent into the field in 1990.

The sisters will receive the award during the annual World Care Annual Benefit and Celebration April 18 in Washington, DC.

CSW 2024 Food Drive

Catholic Sisters Week is March 8-14 and this year, the Congregational Office staff, along with the Motherhouse Sisters, staff and friends, are joining efforts to raise food and money for the St. Bonaventure University Food Pantry.

The SBU Food Pantry started in October 2019 after it became obvious to the campus community that food insecurity is an issue on college campuses across America. 

The SBU Food Pantry is in Room 113 of the McGinley-Carney Center for Franciscan Ministry. All members of the SBU community are welcome to visit daily, helping themselves to five food items per day. Pantry hours are 4-8 p.m. Monday–Thursday and 4-6 p.m. on Friday.

A list of items the food pantry needs will be made available before the official start of the food drive.

During Catholic Sisters Week boxes will be set up in both the lobby and dining hall of St. Elizabeth Motherhouse to collect non-perishable food items. People can also drop items off at the food pantry. Anyone interested in making a monetary donation may email anne.holliday@fsallegany.org

House of Prayer for All People

2023 Annual Report

By Kathie Uhler, OSF, Resident-Contact

The House of Prayer for All People (HoP) evolved smoothly in the flow of the 2023 calendar year. My ministry through it is comprised, if you will, of outreach, in-reach and Zoom. 

To begin with, the outreach takes form from my active membership in two churches: Trinity Episcopal and Our Mother of Good Counsel R.C. in Bryn Mawr. I am twice blessed as a recipient of their worship services and by the parishioners themselves. Further outreach includes my participating in their various ministries, e.g., the Trinity Neighborhood Group (TNG) and the Peace and Justice Committee, respectively.

“In-reach” is a term that I have coined to describe my life and prayer forms inside the HoP. However, as a Franciscan Sister of Allegany, N.Y., (FSA) I am geared toward the active contemplative life as exemplified in the Gospels: Jesus was both very active and inter-active; he also spent quality time alone with the Lord, often in desert places. 

Overall, I see myself moving in this two-pronged direction as an “itinerant hermit.” Is “peripatetic” a better word? Or maybe “footloose”? There are aspects of in-reach and outreach in the HoP life for me. This is mirrored when I, at times, with the HoP weekly or monthly retreatants or some of the TNG folks take walk-abouts to perform acts of friendship in the neighborhood.

Zoom also has become a form of out- and in-reach for my HoP life and work: Through Zoom, the Monday night Psalm Prayer Hour participants reach into the HoP; and I go out through Zoom when I participate in various FSA activities. 

Speaking of which, throughout 2023 I was very much involved in in-person and Zoom meetings as a facilitator in the FSA CARE process. CARE stands for “Conversational Approach to Relational Effectiveness.” The goal is to assist all our sisters to engage in more in-depth and mutually focused conversations. The hope is that, as we get older and fewer in numbers, we will be enabled to discern the future of our Congregation together. This will begin in a special General Assembly to be held at the Motherhouse in Allegany this summer from July 29 to August 3. 

The time required of us facilitators working in-person with the sisters was considerable in 2023: I was a week in Tampa, Florida, in February, March, April and May; then a week away with the group in Allegany in June, July, August and September. In between these sessions there were eight Zoom practice sessions. I am also facilitating the process in Brazil. This began with two weeks in January and will include two weeks each in March and May this year. To support my input in Brazil I have been learning Portuguese through Duolingo and have a 285-day “hot streak” going!

New Equipment for St. Joseph's Hospital

St. Joseph’s Hospital – North in Tampa, Florida, has added a new germ-killing, cleaning robot to its team. 

The hospital recently acquired the latest and greatest version of Tru-D®, an acronym for Total Room Ultraviolet Disinfection Robot, affectionately known as “Trudy.” They now have four robots -- three of an earlier generation and now the most modern Tru-D version. The manufacturer says St. Joseph’s is the first in Florida to have the most up-to-date version: the Tru D IQ.

The Tru-Ds use ultraviolet energy to attack infectious cells so they cannot reproduce. The hospital’s Environmental Services Team (EVS) uses the robots to clean vacated hospital rooms, operating rooms, and other hospital areas to help prepare the rooms and areas for the next patient or procedure. The ultraviolet rays attack infectious cells so they cannot reproduce and disinfect a whole room in its entirety.

“Tru-Ds do not take the place of what we do, but are an added layer of protection and disinfection,” said EVS Manager Belinda.

The newest Tru-D was purchased with a grant from the Philanthropic Women of St. Joseph’s.

Happy Birthday!

Happy Retirement Doretha!

Since 1977 Doretha Bull has served the Franciscan Sisters of Allegany as a cook. Several sisters threw her a retirement party at St Elizabeth Convent in Tampa on Feb. 10 to honor her many years of service.

Tara Lapinski Remembers Sister

From: Cathy Cahill, OSF

Tara Lapinski, former Olympic skater, was the guest speaker at a recent luncheon of the Philharmonic Women of St Joseph’s in Tampa. Knowing that she has had many fans over the years, I wondered if she would remember Sister Vicki Masterpaul, who was an avid follower of Tara’s career. Vicki wrote to Tara and eventually joined Tara’s mother when Tara was skating in Camden. She certainly did remember! She teared up when I mentioned Vicki’s name and recalled fondly how much Sister’s prayers meant to her and her mom. We ought never underestimate what our promise of prayers means to people.

St. Elizabeth Mission Society

Easter Mass Cards

By: Laura Whitford, St. Elizabeth Mission Society

Send your special prayer blessings to friends or loved ones this Easter with Mass enrollment cards from St. Elizabeth Mission Society. As members of the Mission Society, their intentions will be remembered at Easter Sunday Mass and in other Masses celebrated throughout the Easter season in the Motherhouse Chapel. They will also share in the prayers and good works of our Sisters in Bolivia, Brazil, Jamaica, Mozambique and the United States. 

As a sponsored ministry of the Franciscan Sisters of Allegany, the St. Elizabeth Mission Society shares in its spiritual aims, one of which is to advance the awareness of God's love. Donations given for the cards are used to support the ministries of the Franciscan Sisters of Allegany and their Associates who work to educate, heal, clothe, and feed those who are experiencing poverty in Bolivia, Brazil, Jamaica, Mozambique and the United States.

Easter cards, as well as various other enrollment cards, can be ordered online at https://www.franciscanhope.org/shop/ or you can call the Mission Society office at (716) 373-1130 or e-mail the staff at StEliz.Office.Manager@FSAllegany.org. Easter cards are also available in the Mission Society office. Please note that, in an effort to use our card inventory we currently have, we did not make a new card design this year.

Cards for Jubilarians

By Laura Whitford, St. Elizabeth Mission Society

Help the Jubilee Sisters "celebrate their journey" with a special Jubilee Mass enrollment card from the St. Elizabeth Mission Society. As members of the Mission Society, their intentions will be remembered at Masses celebrated throughout the year in the Motherhouse Chapel. As always, they will also share in the prayers and good works of our Sisters in Bolivia, Brazil, Jamaica, Mozambique and the United States.

As a sponsored ministry of the Franciscan Sisters of Allegany, the St. Elizabeth Mission Society shares in its spiritual aims, one of which is to advance the awareness of God's love. Donations given for the cards are used to support the ministries of the Franciscan Sisters of Allegany and their Associates who work to educate, heal, clothe, feed and be present for those who are experiencing poverty in Bolivia, Brazil, Jamaica, Mozambique and the United States.

Jubilee cards, as well as various other enrollment cards, can be ordered online at https://www.franciscanhope.org/shop/ or you can call the Mission Society office at (716) 373-1130 or e-mail the staff at StEliz.Office.Manager@FSAllegany.org for more information about ordering the enrollment cards. Jubilee cards will also be available in the Mission Society office. 

We Want to Hear From You!

We would love to include more news from Brazil, Bolivia, Jamaica and Mozambique in our newsletter. If you have any pictures, tidbits of information or bigger stories you’d like to share please email them to FSA Communications Coordinator Anne Holliday anne.holliday@fsallegany.org. If you have any questions about whether it’s something that could or should go in this newsletter, you can ask Anne about that, too. But she’ll probably say, “Yes, send it.” 😊