Words of Encouragement from Mother Cabrini:
“What have we to fear if the Heart of Jesus protects us? And what can we not hope for, entrusting ourselves to the Heart of of such a compassionate and powerful advocate?” New Orleans to Panama, May to June, 1895
From: Travels of Mother Frances Xavier Cabrini ©1944
Submitted by: J. Hasse, Reference Librarian
The Missionary Sisters of the Sacred Heart of Jesus (MSCs) is an international congregation of women religious present on six continents and in seventeen countries. The MSCs are women who are drawn by the Heart of Jesus to be bearers of Christ’s love in the world. In the Snapshot you will meet one of these amazing women, Sr. Antonina Avitabile, MSC. Sr. Antonina, known also as Sr. Toni, is a familiar face at Cabrini College. Sr. Toni came to Cabrini in 1982 to serve as the College Registrar. In 1983, Sr. was assigned to Australia and became a hospital administrator for the Cabrini Health system. Sr. Toni returned to the College in 1990 and began the Purchasing department. After receiving her Masters degree in accounting from Widener University, Sr. Toni was called to serve again in hospital administration, this time much closer to home, in New York. Follow the link to view Sr. Toni’s vocation message.
Submitted by: A. Schwelm, Assistant Library Director
The Engagements with the Common Good sequence culminates in the senior year with a capstone project in the student’s major. For example, seniors in the Communication Department can choose to take COM 472 Media for Social Justice or COM 474 & 475, Senior Convergence Seminars to fulfill the capstone requirement. In the Senior Convergence Seminars, students use multimedia tools to address a social justice topic. The multimedia project is then mounted on a website. The most recent Convergence project addresses the issue of domestic violence. The interactive web project is designed to inform elementary school teachers about domestic violence and provide ways to help students living with domestic violence. The project is entitled, “Children as Witness”.
Submitted by: A. Schwelm, Assistant Library Director
Mother Cabrini on waiting for God to answer our prayers:
“Oh, hope of heaven, the more you wait and hope, the more you obtain! Let us not grow weary, daughters, when it seems that our prayers are not granted and our hope is disappointed. No, it is never disappointed, but all is disposed according to the all-seeing wisdom of God. He knows the reason! Trust against all hope and you will never be confused.” Le Havre to New York – September, 1891
From: Travels of Mother Frances Xavier Cabrini ©1944
Submitted by: J. Hasse, Reference Librarian
“Three years before Ellis Island opened, a seemingly frail sister from Italy arrived in New York. Frances Cabrini had hoped to go to China, but Pope Leo XIII had instructed her: “Your China is in the United States.” Thus reads the entry for Mother Frances Cabrini in the exhibit: Women & Spirit: Catholic Sisters in America. The three year travelling exhibit details the history of nuns in America. The exhibit runs through June 2012 and is currently showcased at the California Museum of History, Women & the Arts in Sacramento, CA. The exhibit shows how Sisters built up the largest private parochial school system in the world, hospitals, and over one hundred women’s colleges. Mother Cabrini is featured in the exhibit and several of the items from the College’s Cabriniana Room are on display.
Mother Cabrini showcased at the Women & Spirit exhibit. Some of Mother Cabrini’s personal items include her pewter travelling set.
Professor Hedtke leads the ECG 100 course Identifying My Political Voice. One of the Engagements with the Common Good courses, this course guides students on the path to determining their own political identity. Students are asked to first explore and reflect upon their core values and to then critique these values using theories of social justice. The syllabus reads: “The course encourages students to become civically engaged and use their political voice to advance the Common Good and reach the realization that “justice matters.”
Submitted by J. Hasse, Reference Librarian
May 1 has long been associated with workers’ rights. Since 1889, socialist and Communist groups have marked the day as a commemoration of the 1886 Haymarket Riots in Chicago, during which police and striking workers engaged in a bloody confrontation.
On May 1, 1933, the first copies of the Catholic Worker newspaper were distributed in New York City, marking the start of a long-lasting organization that to this day is dedicated to the laboring classes, the poor, and oppressed.
The papacy has given special attention to the day by associating May 1 with St. Joseph, the Worker. St. Joseph is the patron saint of fathers, carpenters and social justice. In 1955, Pius XII instituted a liturgical memorial of St. Joseph the Worker on May 1. Already, though, Pius IX had declared St. Joseph the Patron of the Catholic Church.
John Paul II reflected on the significance of St. Joseph in his 1989 apostolic exhortation, Redemptoris custos, “On the Person and Mission of St. Joseph in the Life of Christ and of the Church.” Importantly, Jesus spent his “hidden years” working alongside Joseph as a carpenter. As John Paul II writes, “At his workbench where he plied his trade together with Jesus, Joseph brought human work closer to the mystery of Redemption” (22). Consequently, work becomes an important avenue for sanctification. “What is crucially important here,” explains John Paul II, “is the sanctification of daily life, a sanctification which each person must acquire according to his or her own state, and one which can be promoted according to a model accessible to all people” (24). St. Joseph is one such model.
Jesus was a worker during his earthly ministry. The Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace, in The Compendium of the Social Doctrine of the Church, discusses the significance of work in Jesus’ own life, as a laborer alongside Joseph and, later, during his public ministry. In the Gospels, Jesus identifies himself as a co-laborer with his Father in heaven and describes his disciples as “workers in the harvest of the Lord” (259). Christians can recognize the dignity of work by association not only with St. Joseph but with Jesus the worker.
Made in the image and likeness of God, write the authors of the Compenedium, human beings are co-creators with God: “It falls to man [sic] to discover the order within it [the cosmos] and to heed this order, bringing it to fulfillment” (262). In a powerful statement, the authors of the Compendium link human activity with the action of God from the beginning of time: “Human activity aimed at enhancing and transforming the universe can and must unleash the perfections which find their origin and model in the uncreated Word” (262). Seen from the cosmic and eternal perspective, work seems not only to be dignified but indeed a sacred act performed in concert with the Creator.
Submitted by: N. Rademacher, Ph.D., Assistant Professor, Religious Studies
See:
John Paul II, Redemptoris custos, http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/john_paul_ii/apost_exhortations/documents/hf_jp-ii_exh_15081989_redemptoris-custos_en.html
Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace, Compendium of the Social Doctrine of the Church, http://www.vatican.va/roman_curia/pontifical_councils/justpeace/documents/rc_pc_justpeace_doc_20060526_compendio-dott-soc_en.html
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