What? ANOTHER Diamond Jubilee?!

A Handmaid Diamond Jubilee, HISTORY, HPB Vocations

A Diamond Jubilee can refer to either a 75 year anniversary or a 60 year anniversary. And we’ve got a 60th to rejoice in. Sister Mary Genevieve of the Will of God marks her Diamond Jubilee this year, still joyfully serving God as his Handmaid of the Precious Blood. She received her name and habit from Father Gerald himself in …

Archive Treasures: International Eucharistic Congress 1976

A Handmaid Diamond Jubilee, HISTORY, News

As the Catholic Church in America gets its Eucharistic Revival underway, there are plans for a National Eucharistic Congress in July 2024. (For more information visit: https://www.eucharisticrevival.org) As cloistered contemplatives we will only be attending in spirit. But in 1976 we were still a Diocesan Community with a semi-active rule and not yet, enclosed. So we had the honor and …

Archive Treasures: Meeting Saint Paul VI

A Handmaid Diamond Jubilee, HISTORY, News

Mother Dolorosa and Sister Bernadette (who would become the next Mother) greet Pope Paul VI during a visit to Rome. They were delighted to meet the successor to Peter and the Vicar of Christ on Earth but might not have guessed how soon he would be canonized.

ARCHIVE TREASURES: SISTER ELIZABETH’S CRUTCHES AND LEG BRACES

A Handmaid Diamond Jubilee, HISTORY, News

Of the first women who came to join the Handmaids of the Precious Blood in May 1947 only one, Sister Elizabeth of the Trinity, persevered. Yet she was paralyzed below the waist from polio. Perhaps, like the late Cardinal George who contracted polio at 13 and was thus rejected by a Chicago preparatory seminary, Sister Elizabeth also experienced rejection and …

Praying the Stations of the Cross in the Mary, Mother of Priests Tribute Garden

A Handmaid HISTORY, HPB Vocations, Priests Garden

God blessed us with very fine weather during the last weeks of October and, on a warm and windy day, we took advantage of the conditions to pray the Stations of the Cross together in the Mary, Mother of Priests Tribute Garden. The perimeter of this first phase of the garden is ringed with 14 traditional Stations of the Cross …

Post Corpus Christi Blessings: Aspirant Renae Arrives!

A Handmaid HISTORY, HPB Vocations

In addition to Jesus’ Real Presence in the Blessed Sacrament, the week of the Solemnity of Corpus Christi brought us many other blessings as well, large and small, from resuming the use of holy water fonts in Chapel, to beautiful flower blossoms, and last, but not least, to the joyful arrival of our Aspirant Renae. The Lord never ceases his …

White Christmas! Not So Typical!

A Handmaid HISTORY, HPB Vocations, News

We recently shared a post on what a typical monastery Christmas is like. But what was it really like this year? It was a WHITE CHRISTMAS!!!!!! That’s a shout-able event. Why? Because it was a rare event experienced maybe only once every 10-15 years or more…a White Christmas of 5 to 7 inches of snow that meant no Midnight Mass, …