Homily for the Feast of Saint Madeleine Sophie - 2007 
Rita Carroll, RSCJ - Stuartholme

Today, as we celebrate the Feast of our saint, we are standing at a particular point in history - a vantage point from which we can pause and take stock. It is our Year of Reflection and the anniversary of the arrival of the Society in Australia and Brisbane. So “Past, Present and Future” has been chosen as the theme for our celebrations.

Just one hundred and twenty-five years ago, five sisters of the Sacred Heart arrived in Sydney on the ship, “The Orient”, to begin the first school of the Sacred Heart in Australia.  I spent a little time this year researching the lives of these five women and came to have an appreciation of their individual gifts and personalities. They were an extraordinarily gifted and courageous group of women. Not only were they prepared to travel to the ends of the earth to establish the Society here but their journey in faith had already led three of them from the Anglican Church to Catholicism, and then on to become Religious of the Sacred Heart. A number of years later, two of them would be called continue their missionary journeys – Rose Dunne, along with some other Australian sisters, went on to become a founding member of the Japanese Province, while Mary Maclaine Jackson later travelled to South America to take up the role of Superior of the Society’s houses in Argentina and Chile.

The work of these original five foundresses flourished and Sydney became the centre from which other foundations were made. Ninety years ago, just thirty-five years after their arrival in Australia, Religious of the Sacred Heart came to Brisbane to run the Parish school at Annerley while they searched for a place to start a boarding school. Among our Stuartholme foundresses, we have our own adventurous religious, Mother du Pradel, whose missionary call took her from Stuartholme on to South America. On the way to the Spruson Building we have a photo of her with our other foundresses – she is the one standing at the bottom of the stairs.

Today, as we gather in this chapel, we can see that the work of the Brisbane foundresses also flourished. We can look back on Stuartholme’s track record and see that many fine women received an education here. Two of our alumnae, who are with us today, Sisters Margot Crowther and Mollie Ahern, have helped to plant the Society in Africa, while Sister Dain Inglis, a Missionary of Our Lady of the Sacred Heart, currently runs an orphanage in South Africa for children who are victims of AIDS. Of course there are many other Stuartholme graduates making outstanding contributions in all walks of life – each of you will be able to name some of them.

           
None of these women would have been able to face the challenges presented to them without a strong spirit, in fact the same spirit that inspired Sophie, a girl from a country town, Joigny, in France. Sophie had a dream and a vision that embraced the whole world, and it is her vision that inspired our five foundresses to traverse the globe 125 years ago. Their courage reveals something of Sophie, a remarkable woman, who in her own lifetime gathered over 3,000 followers. Sophie’s vision has not lost its appeal – she still inspires us here at Stuartholme to rise to the challenge of building a loving community and to take that love out into a world that needs it so much.

So we pause in our journey once again to listen to St Paul describe how we must act to create a loving community. Paul says…

"You must live your whole life according to the Christ you have received…

you are God's chosen,.. He loves you,

 you should be clothed in sincere compassion, in kindness and humility,

gentleness and patience…

forgive each other as soon as a quarrel begins.

Over all these clothes…put on love.

It is a huge challenge to live this day by day – as challenging as crossing the earth – as challenging as entering another culture…for a war torn world that places such store on material possessions should be a foreign culture to us. Our task as a loving community is to create an alternative culture. Living the way St Paul urges us to, is not something that we can do alone. Just as the original five sisters who came to Sydney relied on the inspiration of Sophie Barat and letters and material support from home, we rely on each other for support, encouragement, challenge and inspiration. The Gospel tells us that we must remain connected…connected to each other…but more importantly connected to Jesus, to God from whom all life flows.

As a branch cannot bear fruit all by itself,
but must remain part of the vine, neither can you unless you remain in me.

I am the vine,
you are the branches.
Those who remain in me, with me in them,
bear fruit in plenty;

 

To remain part of the vine means that we need to take time and space for silence, for prayer, so we can be in touch with our inner selves and hear the Spirit speak to us. How can we know where we are called if we cannot hear the gentle whisper of the Spirit in our hearts?

As we journey through this Year of Reflection, each of us needs to include times of silence and stillness, time to listen to the Spirit so we, too, can hear the call to set sail for the new worlds that await us in the future.