The Society of the Sacred Heart
Australia-Aotearoa
New Zealand ,
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The Society of the Sacred Heart
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It is not what you are nor what you have been that God sees with
all merciful eyes,
There is something wanting in education where a child has not had its share of leisure, to be rapt in silence and alone… Janet Stuart rscJ
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Sr Alison Goodson, R.I.PAn alumna said yesterday "She was
sunshine in the classroom” and a Hungarian refugee in Wellington described her
as “a golden ball of go The seventh of eight children, she was born in Hawera in 1917. If you are driving through Hawera, turn aside to visit the Goodson Garden in the public domain. Her father, who died when she was two, was a farmer and breeder of horses, and her wonderful mother, a beautiful and talented singer, who passed on her love of music to all her children and grandchildren. “My childhood on the farm was happy and free”, she writes, “we had governesses during our primary years…As the five girls became boarders at Island Bay convent, the family moved to Wellington, where Glen Rd, Kelburn became for nearly 50 years the centre of family activity… We remained close-knit, sharing and caring for one another really deeply.” And, as all Island Bay-ites know, the Goodsons became part of the RSCJ family for three generations. We greet them all today and share in their pride and sadness. Sr Alison’s notes continue: “I owe much of my devotion to the love of Christ to the atmosphere of my home… and at school I was increasingly attracted to a life of dedication and reparation, a desire that deepened and soon led me to “enter” at Rose Bay in 1934, after a tortuous three-day crossing of the Tasman Sea… I’m not sure how I survived the loneliness and the extraordinary and weird monastic practices of the Noviceship…I came close to breaking point for a time…but the gentle encouragement of Mother Woodlock and my great admiration for Mother Janet Stuart pulled me through…If she could do all this for the love of God, I thought, so can I. For my First Vows, for example, my much-loved mother brought over a large 21st birthday cake for the twenty novices, but, alas, disappeared until after Lent.” Being so adaptable, she was moved constantly, filling gaps for the next 13 years, progressing from secondary teaching to a BA degree, to Mistress of Discipline, to Mistress General at Island Bay and Baradene. Her pupils are unanimous in finding her firm and fair, stern if need be but never hard or unreasonable, good-humoured and enduring girlhood crushes with supreme disregard. After that came happy years founding the Parish School in Burnside, Christchurch, followed by a lectureship at Loreto Hall Teachers’ College. Then, as we say, came “the changes”. “1966 to 1970” she wrote, during her renewal months in Rome in 1979, “was a period of ill-health and disillusionment… I was sent from a position that was fulfilling to one where I was never made to feel needed… At the same time the updating changes in the Society left me behind, mentally and psychologically, unconvinced of their genuine value and experiencing an inability to adapt…. I am by nature conservative and unadventurous, and had become too dependent on known persons, places and things…However, over the years I have learnt to face the unwelcome and the unexpected with a certain amount of openness and a recognition of the work of the Spirit of Christ in so many varied situations.” How well her strong, loving spirit achieved this is shown in her guidance of both Cottesmore College and Erskine College during the difficult years of their closing in the 1970s and 1980s. We can only guess at the anguish this caused her, as she does not speak of her sufferings at this time. But a line from Mother Janet Stuart’s life is relevant: “From pain and the darkness, she sailed out into the sunlight”. Her sunny disposition, her wisdom and her practical skills found wider outlets. In community she graduated from the nunly arts of needlework and housekeeping to those of a homemaker, an excellent cook, a skilled driver, a health-adviser and a gracious hostess. Shopping round Island Bay became a socializing, evangelizing activity. .As Provincial Bursar she had a host of admiring tradesmen, clerics, car-dealers, professionals and Board members at her beck and call. One birthday card reads: All happy returns to our Bursar
She was always a comforting presence to have around, serene and secure in herself, never swayed by trends and opinions. And always there was music. It gave to her life a kind of mandorla, a golden background like that of an icon. There must be hundreds of students, alumnae, parishioners who can hum in the kitchen Blue Danubes and Vienna Woods and snatches of Gilbert and Sullivan, who can recognize in church hymns, motets, Ave Marias and Ave Verums, that she taught them with lively skill. She lists 26 organs that she has played in chapels and cathedrals and once in Sydney University. Liturgies, weddings, jubilees and hundreds of funerals; the special thrill of accompanying her nephew Patrick Power, an international opera-singer. She speaks with gratitude for a gift that has given so much joy to herself and hopefully inspiration and comfort to many others. She loved doing handwork, while listening to classical music and conversing with her successive canaries. And what of her inner life? When she was 21, a businessman on the same flight asked how long she had been a nun. “Nearly three years!” she said proudly. “What a waste!” he replied. So she wrote a vocation story titled “A Wasted Life”, in which she says, ”The love God gives us for Himself is like a diamond –durable and imperishable, through all trials and tests. I became a nun because at the age of 18 I was in love with Him…I still am…And I do know what it is to be in love!” Answering a questionnaire she gives us a glimpse of her prayer as “simple and direct, a being with, trying to listen to, conferring with the Lord… I experience the Lord as a loving, caring person living close to me and trying to guide me towards his love… I want to belong to Him wholly as his instrument… I want to deepen my understanding of the spirit and charism of the Society and to have a greater awareness of how to carry out its mission in this present time.” In the last decade of her 25 years in Island Bay she struggled valiantly against the increasing illness which finally necessitated her transfer to Baradene in 2006. Although at first she was listless and withdrawn, she entrusted herself with great simplicity and gratitude to this community and its staff. Over the last year, however, with the help of her devoted carers and Sr June, she came to life again with her renewed interest in everyday events, her quick wit and her perception of the needs of others. I would say to her “Today is the feast of St Peter, we should be singing Tu Es Petrus”. “Oh,no”, she replied, “Let’s have Domine Tu Scis, You know that I love you!” “Today is the feast of St Maria Goretti, we should be singing Jesu Corona Virginum”. “What about Veni Sponsa Christi?” she countered. It is as this wise, serene and sympathetic matriarch that we shall always remember her. May she rejoice forever in the love of her God and the music of Heaven. Sr Margaret D'Ath |
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Society
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odness”.