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Reflection on Ascension Sunday/the Seventh Sunday of Easter/

Posted on May 16, 2021, by Sharon Kassing SL

Years ago, my brother renovated his basement, and since I am a born scavenger, I became heir to his leftover plywood. Coincidentally, that same summer, Helen Jean, Betty McGrath, Eileen Kersgieter and I took a little vacation to Wisconsin Dells. Not far away in Baraboo is the Circus Hall of Fame. I’ll leave it up to your imagination to decide who among the four of us enjoyed that the most. One of the highlights of that place was a huge warehouse full of authentic circus wagons. I bought postcards! Postcards of circus wagons plus plywood equaled a major art project for my sixth graders in the fall. 

I told the kids they could work in pairs for the project, but Jeff asked to work alone on his wagon. He was sort of an introvert, so I didn’t question his choice. Over the course of about eight weeks, he quietly worked alone at a table in the back of the room. His was a cage wagon, meant for a tiger or some other menacing animal. It had bars on both sides. Jeff was stymied for a while about how he might render those bars, and that held up completion of his project. Finally, one day, he walked into class grinning from ear to ear, with a handful of spokes — not from his own bike, but from his brother’s! In no time he fitted them into the sides of his wagon. They worked perfectly. In the end, his wagon was magnificent; and I told him so again and again.

Unfortunately, even as a sixth grader, Jeff could barely read. Except for math, the rest of his subjects were really hard for him. He made it to his eighth-grade graduation, but it wasn’t an easy trek. Because of his success with the wagon project, I encouraged him to pursue a career in which he would use his hands, and after high school he studied and apprenticed in carpentry. I saw his mom from time to time over the years, and even saw Jeff at St. Pius functions once in a while. But it wasn’t until just a few years ago, that I found out that, over time, Jeff had risen from a journeyman carpenter to become supervisor of construction for the whole Barnes/Jewish/Children’s Hospital addition recently completed in St. Louis. For those of you who know the St. Louis skyline, you know that that was a huge piece of work! I was so proud of him. I knew he had it in him.

Jeff died last year of cancer. In conversation with his mom at that time, I found out that she and I had prayed the same prayer for Jeff over the years, a prayer that sounds very much like Jesus’s prayer to Abba God for his followers. He said, “I gave them your word. … I do not ask you to take them out of the world, but that you keep them from the evil one. … Consecrate them in the truth.  … As you sent me into the world. So, I send them into the world.” 

I’m sure that many of us have prayed that prayer again and again for those we’ve sent out, our own children, our students, any of those we’ve mentored in one way or another. We send them out confident that they have learned well and won’t let us down, and that God will be with them.

As members of this Community, we were sent out, too. Remember? Think back. I clearly remember my classmates and I piling into cars right outside this chapel and embarking on our trip to St. Louis and the House of Studies. It’s etched in my memory, even after all these 59 years! And I’m sure that our mentors here at the Motherhouse prayed that same prayer as they waved us off that day. That’s our communal and personal history — arriving, learning, imparting and embarking: arriving, learning, imparting and embarking!

I don’t know about you, but over the course of the last year and a half, there have been days when the rhetoric, the politics, the violence and the lockdown itself have tempted me to think that that historical cycle might be winding down, that our real work might be coming to an end. I sometimes let myself forget that there’s more to this life than just getting through this or that current dilemma. 

Then I remind myself that like Jesus, our good ancestors haven’t prayed for us just so we could coast when things got tough. Like Jesus, we know that there’s more life to come, and we have embarking yet to do!

I’d like to close with these powerful words of Carol Zinn: 

“As we continue to journey through these uncertain and unprecedented times with no clarity ahead, 

how full of resurrection power can we become?

As we remain faithful to our gospel vocation lived through [a committed] life, 

how full of resurrection power can we become?

As we discern, together, the emergence of the [committed] life and our response, 

how full of resurrection power can we become?

As we commit to dismantling our own white privilege and domination, 

how full of resurrection power can we become?

And as we journey into an unknown future, 

how full of resurrection power can we become?

How full of resurrection power can we become!”

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Sharon Kassing SL

In addition to being part of Loretto's Executive Committee/Community Forum, Sharon also serves on Loretto's Discernment Steering Committee, the Motherhouse Coordinating Board and the Farm & Land Committee. She also oversees Loretto's Assembly planning. A native St. Louisan, Sharon says she finds this "a very exciting time to be in a religious community, especially the Loretto Community, because I see us at the very edge of what is to come. I am confident that we, as a Community, have the courage and strength to be a part of a future that has yet to show itself completely."