The First Sunday in Advent

November 29, 2020

First Week of Advent
Opening Song: Prepare Ye the Way of the Lord – Godspell

Reflection: The song, ‘Prepare Ye the Way of the Lord,’ was sung by John the Baptist in the play, Godspell. He was telling the people to prepare the way for one greater than he who was to come. How appropriate those words are to also announce the coming of the one who is greater than us. It is a call to prepare ourselves for the coming of the Christ Child.
The year 2020 has certainly been a hard year. COVID-19, the elections in the US, wildfires, landslides, mudslides, earthquakes, etc. etc. have all made this such a difficult time for everyone. It has been so hard to silence our minds and hearts. And yet, despite all of this, we are assured of the coming of Jesus. Despite all the despair and the chaos, we are assured that the Christ child will be born on Christmas Day.
In the Gospel for the first Sunday of Advent (Mark 13:33-37), we are told three times to be watchful. We have been listening for hours and hours to reports and updates about COVID-19, the elections, the different storms, etc. I find myself sometimes becoming numb to all that I am being bombarded with.
How can I silence my heart, my soul and my mind to prepare the way of the Lord this Advent?
What can I do to assure myself that despite all that is happening in this world, I will have Jesus born in my heart? What do I need to be watchful of to obtain the peace and love in my heart?
I know that it can be very frustrating when the words of some songs stay in my head. Perhaps, this Advent, it would be good to keep the words of ‘Prepare Ye the Way of the Lord’ in your head. Let it be a reminder that we are starting a very sacred and powerful journey to Bethlehem.
Lorraine Campanelli, CLM

CLM Director Hosts Virtual Brown Bag Lunch

November 19, 2020

The year 2020 has been a year of many firsts. On Tuesday, November 17th, we held our first Cabrini CLM Chat via Zoom. Participants were invited to bring along their lunch and join in the conversation.

Lorraine Campanelli, the Director of the Cabrini Lay Missionaries (CLMs), spoke to a group of administrators, faculty and staff from Cabrini University, and other invited guests. The lunch time meeting opened with a beautiful prayer given by Sr. Grace Waters, MSC, followed by an introduction of Lorraine by Sr. Christine Marie Baltas, MSC

Lorraine presented information about the CLMs and how they are integral members of the Cabrini Family. She spoke about their initial formation period and the journey to making a commitment as a CLM. The participants offered wonderful comments and questions for Lorraine.

In addition to the formal presentation segment of the brown bag lunch meeting, the participants enjoyed seeing each other and having some informal, friendly conversation. There was such a beautiful spirit amongst everyone. Because of COVID, many people had not seen each other, especially in-person, in a long time. It was energizing to reconnect virtually.

Thank you to Sr. Grace, Sr. Christine Marie and Nancy Costello for arranging the meeting and inviting us to attend. Thank you, also, to Nancy Golen, the Director of the Cabrini Retreat Center in Chicago, for providing the Zoom technology. And, of course, a big thank you to all those who participated in the discussion. ~ submitted by Lorraine Campanelli, CLM Director

For those interested in learning more about the CLMs and their ministries, kindly contact:
Lorraine Campanelli: Email: cabrinilaymissionariesgp@gmail.com Phone: 914-907-0143

A Thanksgiving Prayer

November 19, 2020

Loving God,
we turn our hearts to you
during this season of giving thanks,
mindful of your many gifts.

For each one, we are grateful.
For each one, we are blessed.
For each one we are opened to the abundance of your love.
May this Thanksgiving be a time to be as generous with others as you are to us.

We offer this prayer of thanks mindful that
this year has been difficult and challenging for so many.
Yet, we know in your infinite goodness
you are walking with us each day.
Thank you for being with us in all our joys and sorrows.
Thank you for your comfort and companionship.
Please grant us your mercy and your continued graces
and blessings throughout the coming year.
~ adapted from Catholic.org

A CLM Commitment to the Charism

November 18, 2020

The Feast of St. Cabrini was truly a day of blessings and celebrations. Three of our Cabrini Lay Missionaries (CLMs), renewed their commitment for three years on the Feast Day.

Thanks to technology, we were able to come together, via Zoom, to celebrate Patricia Krasnausky, Patricia Stancato-Purkey and Vicky Lucio as they prayed their recommitment.

Ordinarily, our commitments are made on the Feast of the Sacred Heart. Due to COVID-19, we could not come together for a prayer service. It was then decided that our three CLMs would make their commitments at the Provincial Assembly. Again, COVID made us change the plans as the Assembly was cancelled. I guess it was like the determination of St. Cabrini that we finally were able to connect and pray together for our CLMs.

What a special time it was as we had several of the Missionary Sisters of the Sacred Heart join us in our prayer service. In addition to our CLMs who live in California, Washington State, New Jersey and New York, we had Sr. Bernadette Anello, MSC, General Councilor, who joined us from Rome, Sr. Diane Olmstead, Provincial, from NYC, and several other Sisters from NYC and the Sisters who minister at St. Cabrini Nursing Home.

We had a pleasant surprise to have so many of the Sisters from Sacred Heart Convent join us! It was so nice to see everyone and share some conversation and prayer.

Residents and Staff Join in Feast Day Observances

November 18, 2020

Cabrini of Westchester celebrated the Feast Day of St. Frances Xavier Cabrini on Friday, November 13th and included both staff and residents in the celebration. A Mass, with live music, took place in the St. Cabrini Nursing Home Chapel that was beautifully decorated with vases of purple and white flowers. Sr. Romualda Molon, MSC also included a striking figurine of Mother Cabrini that was hand painted in 1939 and a gorgeous violet plant that she lovingly tends to in the home’s convent among the décor for the altar.

Later in the day, Sheri Gottlieb and her dedicated Therapeutic Recreation Staff distributed ice cream cones to the residents as a special treat in honor of the Feast.

The staff was included in the celebration with the distribution of $10.00 gift certificates to Magnolia’s Café for each employee.

What a special day to honor such a truly extraordinary wom an: our patroness, St. Frances Xavier Cabrini!

A Week of Activities and Celebration!

November 18, 2020

In honor of Mother Cabrini’s Feast Day, each year Cabrini High School hosts Mother Cabrini Week. This year Mother Cabrini Week was bigger and better than ever. The following are just some of the activities that took place:

Each morning the school community joined together and said the Mother Cabrini Novena.
 Monday – Students took a break from class and played online Mother Cabrini Kahoots games.
 Tuesday – Cabrini High School hosted its annual Open House for prospective students, which was very successful.
Wednesday – There was a Mother Cabrini scavenger hunt where students were on a mission to find different Mother Cabrini images around campus. Also, our annual Thanksgiving Food Drive began.
 Thursday – There was a Mother Cabrini puzzle available for students to complete.
 Friday – Simultaneous masses were celebrated at Holy Rosary Church next door to Cabrini’s campus, as well as in the school’s gymnasium in honor of St. Frances Xavier Cabrini’s Feast Day. Due to COVID-19 restrictions, the entire student body could not be accommodated in one facility.
At Cabrini High School in New Orleans, Mother Cabrini’s presence is felt every day on campus, but during “Mother Cabrini Week” each year it feels a little more special.

In the Spirit of Mother Cabrini, Agency Serving Immigrants Endures

November 12, 2020

~ Chris Herlinger, Global Sisters Report

This article was published today on the Global Sisters Report website: https://www.globalsistersreport.org

New York: On the last Tuesday of October, a line of about 60 people, orderly and quiet, wrapped around the block that houses the social service agency Cabrini Immigrant Services of New York City and neighboring St. Teresa’s Church, waiting for the weekly food pantry to open.
At the head of the line stood Sr. Yolanda Flores attentively checking IDs, patiently answering questions and making sure that things ran smoothly. They nearly always do, even with an increased demand for food in the midst of a difficult time in the neighborhood.

Flores, a Nicaraguan-born member of the Missionary Sisters of the Sacred Heart of Jesus and Cabrini Immigrant Services’ family program coordinator, helps organize the Tuesday morning distribution from one of the largest weekly food pantries in this part of Manhattan, anchored in the Chinatown area. Though the food pantry is among its most visible programs, the agency also provides legal services and education, cultural and family programming.

Pre-pandemic, the weekly pantry would provide food for about 200 – 300 people; now, the numbers have roughly doubled.

“The pandemia has been a real challenge,” Flores said during a short break during the morning’s activities which began at about 7:30 a.m. By about 10 a.m. or so, the food packages were nearly cleared out; the demand often outstrips what is available.

That is a source of frustration, Flores said, but it is not surprising. Most of those receiving packages – which on this day included a frozen chicken, milk, tea, rice, beans, potatoes and other vegetables – are elderly neighborhood residents, nearly all Asian, who themselves may not be working but have younger family members who have lost jobs during the economic downturn. “No work, no jobs,” said Flores.
Cabrini had to adjust and retool during the pandemic. Cabrini’s executive director, Javier Ramirez Baron, said that the staff and the agency’s clients have weathered a challenging moment well. “It’s a huge change, but, it’s worked great,” said Ramirez who estimates that the agency has assisted more that 50,000 people since it was founded in 1999.

He said clients, staff and volunteers have all adapted, switching many programs – legal services, individual counseling, community workshops and even Zumba exercise classes – onto platforms like Zoom and Facebook.

“Sometimes, in a moment of crisis, you have to discover ways to be creative,” said Ramirez, who is originally from Colombia.
With Missionary Sisters working and volunteering at the agency, and with the agency a sponsored congregational ministry, ties to the congregation continue. The focus of that agency’s mission remains assisting immigrants in the New York City metropolitan area, including 800 families who regularly receive food packages.

While efforts to continue support to the immigrant community are ongoing, Ramirez said that the pandemic came at a tumultuous time: In the last four years, immigrants in the United States have faced cultural and political headwinds, with the Trump administration instituting tougher immigration policies that have made life more difficult for those seeking to enter the country legally.

Sr. Flores and other Missionary Sisters who have worked with Cabrini Immigrant Services through the years are mindful and proud of the legacy bestowed on them and their congregation. “The dignity and respect of the other person is so important to us,” Flores said. “So is welcoming. That’s one of the legacies she passed on to us.”

Certainly, a feeling of hope and love were on display during the recent Tuesday morning food distribution. Things bustled, with food packages carefully put out and then distributed outside.
Missionary Sister Antonina Avitabile was there, working in tandem with fellow volunteers Heather Lee and Margarita Tlaseca Vides and food pantry manager Jo Lee.

Here, you hear a number of different languages – English, Mandarin, Spanish, French – and it not too hard to imagine that Mother Cabrini would be proud of the work. “It’s a blessing to see us working together, all different nationalities,” Avitabile said. “Here, we all lend a hand together.”

To read the complete article: https://www.globalsistersreport.org/news/ministry/news/spirit-mother-cabrini-agency-serving-immigrants-endures-amid-pandemic

Voices for the Voiceless

November 12, 2020

We are very proud and grateful for the students of Cabrini University’s ECG 200, Voices for the Voiceless class. They helped organize a Human Trafficking Awareness Walk at Cabrini University on November 10 (Cabrini Day) and had “stations” where they shared info on Human Trafficking. The students in this class have become abolitionists and we know they are going to continue to be voices for the voiceless!
~ The Barbara and John Jordan Center for Children of Trauma and Domestic Violence Education, Cabrini Action and Advocacy Coalition, and ECG 200 Voice for Voiceless-Anti-Human Trafficking Class

Some topics discussed:
What is Human Trafficking?
Human trafficking is a form of modern-day slavery, in which people are controlled and exploited for profit. Perpetrators use force, fraud, and/or coercion to manipulate and establish control over individuals.
Types of Trafficking:
Various forms of trafficking exist around the world, including forced labor, sex trafficking, child labor, forced marriage, and child soldiers.
Statistics:
In 2019, 11,500 situations of human trafficking were reported to the U.S. National Human Trafficking Hotline. These situations involved 22,326 individual survivors; nearly 4,384 traffickers and 1,912 suspicious businesses. Human trafficking is very much under reported. Shocking as these numbers are, they are likely only a fraction of the actual problem.
Impact:
Trafficked persons often have limited access to basic necessities such as safety, food, sleep, hygiene, and medical care.

Get Involved:
Learn everything you can about human trafficking and share that info with your friends, neighbors, family members; donate to organization’s who help trafficked victims & volunteer for them:

Please place the National Human Trafficking Hotline # in your cell phone 1-888-3737-888 and report suspected cases.

LCWR Says It is Time to Reconcile and Heal

November 12, 2020

~ by Dan Stockman, Global Sisters Report

The leadership group representing about 80% of the 42,000 sisters in the United States pledges to work with the Biden administration to bring healing to a divided nation.

Leadership Conference of Women Religious issued a statement on November 9 congratulating President-elect Joe Biden and Vice-President-elect Kamala Harris and promised to work with them.

“After a difficult election season, it is time for us to take up the twin tasks or reconciliation and healing. In these challenging times it is critically important that we break through that which divides us one from another, repair fractured relationships and reclaim our essential unity,” the statement says.

“The people of this pluralistic nation form a diverse community characterized by different beliefs, experiences, and interests. We know our differences can be our greatest strengths; our disagreements, opportunities to seek the truth. Our challenge is to embrace those differences and together seek the common good lest we rend the bonds that unite us.”

“Now is the time to make space in our hearts and our communities for the needs and concerns of all God’s people, the undocumented mother, the Midwest farmer, the unemployed steel-worker, the suburban business woman, and the children and elders consigned to live in poverty. It is a time to tear down walls, real or imagined, which divide us by gender, race, class, geography, lifestyle, ideology, political party, and religious belief and to make room in our body politic for all who have been disenfranchised and discarded.

Cabrini

November 12, 2020

Like its namesake, a film against all odds
~ by Rev. Alexander Santora/for the Jersey Journal

The feature length film will simply be called “Cabrini.”

Before completing the script, executive producer J. Eustace Wolfington and screenwriter Rod Barr read 22 books on the life of St. Frances Xavier Cabrini and spent time in the Vatican archives. They discovered that Mother Cabrini personally lobbied Pope Leo XIII to found her own missionary order of women religious independent of any priest, a first. When Pope Leo saw her coming he would simply [exclaim] “Cabrini,” according to Wolfington.

And that’s how the film got its title.

The hard part followed. Some $30 million needed to be raised and now with a completed script, casting can begin in March 2021.

“I would like to get across her leadership, organizational and entrepreneurial skills,” Wolfington said.

Mother Cabrini and six sisters arrived in New York City on March 31, 1889 and were turned down by Archbishop Corrigan for financial assistance and were told to return to Italy. Cabrini was also prohibited from raising funds outside the Italian community which was poor. She was shrewd enough to go to the press, which exposed the plight of the Italian immigrants to be pathetic, with many orphan children living in subhuman conditions. Then [donations] poured in and she founded orphanages, schools and hospitals.

“She had a way with people to get them on board with her vision,” said Monsignor Paul Bochicchio, now a senior priest at St. Francis Church in Hoboken, NJ, and who serves on the film’s committee.

The film will have a possible release date later next year on her November 13 feast day or in 2022.

feature length film will simply be called “Cabrini.”

And that’s how the film got its title.

The hard part followed. Some $30 million needed to be raised and now with a completed script, casting can begin in March 2021.

“I would like to get across her leadership, organizational and entrepreneurial skills,” Wolfington said.

The film will have a possible release date later next year on her November 13 feast day or in 2022.