The Wonderful World of Teaching Sisters

I grew up a product of Catholic schools and have many happy memories of all the Sisters I've been blessed to know. When I was a teenager, I would have told you that I considered one of them to be my closest friend. No, not because I didn't get out much, but because she was a delightful fascinating woman, who was just fun to be around. I consider this Sister to have been one of the most influential people in my life.

My children had the opportunity to get to know teaching sisters for the two and a half years we lived on the Western Slope of Colorado, and even in that short a time, their lives were changed forever. I can teach the children Catechism; I can try to make the Church year come alive for them the best I can. But, the Sisters are a direct contact with Heaven. They are the Brides of Christ. One Sister we know and love joyfully and openly refers to Christ as her Husband. Oh, how I love that! I am so grateful my children got to reach for the Hand of God through them.

I'm so grateful for their touch on my life!

It's sad to me that the uninitiated world has such a backward impression of the Sisters. They're expected to be stern and serious ~ and, well, sometimes they are, when it's appropriate. Indeed, their vocations hold them in a higher position than most of us, and their responsibilities may be farther reaching, but they're essentially people just like us. When they don the habit, they don't remove their personalities.

And, in my experience, they're a joyful, happy, God loving, fun loving group!

I remember a tough teaching Sister who surprised her class on a very snowy day many moons ago by improvising sleds to go down the hill at our school. She used several gigantic silver "doughnut trays" (oversized cookie sheets, really) that she swiped from the kitchen! And did they all fly down that hill! Sister and the children! It seems I even remember her using wax paper to slick up the bottoms of the trays. Those Sisters are full of tricks!

One Sister we know teased about having shortwave radio in her veil. The pins were really antenna. But, she finally did admit it was shortwave to the Almighty. (We still think she could read minds, though...)

We've played baseball, tennis, volleyball, and ultimate frisbee with Sisters. They ice skate, they ski, they ride horses, they websurf (very prudently!)... Sisters can do anything. So long as it's pleasing to God.

And, they sing! Here's where you can order some CDs from the Singing Nuns, our favorite singing group outside of our own children's choirs.

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And, Oh, you've got to take a look at this wonderful video we happened to chance upon! Click here and scroll down to the photo of the blue sisters skiing. We know two of these sisters personally! We were all just grinning from ear to ear to see them singing and skiing (a few years back) on our Colorado slopes! How blessed we are to have them in our lives! (SisterK and Sister B., if you are reading this, howcome you never told us you were television stars?)

It's always so nice to see the Religious getting good press. On that note, we recently stumbled across a book at the library we would like to recommend. It's called Snow Day, by Moira Fain. It's a children's book about a tough teaching Sister who surprises the children in her class by meeting them on a Snow Day for a sledding race.

Was this ever a book after our own hearts! The main character is from a family with six children and the Sisters are shown as positive role models with fun loving spirits. It got me to reminiscing about the Sister from my childhood sledding on the cookie trays. And it left us all missing our own dear Sisters over the mountains!

(Weather permitting, Sisters, I'm coming up for a visit this coming weekend!)