N.O. sisters prove: ‘We Shall Not Be Moved’

    It was early 2006 in Gentilly, and the vegetation outside the Teresian sisters’ swamped convent on Mirabeau Avenue still reflected the color of the congregation’s habits – beige with a complementary touch of brown.
    The Teresians had decided in the wake of Katrina to keep their brown flag firmly planted in Gentilly and rebuild one of their best houses, but they had absolutely no money to finance the project. Unlike other communities of religious women in the Archdiocese of New Orleans, they owned no schools and did not have a history of running hospitals. They ministered quietly in parishes and gave retreats.
    No money. No business plan – other than to trust God and get out of the way.
    Then, each morning, the manna fell, if not from heaven, then at least from the United States Postal Service. The mail kept coming. Sister Isabel Ordono, a native of Cuba, was the Teresians’ local treasurer, and her job was to open the envelopes and let the miracles cascade to the floor.
One day a check for $25,000 arrived from some organization neither she nor her Teresian sisters knew. The next day it was a check for $10,000 from another faceless donor.
    “I could not believe it,” Sister Ordono said in her Cuban-accented English. “Never on earth I have experienced what real generosity is, from people that do not know you, but trust you and believe that God wants you to continue doing his work. And to me, until the day I die, Katrina will always be a synonym of the generosity of the United States.”
    Such stories of faith and perseverance are compellingly told in “We Shall Not Be Moved: The Catholic Sisters of New Orleans,” an hour-long documentary by Franciscan Sister Judith Zielinski of New Group Media that is scheduled to air nationwide on ABC affiliates beginning Sept. 23. (A New Orleans air date has not yet been confirmed.)
    The documentary highlights the daunting decisions several congregations of religious women faced after Katrina. The Sisters of the Holy Family, whose St. Mary’s Academy, Lafon Nursing Home and motherhouse were inundated by Katrina, wondered openly if God was sending them a message.
    Sister Sylvia Thibodeaux, then serving as provincial, raised the question: Should the sisters rebuild their institutional ministries or was God calling them to live out their charism in another way? In the end, they decided to rebuild, and today all three facilities have been transformed.
    “My overall takeaway from this project was hearing the sisters say how overwhelming it was to be on the receiving end of all this help and volunteer efforts and goodness,” Sister Judith said. “As sisters, our lives are spent in ministry, where we’re trying to be of service to the people of God. In some way, the tables were turned, and the sisters suddenly were getting the phone calls and the checks and the cards. They were deluged. As Sister (of Mount Carmel) Beth Fitzpatrick said, ‘You can get through anything if you know you’re loved, and we found out how loved we were.’”
    The other religious communities profiled in the documentary are the Ursuline Sisters, who remained at Ursuline Academy and opened their school building to stranded neighbors; the Marianites of Holy Cross, whose Holy Angels complex became a National Guard command center; and the Congregation of St. Joseph, whose convent on Mirabeau was inundated, partially repaired and then burned to the ground 10 months after Katrina by a lightning strike.
    The Congregation of St. Joseph ultimately decided to raze the convent, but its ministry presence is still felt through the People Program for seniors and through parish work, including that of Sister Kathleen Pittman at St. Gabriel the Archangel Parish. One of the film’s poignant scenes shows 18 Sisters of St. Joseph standing and praying in a circle around the order’s seal, etched into the terrazzo floor of the former convent – the only sign of their indelible presence.
    “I tried to make the point that even though they don’t have a physical presence of a huge building anymore, they have not abandoned the city and are still working in ministry,” Sister Judith said. “We’ve got footage of a senior ballet class in the People Program of 80-year-old ladies in their tutus and people doing needlework and woodworking.”
    In the dark days after Katrina, the Ursuline sisters held Communion services every day for their stranded neighbors in the National Shrine of Our Lady of Prompt Succor on State Street, using a flashlight at the ambo to read from Scripture.
    “They got together for a period of quiet reflection, and then they sang a song and prayed for the whole city,” Sister Judith said.
    Sound familiar?
    Peter Finney Jr. can be reached at [email protected].