Benedictine Prioress, Sr. Yvette Mallow, with Bishop Blase Cupich and Tom Fritz signing St. Martin’s property paper work. Fritz provides legal counsel to the sisters.
An Historic Day
October 8, 2009 will be marked as an historic day for both the Benedictine Sisters of St. Martin Monastery and the Catholic community in western South Dakota. During a brief ceremony at the sisters’ new monastery building, the prioress, Sr. Yvette Mallow, OSB, handed me a giant key symbolizing the transfer of ownership of the sisters’ former residence to the Diocese of Rapid City and the Rapid City Catholic School System.
As was reported earlier in the West River Catholic, the sisters came to a decision in 2007 that their needs were not being served by the building in which they had resided since the early 1960s. Yet, they wanted to ensure that this beautiful property and its surrounding acreage would remain holy ground, a place where their decades-long tradition of nurturing the spiritual lives of the people and our parishes through education, retreats and spiritual direction would continue.
A New Name for This Holy Place
After discussing all of this with my advisors, it became clear to us that this property should always remain a holy place for us to become holy people. In fact, we owed it to the sisters to choose a new name for the facility that would represent their vision and, at the same time, recognize their contribution to the faith life of our people over many generations.
Keeping all of that in mind, we recalled that there is a special place on this earth that people recognize as holy ground, the place where our Lord was born, lived, died and rose from the dead, a place where Jesus called us to be a holy people. It is called the Holy Land, or in Latin, Terra Sancta. We are calling this property Terra Sancta to honor the sisters who made this ground holy through their many years of service and prayer. At the same time, Terra Sancta is a name that reminds us that, just as Jesus walked amidst the people of his time in the Holy Land, He will be ever present with us in the work we will do in this holy place. This will be a place where Jesus will help us become a holy people.
The Spirituality Initiative
Our first event at Terra Sancta will do just that by offering a program to enhance the spiritual lives of our parish communities. Beginning in November and continuing through February of next year, our pastors and parish lay leaders will come to Terra Sancta for a weekend of renewal called the Spirituality Initiative. All expenses for the weekend, including travel and even the cost of a substitute priest, will be covered by a grant. The purpose of the weekend is to assist pastors and parish lay leaders to define and own a “big picture” strategy for making their parishes more vibrant, thus improving their future viability.
The Importance of Parish Life
We recognized in our Synod 2002 that investing in the life of our parishes throughout the diocese is key to the growth of our personal spiritual lives. The parish continues to be the primary experience of what it means to belong to the Church. It supports our families and is home to a wide diversity of people. The parish also ties us to other Catholics within the diocese and to the universal Church.
Over my more-than-a-decade of service in western South Dakota as your bishop, I have enjoyed visiting the parishes and witnessing firsthand how parish communities are fulfilling the mission of Jesus, who told us, “I came that they might have life, and have it more abundantly” (John 10:10). At the same time, I know that many of our parishes are experiencing new challenges due to the shrinking populations and diminishing resources of rural communities, the shortage of priests, and the impact of a secular culture, which often undermines our efforts to live the life that Christ came to give us. That is why we are inviting parish leaders, both lay and ordained, to participate in the Spirituality Initiative and offering them a special invitation to re-think imaginatively with me ways to more effectively sustain and enhance the vibrant parish life to which Jesus calls us.
Yes, October 8, 2009 will be marked as an historic day in our diocese. The mission of Terra Sancta, a holy place to help us become a holy people, has begun.