For each parish community, it is a great honor that the Lord God calls from its members his servants. Currently, there are five priests from Krzęcin, and as for the nuns – only one: Sister Maria Elżbieta (Katarzyna Antos). Thanks to the kindness of the Mother Superior and Sister Maria Elżbieta, we will try to bring this calling closer to everyone in the pages of our parish newspaper.
Fr. Krzysztof: Sister Mary Elizabeth – why did you choose the Convent of the Visitation Sisters?
Sister Mary Elizabeth: From my earliest years I was drawn to prayer and religious services, the desire to do good to others. I had my first thoughts about religious life at the age of 17. For a long time I pushed that inner voice aside, but circumstances happened to make me meet several clergymen from various congregations, with whom I kept in touch. They told me about their communities and founders. Their testimony helped me shape my Christian life more and more. It was then that thoughts about a vocation were born. When I said yes to God internally, I did not know for a long time where to go. I wanted to be in a religious order that honors the Most Holy Mother, and at the same time I was attracted by the cult of the Sacred Heart of Jesus, so I read the short life of St. Margaret Mary Alacoque, and then the servants of God Sr. Maria Benigna Consolata Ferrero and Sr. Maria Marta Chambon, as well as St. Francis de Sales, the founder of the Order of the Visitation Sisters. I decided that God was calling me to this order and on November 21, 1991 (the Feast of the Presentation of the Blessed Virgin Mary) I came to the Krakow monastery and stayed there.
The Order of the Visitation Sisters is a contemplative order. Please explain this difficult concept to our readers. What do the Sisters do? What is their charism?
Sister Mary Elizabeth: Our main task is prayer. Of course, we do not pray all day, because we also undertake work and duties. We offer them to God for various intentions. Because as the name of our order says (Visitation of the Blessed Virgin Mary), we try to visit the hearts of others with prayer and sacrifice, following the example of Mary.
Since the basic vocation of the Sisters is prayer, please tell us for what intentions the Sisters pray? Can we also turn to the Sisters with a request for prayerful support?
Sister Mary Elizabeth: We pray for the current intentions of the Holy Church, for the Holy Father, priests, the Homeland, and also for the intentions of many people who turn to us with a request for spiritual help. I think that my compatriots from Krzęcin are particularly close to me, so I await their intentions with joy.
As you mentioned, prayer is not the only “occupation” of the sisters. You have to remember about human matters like eating and cleaning. What does it look like in a monastery?
Sister Mary Elizabeth: Indeed, all this must be done. We work just like everyone else. We have to clean, cook, sew, take care of the religious church, and also animate the activities of the Honor Guard through publications, services, retreats, meetings for members or zealots, etc.
Sister, probably few people would know that when we speak of Sister Maria Elizabeth we mean Katarzyna Antos. We priests, when we are ordained, do not change our names. Why is it so in the case of the Visitation Sisters (as in many other monasteries and congregations)? And why “Maria Elizabeth”? The Visitation Sisters are the Order of the Visitation of the Blessed Virgin Mary – are these names somehow connected with this biblical event?
Sister Mary Elizabeth: In principle, we do not change godparents’ names if there is no sister with the same name in the monastery. And because when I joined the Visitation Sisters there was already Sister Mary Catherine, the superior at that time asked me what my second godparents’ name was. And that is why I received the name Sister Mary Elizabeth. However, each of us receives the name Mary in honor of the Blessed Virgin Mary.
So in the case of sisters, the name does not always change. Practical considerations are taken into account here: there is only one Visitation Sister, named Maria Elizabeth. Being a Visitation Sister also involves religious vows. Please tell us more about this topic.
Sister Mary Elizabeth: We make three vows: chastity, poverty and obedience. The religious vows help us work on ourselves in striving for holiness. They allow us to make good use of our time, things and talents. We prepare for perpetual vows through the period of postulancy (1 year), novitiate (2 years), and temporary vows (3 years). Before perpetual vows we have a 10-day retreat. Each sister makes it in private. The sign of consecration is a silver cross, with relics of the holy Founders of the Order.
The Sister’s attire also has a certain symbolism. What does it express? Sister Mary Elizabeth: The religious attire is a sign of consecration and dedication to God, a form of mortification. The Polish Visitation Sisters, despite the passage of many years, have preserved the original attire of the co-founder of our Order, St. Joan Frances de Chantal.
For the modern world, this kind of vocation is very difficult to accept. Some people think that in a sense it is an escape from the world, hiding behind the walls of a monastery, but it is not. The sisters – although in isolation – are well aware of what is happening in the world, right?
Sister Mary Elizabeth: That is indeed the case. We are constantly informed about important events in the Church and the world. However, religious life, it must be admitted, is a daily giving of oneself to God as a sacrifice of love and there is no room here for excessive concern for one’s own affairs, if that were the case – religious orders would not fulfill their mission in the Church.
For a fuller picture, please tell us whether Sister leaves the convent, watches TV, goes to the cinema, or goes on vacation?
Sister Mary Elizabeth: All this is good for people living in the world. Cloistered nuns can go to the doctor, to the elections of candidates for parliament or president, to meetings with the Holy Father in Poland. We watch television only when important events in the Church take place, especially papal broadcasts.
Now I will ask a somewhat strange question (because for those called the answer is clear), does such a way of life, of fulfilling a calling, make a person happy? Many say that it is terribly difficult.
Sister Mary Elizabeth: The grace of vocation is a great gift given to man by God. If we are faithful to the grace of God, we can truly be very happy. In the order, we receive many means that help us improve our lives, so that we can then share their fruits with other people.
A beautiful sign of the Visitation Sisters’ vocation is the devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus. Why do the sisters love this Heart of Jesus so much?
Sister Mary Elizabeth: The founder of our order, St. Francis de Sales, had a deep devotion to the Wound of the Side of Christ from his youth. In this Wound he learned the love, gentleness, patience and humility of the Heart of Jesus. He himself lived these virtues. Later, when he founded our Order, he did not give us harshness and external mortifications, but precisely the imitation of the virtues of the Heart of Jesus. Our Sisters lived deeply moved by this spirit, until the moment when the Lord Jesus revealed to St. Margaret Mary, a Visitationist, his Divine Heart, burning with ardent love for people and desiring reparation for the sins and insults it suffers. From that time on, the devotion to the Heart of Jesus took even greater root in our Order. About 200 years later, another Visitationist, living in Bourg-en-Bresse, Sr. Mary of the Sacred Heart, became the founder of the Guard of Honour of the Sacred Heart of the Sacred Heart, whose aim is to honour, love and reparation for the Heart of Jesus.
In our church there is a beautiful painting of the Sacred Heart of Jesus, in June we sing the Litany before it. I admit that I myself am a member of the Honor Guard of the Sacred Heart of the Lord Jesus. However, in our community there is no Honor Guard. Once I tried to encourage others to join this form of devotion. I guess I didn’t try hard enough. Perhaps you will encourage our readers, our parishioners, to create the Brotherhood of the Honor Guard of the Sacred Heart of the Lord Jesus.
Sister Mary Elizabeth: Many lay people misunderstand the way of practicing the hour of presence at the Heart of Jesus. It is believed that during this hour one must pray all the time, but that is not what it is about. The point is to offer everyday activities experienced at the chosen hour to the Heart of God in reparation for one’s own sins and the sins of others. For example, when caring for the sick, we try to show more patience and understanding during this hour; when cooking dinner, prepare it carefully and willingly – all in the spirit of reparation to the Heart of Jesus. People who have free time can, however, spend the Hour of Guard in prayer. In principle, both young and old people can belong to the Guard of Honor.
I hope that we will manage to create a Guard of Honour of the Heart of Jesus. I trust that there will be volunteers who will want to make amends to the Divine Heart for the insults committed by our sins.
Sister, allow us now to discuss more mundane matters. What is a day like in the monastery?
Sister Mary Elizabeth: We get up at 5:25. At 6:00 is the Angelus and the hour of meditation. Then at 7:00 we say Morning Prayer (Breviary) and participate in the conventual Mass. After thanksgiving, we pray for the intentions recommended to us. At 8:00 we eat breakfast, and then each of us goes to her duties. We meet again for common prayer at 12:00, saying the Angelus and midday prayer (Mediana). After a short examination of conscience, there is a free quarter of an hour and at 12:30 we eat lunch in the refectory, during which one of the sisters reads good religious books. At 13:30 we experience common recreation – a time of relaxation, conversation, and a walk in the garden. At 14:00 we meet for the so-called obedience, where Mother Superior provides information about more important events in the Church and the world, as well as intentions recommended to the prayers of the Congregation. After obedience, going to the convent chapel, we bring all the matters recommended to us to Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament. At 3:00 p.m. each of us makes an individual spiritual reading. We pray the rosary together at 4:30 p.m., and then we sing Vespers and experience a half-hour meditation in silence. We end it with the Angelus prayer and at 6:15 p.m. we go for dinner, and then recreation, ending with another obedience at 7:30 p.m. We stop again in the Congregation chamber – for a 20-minute singing rehearsal, to learn the correct singing of the office and new religious songs, sung later during Holy Mass. Our teacher is one of the sisters, who completed her studies at the Academy of Music in Krakow before entering the convent. At 20:10 we gather in the choir again, where we end our day with the Hour of Readings and Compline. Joining with Jasna Góra, we sing the Jasna Góra Appeal. Later, great silence is observed. Some of the sisters go to bed, others finish the work they started earlier.
Everything is in order and clear. Many readers probably cannot imagine themselves in such a role at all. This is the mystery of vocation. Do many girls choose this path of vocation (choose – or rather respond to God’s invitation)?
Sister Mary Elizabeth: In today’s times, few people decide on this kind of life. Which does not mean that its value is less. It must be admitted that the radicalism of cloistered life brings with it greater demands than in active communities. But the merit will also be greater. You simply have to trust God and surrender yourself to Him completely.
Undoubtedly, we need to ask God for more vocations. We will turn to our parishioners with this request, especially to our 22 rosary roses that we have in the parish.
And now I’ll change the subject a bit: do you remember any of your teachers from primary school? Perhaps you remember some interesting event from those years?
Sister Maria Elżbieta: I have very fond memories of Mrs. Elżbieta Chmielarczyk, whom I send my warmest greetings. I also remember the catechist from primary school, Fr. Jan Kordaczka. However, my life after finishing primary school was connected with Krakow. I studied and worked there, and I also met many people there who helped me a lot, especially priests, whose spiritual ministry I benefited from.
I had the opportunity to drive past my sister’s family home recently. Dad was bustling around the house, and around him were fields, fields of grain waving in the wind, slender trees by the stream – and silence, peace. I thought to myself that in such an atmosphere the Lord God can tell a person many things. Do you still remember that atmosphere of your family home?
Sister Maria Elżbieta: This picturesque view of Krzęcin, the silence, the peace, the singing of birds – they delighted my soul. Every time I observed the nature around me, I thought of the One who is the Creator of everything. It awakened in me good thoughts, the desire to know God better and better and to serve other people.
On the occasion of this conversation, I wish all the inhabitants of my hometown a fervent devotion to the Heart of Jesus, because it is He who teaches sensitivity to human poverty and at the same time gives enthusiasm for living in accordance with the principles of the Decalogue.
Thank you very much, Sister, for the conversation. I hope that for many of us it will be an encouragement to pray for vocations, and also give us strength to fulfill our own vocation. I hope that there will be another opportunity to talk. If you write us a letter, we will be happy to print it in our parish newspaper. We will remember you and all the Visitation Sisters in our prayers and we ask you to remember us in prayer. God bless you.
Fr. Krzysztof Grabiec spoke with Sister Maria Elizabeth
Source: https://parafiakrzecin.pl/2019/08/05/s-maria-elzbieta/