Dear Friends, Family, and Fellow Carmelites,

As March moves out and April arrives we know people across the country, especially up north, are looking forward to spring with its warmer temperatures. This past winter’s weather helped us to make the transition into Lent much easier! Just as in winter we need to warm up our houses so in Lent we need to take the chill from our souls. Here in Oklahoma the chill of winter is finally past and the flowers are bursting forth in fields and flower beds, on bushes and trees. It has all happened so quickly and profusely that we are once again left amazed and dazzled. One cannot help but think about what Our Lord’s disciples experienced at the glory and wonder of his Resurrection after the desolation of his Passion and death. Spring like Easter is the time when the “Son” shines warmly upon us and, once again, brings new life to the earth in a wondrous way.
In Scripture in Church, Helen Doohan writes, “Easter is a season of celebration and joy. It marks the central mystery of our faith, that Jesus who died truly lives again as Risen Lord. All the readings [of Easter Sunday] testify to this reality and as believers two millennia after the event, we still experience awe and wonder when we reflect on this profound truth. . . .Because of the resurrection we live in a new way. The power of God at work in and through Jesus is ours because we are one with him. The transformation from death to life is a reality witnessed to again and again in the early Church. It offers hope to us in our lives and changes how we look upon death and its aftermath. Forgiveness and fullness of life in Christ is ours and implies that we offer forgiveness to others and work towards an enriching life for all humanity.”
Our most important item of news is that we have a new Prioress. On the morning of March 16 our srdrProvincial, Fr. Gregory Ross, arrived to preside at our Community elections for Prioress, which takes place every three years. After Mass and special prayers for the help of the Holy Spirit, we proceeded to elect our Sr. Donna Ross who graciously accepted her new charge. She has been our Treasurer and our Novice Mistress for a number of years and in 2005 was elected Alternate Councilor by our Association. We have now increased her responsibilities considerably and are confident in her capable leadership. After the election we celebrated and visited with Fr. Gregory until after dinner. Later in the day we elected Sr. Monica and Sr. Jeanne Marie as First and Second Councilors respectively. We ask you to join us in asking God to grant us many graces and blessings during these next three years and to send us good vocations that we might continue our work of prayer and sacrifice for the Church and the world. Sr. Donna’s vocation story is unique and interesting and can be seen on our website: www.okcarmel.org.
In our last Chronicle we had asked prayers for Sr. Teresa Chau’s father, Dominic Tran, who was very ill and was in intensive care. He had been living in Houston with all her brothers and their families. Sister was able to go and spend some time with him there. On November 10th Our Lord came for his faithful servant. Mr. Tran was a beautiful person, very devoted to God and to his family, a truly wise man whose counsel was very much appreciated by his children and grandchildren alike. His funeral was celebrated by many priests, his large family, and his many friends. Please pray for Sr. Teresa Chau and her family; they miss his beautiful and loving presence very much.
Also in November Maria Scaperlanda, who lives in Norman, OK, came for several days to work with Sr. Ruth Miriam to translate some of our website into Spanish. Her family is from Cuba and she is fluent in both Spanish and English. Maria is a writer who became acquainted with Sr. Ruth Miriam while she was doing a biography of Edith Stein published by Our Sunday Visitor. Since then she has written several highly acclaimed books on Mary. She is the mother of four beautiful children, all college age and older. Her stay with us was a very enriching experience. She brought her parents and two of her daughters to visit us after Christmas. They are all exceptional people and very committed to their Catholic faith
The week of Thanksgiving Fr. John Magdalene Suenram, OCD, who comes from San Antonio about three times a year for confessions and a conference, gave us a talk on the Gospel according to U2, the rock group led by Bono. Noticing the powerful message their lyrics contain, he had been thinking about putting his insights into a conference for some time. Our Sr. Donna had previously mentioned the group to Father and had given him a book on U2; we were all delighted with his presentation and enjoyed listening to some of U2’s music. Father also showed us a DVD and a number of special items about the marvelous 75th Anniversary Gala for the benefit of the Shrine of St. Therese in San Antonio that had taken place on November 4th. He is the Superior and Pastor of the Shrine. Our Carmelite Fathers are in the process of renovating the beautiful basilica and are also participating in renewal of the neighborhood surrounding the Shrine.
On Thanksgiving Day itself Sr. Jeanne Marie’s brother, Fr. John Futrell, SJ, and her sister Sr. Janice, OSB joined us for our festive dinner and a warm and stimulating visit. We also had the pleasure of meeting Kerry’s parents who are both teachers, and two of her sisters during the Thanksgiving holiday. They all came over to the monastery for a visit one evening and we had a wonderful time. They are a delightful family. Her sister Mara is working with another young woman doing presentations on Catholic topics throughout the country. Using music and skits they create the whole production themselves and are in high demand.
December brought our individual Advent retreat days, an oasis amid all our preparations for Christmas. Fr. Franklin Wrigley graciously agreed to be our celebrant for Midnight Mass which we moved to 8:00 pm. It was very well attended, as was our Mass on Christmas morning. Archbishop Eusebius Beltran was our celebrant and Deacon Paul Albert assisted. The archbishop joined us for dinner afterwards and a very enjoyable visit. Our New Year’s celebration was slightly dimmed when five of us came down with a stomach virus. Unfortunately we passed it on to Fr. Paul Donovan, who was celebrating the feast with us!
Early in January we had the joy of seeing several of our Carmelite Friars who had come for the Solemn Profession of Br. Luis Gerardo Belmonte-Luna at Little Flower Church here in Oklahoma City on New Year’s Day; we are always happy to see them. After Epiphany our Friars from Little Flower joined us for a Christmas get-together and we were able to give Br. Luis our congratulations on his Final Profession. He was ordained a deacon by Archbishop Beltran at Little Flower on February 2nd and we were honored that he made his retreat in preparation here in the extern quarters of our monastery. To the great joy of our Province he will be ordained to the Sacred Priesthood this summer.
Our community retreat scheduled for January 14-22 had to be postponed because of the winter storm. Fr. Jerome Earley, OCD, our retreat master, was unable to get out of Dallas because of the weather. Since we were “iced in” anyway we decided to spend the week using some excellent CD’s on the vows by Sr. Barbara Metz, SND. The weather-imposed solitude made it a perfect time since the phone and doorbell were very quiet. We have rescheduled our retreat with Father Jerome to May and are praying that we don’t have a tornado!
On the weekend of February 9th Sr. Therese’s nephews from Hartshorne came once again to give us their generous and loving help in caring for our monastery grounds. This year they tackled the clearing of the brush and undergrowth from the fence that runs along the north side of our property. It was a hefty job, but as always they did it with competence and energy. On top of that they cooked us a delicious fish fry dinner with all the trimmings! It is a great blessing and grace to know such a beautiful family as the Ranallo’s!

d&k On March 17th our Lenten season was brightened by the feast of St. Patrick. After a delicious Irish meal, Dave and Kerry treated us to an evening of traditional Irish songs and an Irish step dance. They are so talented! Kerry had taught Sr. Maria and Sr. Agatha some steps and the trio stepped and whirled to a peppy Irish jig. Dave sang and played the guitar and harmonica and Kerry joined him in song and on the Irish penny whistle. And of course we couldn’t resist participating in the singing, clapping and toe-tapping! It was truly enjoyable! We crowned it all with the superb Irish dessert called “triffle” made by Kerry, and some Irish Cream! Knowing Dave and Kerry has been a real gift to us. We cannot thank St. Joseph enough for bringing them into our lives. kma
And thank St. Joseph we did as we celebrated his feast day on the 19th. During our novena to our great patron, we remembered the intentions of all our families, friends, and benefactors along with our community intention for vocations and thanksgiving for all he has done for us. Our Fr. John Magdalene who had come to be with us for several days was the celebrant for our festive Mass and gave us a beautiful homily on Our Lord’s foster father. To our joy Fr. Paul Donovan and Fr. Franklin Wrigley also joined us for our feast day dinner. Later Fr. John gave us two excellent conferences on the Beatitudes, which we have found very helpful as we complete the season of Lent and move into Easter time.
Now that spring has arrived, the gardeners are in full swing planting seeds and transplanting many baby plants. Everything is turning a beautiful spring green outdoors, making our hearts full of hope for a good and successful gardening season. We wish all our families, friends, and fellow Carmelites happy gardening, a happy spring, and a beautiful Easter season!
Love and prayers