In my interviews I heard descriptions of many celebrations. Sister Mary Elise Toal, O.P., was a merry young woman with bright blue eyes and rosy cheeks when she taught my second-grade class. A few years ago, at 70 and suffering from a severe heart problem, she had barely enough energy to complete our conversation. Still, she wanted to tell me about her golden jubilee and about the ways she was trying to enhance the celebrations of ordinary events in her current community. She died this year in March.
Religious life continues.
Whatever the future holds, women religious, in confronting the changes in their lives during the last thirty years, have become wise women. Galli, Farrell and Johnson, joining more recently, benefit from the legacy of older sisters but as they live the rare combination of daughter, mother, grandmother and sister, they may also shed some light on the complex relationships with which we all live. Back to SisterSite Text Index . Back to SisterSite Index or SisterSite Homepage . Page maintained by Margaret Susan Thompson .