What's Happening

August 16, 2024, Adrian, Michigan – All are welcome to join the mindfulness community in monthly Days of Mindfulness, held in person on Saturdays from 10:00 a.m. to 2:30 p.m. at Weber Retreat and Conference Center. Sister Esther Kennedy, OP, a Dominican Sister of Adrian as well as a spiritual director and retreat director, conducts these days.

Upcoming Days of Mindfulness are as follows:

•    Saturday, September 7, 2024 – The Myth of Permanence. What we experience each day is dependent on many causes and conditions. We experience a particular emotion or mood and then it dissolves, to be replaced by another emotion or mood. Contemplation helps us to see the impermanence of these states of mind.

•    Saturday, October 5, 2024 – Coming to our Senses. While we don’t know where life is taking us, Jon Kabat-Zinn says the challenge is coming to our senses, both individually and as a species. The cultivation of mindfulness is the first step toward developing an awareness of both heart and mind.

•    Saturday, November 2, 2024 – Lost in Thought. It is easy to get trapped in our thoughts, which weave stories conditioned by the past. But underneath all the fluctuating thoughts and emotions is a dimension of consciousness far deeper than thought.

•    Saturday, December 7, 2024 – Cultivating Warmth of Heart. In silent moments, we grow the courage to hear, with the heart-mind, the voice inside us, connecting us to all beings and the whole web of life.

The costs of each session is $35, which includes lunch. Registration is required. Visit www.webercenter.org and click on “programs,” call 517-266-4000, or email [email protected]. 

Weber Center is on the campus of the Adrian Dominican Sisters Motherhouse, Adrian, Michigan. Traveling east on Siena Heights Drive, pass the Adrian Rea Literacy Center and turn left just before the solar panel-covered carport. Follow the signs to Weber Center. For information, call the Weber Center at 517-266-4000.
 

August 13, 2024, Adrian, Michigan – The Adrian Dominican Sisters formally received Sister Jamie Caporizo as a novice on August 10, 2024, during a special ritual held in the context of Vespers, Evening Prayers. 

Sister Jamie will begin the first of her two years as a novice later this August, when she travels to Chicago to participate in the Inter-Congregational Collaborative Novitiate (ICCN). During this year, Sister Jamie and novices from other congregations of Catholic Sisters will live in community and focus on the elements of religious life, such as prayer, theological study at Catholic Theological Union in Chicago, formal weekly meetings with other novices, and spiritual direction. Each novice will also learn about the spirituality of her own congregation.  

“I’m grateful for all the opportunities for growth that I’ve been given this year,” Sister Jamie said. As a Candidate, she learned about the Congregation through various experiences, often visiting Sisters in ministries from Adrian and Flint, Michigan, to the Dominican Republic. “Each of our Sisters and our Associates has varied gifts and varied talents, and yet at the heart of it all was our mission,” she said.

Sister Jamie, a native of Stamford, Connecticut, began her formal discernment process with the Adrian Dominican Sisters a year ago with her entrance as a Candidate. After earning a bachelor's degree in music education and choral conducting from the University of North Carolina-Charlotte, she taught music at her alma mater, Rippowam School in Stamford, Connecticut. 

While earning her master’s degree in sacred music from the University of Notre Dame, Sister Jamie served as a liturgy intern with the Sisters of the Holy Cross. She continued working for the Sisters for five years as Director of Music and Liturgy. While discerning her call to enter the Adrian Dominican Sisters, she began a new ministry at Alvernia University in Reading, Pennsylvania, first as a campus minister and then as Senior Director of Mission and Ministry.

Sister Patricia Walter, OP, Sister Jamie’s mentor and Dominican Charism Formator, welcomed the assembly to the Rite of Reception and affirmed Sister Jamie’s readiness to begin the next step of her initial formation. “From the very first week, she has said ‘we’ when talking about this Congregation and offered her considerable gifts to us,” Sister Patricia noted. “She has wholeheartedly embraced community life with Sisters in Siena House and here on campus. She has warm-heartedly responded to needs in a variety of places, ministering creatively and effectively.”

Sister Patricia Harvat, OP, in her reflection during the service, agreed. “You are ready, Jamie, for God to write the next chapter in your life,” she said. “The margins are clean and space open for the unfolding words of love, mercy, and hope. Your desire to continue this Dominican journey is bold.” 

During the Rite of Reception, Prioress Elise D. García, OP, formally examined Sister Jamie on her desire to be “received into the Congregation of the Dominican Sisters of Adrian as a Novice, and to experience more fully our way of life in faithful observance of our Rule and Constitution.” 

Sister Jamie received a copy of the Congregation’s Constitution with the instruction to study and reflect upon the document as she continues to discern her call to religious life. She was also presented with and clothed in a preaching garment, with the words of Sister Elise: “Receive this garment, sign of your desire to preach God’s word.”

Sister Jamie will travel to the Inter-Congregational Collaborative Novitiate in Chicago on August 24, 2024, accompanied by Sister Sara Fairbanks, OP, Novice Director.  

The Adrian Dominican Sisters encourage single Catholic women, ages 19 to 35, to consider whether God is calling them to vowed Dominican life. A weekend retreat, “Come and See for Yourself,” is at Weber Retreat and Conference Center September 20-22, 2024. For information, contact Sister Katherine Frazier, OP, at [email protected] or register online at https://tinyurl.com/ADSDiscern.