98 and Looking Great! (Psst! It's the new floor and pews!)

A photo of our community from the 1930s. Already it had grown from the very small group of nuns who first arrived in San Francisco in 1921.

Today our community celebrates our 98th birthday! It was on this day in 1921 that a small group of intrepid nuns left the cloister walls of their monastery in Hunt’s Point (Bronx), New York and headed west to bring Dominican cloistered life and perpetual adoration of the Blessed Sacrament to San Francisco, California.

The struggles they faced in establishing the new foundation were immense, but with the prayers and support of the bishop of San Francisco, the friars of the Western Dominican Province, local congregations of Dominican apostolic sisters and many lay men and women, the community found their cleft in the rocks of the West Coast and thrived.

While the area surrounding the monastery has transformed from cattle and farmland into suburbia and tech companies, some things have remained the same: the prayers and support of our Archbishop and local Church, our Dominican brothers and sisters, and the laity, who were are proud to consider our friends and family.

Installation of the new flooring! Here you can see the last of the old tile flooring.

The new floor before the chapel chairs were put back (awaiting replacement by the new pews).

Installation of the new pews!

One such friend of the monastery recently reminded us of these ties that remain through time. One day last summer, we received an offer from a gentleman to help us with new flooring and pews in our chapel! His grandfather had attended daily Mass at our monastery, until his death a few years ago. This man, who was born and raised in Menlo Park and saw how many people regularly attend Mass at our monastery on Sundays, decided to offer this project in dedication to his grandparents.

After consideration by the community we gratefully accepted his offer. For one week during November, our public chapel was turned upside down to install the new commercial grade flooring over the old asbestos tile. Then, over Lent, the chapel chairs began to “disappear” as they found new homes. Right before Holy Week, the new pews arrived and were installed. We are so grateful for the generosity of this benefactor and were even more excited that the floor was in before Advent and Christmas and the pews before Holy Week and Easter!

Thank you to all our brothers and sisters, friends and family who support our cloistered Dominican life. Be assured you remain always in our daily thoughts and prayers. Deo gratias!

Epiphany and the Melting Pot Dinner

By now in the world, Christmas is a distant memory.  But in the monastery, we are still celebrating in full swing.  Where Christmas tends to be big and flashy, with lots of greetings and gifts between our community and our family, friends, and benefactors, Epiphany is a big feast for us as a community and it is marked in a special way by our novitiate sisters.

When a young woman enters the monastery, she primarily lives and works in the novitiate wing of the monastery under the guidance and instruction of the novice mistress.  It is a beautiful and grace-filled time, almost akin to “monastic childhood”.  And when she leaves the novitiate and integrates into the professed community, the doors of the novitiate are then closed to her.  Literally.  As a professed sister, if she needs something or someone in the novitiate, she must ring a bell outside the novitiate workroom and wait for someone to answer.

But on Epiphany, the novitiate community hosts the professed community for a feast!  The novitiate common room is decorated and set for dining and the novitiate sisters spend the day cooking and preparing.  Actually, the preparing starts the day before or even earlier!  And depending on the sisters, you never quite know what you’ll get.  With our novitiate community, we often joke with delight that novitiate-prepared meals are “East Meets West.”  This Epiphany was no exception – the table was set with spring rolls and peanut sauce, Calabrese-style “no meat” balls with zesty marinara, deep fried Brussel sprouts with honey-sriracha sauce, a snowman pumpkin pie, æbleskiver (a Danish sweet), xôi vị (Vietnamese sweet rice desert), Vietnamese snowballs, and more!

In the course of dinner, our three wise “men” visited the festivities with little gifts for each of the sisters, some handmade by the sisters and others donated by a sister’s family and held just for this occasion.  Music, games and fun conversations over a Christmas picture slide show rounded out a beautiful evening, which was all too short.  But when the bell rang, we were ready to close the day singing praises to God in Compline.

Deo gratias!

Merry Christmas!

Thank you to all of our family, friends, and benefactors who make our lives merry and bright, and for your continued generous giving of time, talent, and treasure in support of our Dominican cloistered life.

. We are especially remembering you today in our prayers and thanksgiving.

A House of Prayer: The Consecration of Our Chapel

Early this morning before Lauds, the twelve chapel consecration candles were lit. They will burn all day in celebration of the anniversary of the consecration of our chapel.

Today our community gratefully and joyfully celebrates the 65th year of the Consecration of our Chapel! We give praise to God for his goodness and remembered at our morning Mass all our dear Sisters who have gone before us and our family, friends and benefactors who have supported our life of prayer throughout the years.

Below is the story taken from our history archives (with comments given in italics) of the glorious celebration of the Consecration of our Chapel on September 12, 1953.  We have posted the story before but in case you haven’t seen it, here it is again…

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About 9 a.m. the ceremony of the Consecration of the Chapel began. Bishop Guilfoyle, attended by Father Bowe and Father Cahil started the august ceremony. Bishop Guilfoyle had prepared for it by a day of fasting, as he was to represent the Eternal Pontiff who opened heaven to us by fasting and suffering.

The sacred relics that were to be placed in the sepulcher had been retained in the sacristy overnight, and were so placed in the little grille opening into our Chapel hall, that we were privileged to venerate them there during the night hours. Two candles burned before them constantly and flowers adorned the aperture.

The ceremony began promptly in the morning. The Bishop, wearing a white cope, and accompanied by the clergy, remaining outside the Chapel, approaches the relics, to implore near them the mercy of God. For this purpose he recites the seven Penitential Psalms. Meanwhile the door of the Chapel is closed. There was no one inside except the Deacon, who was our Chaplain, Father Clark, wearing an alb, girdle and white stole.

(The Chapel had been prepared before the day by removing every movable thing – chairs, tables, flowers, vases, etc. No persons may be inside the Chapel during the first part of the ceremony. All, even the clergy, are outside the door.)

The Bishop, struck by the greatness of the undertaking, cries out, “O Almighty God, Father, Son and Holy Ghost, be in the midst of us.” To implore this help, the Litany of the Saints is recited.

After this, the Bishop blesses salt and water, with the usual exorcisms and prayers. Having made an aspersion on himself and clergy, he goes around the Monastery walls, sprinkling the exterior with holy water, and saying continually, “In the name of the Father, Son and Holy ghost.” During this time, the antiphon is intoned, “The House of the Lord is built upon a mountain, etc.”

Having returned to the front of the monastery, the Bishop recites a prayer, asking God to bless this dwelling and make it a house of holiness and prayer.

Then with his pastoral staff, he strikes the door once, saying, “O princes open your gates; and the King of Glory shall enter in.”

The Deacon, who is inside, asks, “Who is the King of Glory?” The Bishop answers, “He is the strong and mighty God.” During all this time, the outer door of the Chapel has remained closed. There is no one inside, except the Deacon. (He was Father Clark, our Chaplain.)

The Deacon does not open the door. The Bishop now goes around the Monastery a second time, saying the same words.

Having returned to the front of the Chapel and asking God’s blessing on all who were assembled, he strikes the door a second time, saying the same prayers as was said the first time. The door of the Chapel is not opened yet. The Bishop goes around the building the third time, sprinkling the walls and blessing them. Meanwhile, the anthem, “O Master of the universe” is intoned.

Returning to the front of the Chapel, the Bishop offers a prayer and strikes the door the third time, making the same invocation. The deacon responds and then opens the door.

“Peace to this house” the Bishop says, as he enters the Chapel. All kneel down in the middle of the Chapel, and the Bishop intones the “Veni Creator.” The Litany of the Saints is again said. Whereupon the Bishop traces, on the floor, with his crosier, on two lines of ashes, the Greek and Latin alphabet.

(The evening before the ceremony, Msgr. Kennedy had come to see that all was in order. But he found that the wax on the Chapel floor did not permit the laying down of the ashes. So he rolled up his sleeves and scrubbed all the wax off the floor and laid down the ashes in the form of an X from one corner of the Chapel to the other.)

After blessing the walls on the inside, he mixes new water putting into it salt, ashes and wine. This is called Gregorian Water.

(And is used for the consecration of the Altar.)

And now, after more prayers, the Bishop goes around the Altar seven times, wearing cope and mitre, sprinkling the Altar and reciting the Miserere.  The moment has now come to place the sacred relics in the sepulcher.

(This is a rectangular hole which has been hollowed out of the center of the Altar which is made of one large slab of stone.)

The Bishop recites a prayer, after which he consecrates the sepulcher with holy chrism and immediately lays the holy relics in it, together with three grains of incense. The relics were as follows: one of St. Fortunatus, one of St. Felicitus, and that of our holy father St. Dominic in which the last one was allowed at the community’s request.

(The relics placed in an Altar must be those of a martyr of the early Church. We also requested from the Vatican a relic of Our Holy Father Dominic and our request was granted.)

Our Altar with the sepulcher containing the relics inside

The Bishop now consecrates the stone that is to close the sepulcher which now contains the relics. He fixes it on the sepulcher with the cement he has made and blessed. Then anointing it again with the holy chrism, he says, “Let this Altar be sealed and sanctified in the Name of the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, and let peace always surround it.”

After this, the Bishop incenses the Altar and its pillars; while all this time, a Dominican student continued, without ceasing, to swing the thurible, perfuming the Altar with its fragrant incense.

Twelve crosses had been impressed on twelve pillars of the Chapel, one at each Station. From the beginning of this great ceremony, lighted candles burned before these crosses.

(It is good that the Bishop was young and athletic because he had to go up a stepladder at each station to anoint the cross.)

While the candles and incense are burning on the Altar, the Bishop and clergy prostrate and sing the anthem, “God be praised,” etc.

During the progress of this long ceremony, besides the Seven Penitential Psalms, seven various Psalms were recited outside the Chapel and sixteen on the inside.

Archbishop Guilfoyle was assisted, throughout, by Father Raymond Cahil and Father Thomas Bowe. Father Meyer and Father Quinn were Masters of Ceremonies.

After further prayers and ceremonies, the Altar was furnished with flowers and candles were lighted, and the august ceremony concluded with Solemn High Mass at the newly consecrated Altar, at which our Provincial, Very Reverend Father Fulton, O.P. was Celebrant, Reverend Father Kelly, O.P. was Deacon, and Reverend Father Ward, O.P. was Subdeacon.

This great ceremony was a foretaste of the joys that await us in the blessed city of Heaven!

How We Spent Our Summer Vacation, Part Two: A Visit From the Archbishop

Part One may be found here.

On August 11, Archbishop Salvatore Cordileone of the Archdiocese of San Francisco made his annual visit to our monastery. After celebrating Mass with us, we welcomed him inside the cloister for conversation and a walk around our grounds. 

We were eager to learn His Excellency’s ministry is flourishing with the growth of St. Patrick’s Seminary nearby, and with his unique initiative to restore the beauty of Gregorian chant in parishes through the new Benedict XVI Institute for Sacred Music and Divine Worship. Chant camps for children are now being offered, and inmates at the San Quentin state prison have formed a serious schola. Incredibly, the chants are being sung unaccompanied—an extraordinary musical feat in our modern times.

During our walk around the grounds, he seemed particularly impressed with the new brick patio and gazebo installed by the novitiate, and with our overgrown prickly pear cactus, which prompted some nostalgia from his boyhood. And we learned some tips for how to pick the fruit without getting pricked! We are fortunate to have such a holy and dynamic shepherd for our Archdiocese.

Happy 101st Birthday, Sister!

Today is not only the feast of Saint Agnes of Montepulciano for Dominican nuns, it is also our Sister Mary of the Compassion’s 101st birthday!  Join us in celebrating this milestone by offering a prayer for her and reading her fascinating vocation story.

May God grant you many blessings and great joy, Sister!