5th Graders Visiting the Convent

Teachers always love field trips! Especially field trips when the children and parents (chaperones) enjoy what they learn. Every year the Diocese of Oakland invites schools of the diocese to send their 5th grade students on a special field trip. The boys go to St. Patrick’s Seminary in Menlo Park and the girls go to a sisters’motherhouse in the diocese.

Today students came from two diocesan schools to the motherhouse of the Dominican Sisters of San Jose. Three of us sisters, Sister Liz Schille, RGS (a Good Shepherd Sister), Sister

Sister Beth talking to the 5th graders

Beth Quire, OP (a Dominican Sister of Mission San Jose), and I (a Dominican Sister of San Rafael), taught them a little bit about what it’s like to be a sister, and the importance of answering God’s call in their life. It was a fun day, and the girls and their parents really enjoyed themselves.

Truly, all of us are called . . . from the time we are baptized, or even from the time we are born. God calls us to, as the apostle Luke wrote: “. . . to preach good news to the poor. . . to proclaim freedom for the prisoners and recovery of sight for the blind, to release the oppressed, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.” (Luke 4:18-19) God calls us to do this whether we marry or not, whether we become a nun or a sister or not.

Today we talked about our way, as sisters, of living out this call. I always like talking about that, because I love being a sister!