On Being a Providence Woman

Sister Pearl Ceasar, CDP Superior General, gave an address at Providence Catholic School welcoming the Providence Class of 2023. In her address, Sister Pearl helps the students reflect on what it means to be a Providence woman.

Women of Providence

By Sister Pearl Ceasar, CDP
Superior General of the Congregation of Divine Providence

Thank you for inviting me to speak with you today on what it means to be a Providence Woman.

When I think of a Providence Woman, I remember Sister Anna Rose Bezner. Sister Anna Rose taught music. She worked for a just world and believed in the inclusivity of all people. When she taught in Alexandria, Louisiana in 1964, she was asked to chair the annual diocesan choral festival. She mailed out the invitations to all schools including St. James, an African-American school. Remember this was 1964 when whites and African-Americans did not mix. But for Sister Anna Rose, it was a music festival and St. James had a choir. So she invited them. Three days before the festival, Sister Anna Rose received several threatening phone calls because this was a “mixed” festival. She immediately called Msgr. Teacle, Superintendent of Catholic Schools, and Father Gerald Foley, Rector of the Cathedral. Both told her to continue with the festival, but they also arranged for police security.

The festival proceeded without any trouble and St. James won second place. Sister Anna Rose invited those excluded from the larger community to participate in the festival. She provided them a stage and recognition when the local community discounted them. She showed courage by standing in solidarity with her brothers and sisters; she relied on Providence in seeking justice and equality in a community where it was absent. She was a Providence Woman!

Sister Christine Stephens is also remembered as a Providence woman. Many described Sister Christine as a woman who had a burning passion for equality and an intense anger against injustice. As an organizer for the Industrial Areas Foundation, she developed ordinary people into leaders for their community. Her most significant work was as Lead Organizer for Valley Interfaith in the Lower Rio Grande Valley of Texas. She identified, trained and transformed leaders to leverage 250 million dollars for water and sewers for hundreds of thousands of residents who lived in colonias along the Texas/ Mexico Border.

Can you imagine? Up until the 1990’s, our state allowed over a half million people to live without drinking water or sewers in their homes. As an organizer and woman of courage, Sister Christine turned our world upside down as she worked against this injustice. Her abandonment to Providence built a genuine human community. She was a Woman of Providence.

Providence Catholic School assemblySister Margaret Ann Verzwyvelt is a woman of Providence who exemplifies directing her energies and talents toward bringing about the future that Providence desires for our world. Our Congregation is currently making backpacks for immigrants who ride buses to meet their relatives in other parts of the country. They have very little to take with them for the trip. The backpacks provide some snacks, water, a coloring book, notepads, pens, and tissues. So far our Congregation has made 350 backpacks. Sister Margaret Ann decided the children needed pillows for the trip, so she designed pillows to include in the backpack.

Sister Margaret Ann’s care shines through her willingness to contribute to the needs of others. Through her talents, she is creating a world of cooperation, mutuality, and the flourishing of life. Another Providence Woman!

Sister Mary Ann Honza is in her 90’s and lives in McCullough Hall, our skilled care facility. She is almost totally deaf. Every day she eats her meals with the other 50 residents who live there. However, before she eats her meal, she carefully sees that Rita, a resident more feeble than she, is taken care of. Sister gently puts an apron on Rita and feeds her. Only then does Sister eat her own meal. Sister Mary Ann is a woman who does not trust in the false treasure of material possessions and fleeting securities, but in building genuine community. Sister Mary Ann’s acts of care and abandonment create a challenge for us to treat others as we would have others treat us. A true Providence Woman.

The call to be a Providence Woman is a major challenge in today’s world because it is counter to what our culture teaches.

Jesus put it simply in today’s Gospel: the blind shouldn’t lead the blind. Our own actions all too often reflect the values of a society diseased with materialism, war, violence and hypocrisy. Frequently we become misguided and misled. But Luke reminds us through Jesus’ words that the outcome is never good: we end up in a ditch. But Jesus shows us another way. He demonstrates what true leadership is, and it’s not what we usually think. Jesus has a way of turning the world on its head; it’s another indication of how far ahead of his times Jesus was (and is!). We can only lead as far as we are willing to go ourselves. And Jesus was way out there. Like Sisters Anna Rose, Christine, Margaret Ann, and Mary Ann.

The call to be a Providence Woman is to engage actively in bringing about the transformation of the world.
It is a call to take on both the possibilities and the risks involved in turning our world around as Jesus did.
It is a call to let go of our own self-reliance and to leave behind our past securities and safety nets.
It is a call to embrace anew a firmer reliance on our Provident God.
It is a call to open our eyes and make God’s love manifest in the community.
It is a call to open ourselves to a dialogue and a dynamic relationship with God.
It is to engage and interact with God so that we transform ourselves and thereby open ourselves to transforming the world around us.

The call to become Providence Women for our world requires three major virtues: care, courage, and abandonment.

We are called to be caretakers of creation; to guard, protect and nourish both others and the material resources of our world. We are to lay aside our possessiveness and selfishness, and to direct our energies and talents toward bringing about the future that Providence desires—a future of cooperation, mutuality, inclusivity and the flourishing of life, like Sister Margaret Ann.

We are called to be women of courage, leaving behind all the old guarantees and securities and to rely on the God named Providence. We are to have the courage to stand in solidarity with our brothers and sisters against the forces of evil, injustice, and oppression and be willing to turn our world around, like Sister Christine and Sister Anna Rose.

To be a Woman of Providence in our world is to live with abandonment, trusting deeply in God who never abandons us. It is to seek tenaciously a future with a simplicity of heart and clarity of vision, like Sister Mary Ann.

Our wish and prayer for you today is that when you leave Providence Catholic School, we will say of you, as we say of Sisters Anna Rose, Christine, Margaret Ann, and Mary Ann, “There goes a Providence Woman.” She is a Woman who cares, who has courage, and is truly abandoned, unencumbered, selfless, and trusts deeply in our God named Providence. She is a woman who leads. She is a Woman who works to transform the world.

Praised and blessed be Divine Providence. Now and forever, Amen.

September 13, 2019