Prioress's Feast Day
The election of Sr. Mary Martin as our community's prioress meant that Nov. 3, St. Martin de Porres, would continue to be the Prioress's Feast Day. The celebration of the Prioress's feast day begins the evening before (just like All Saints' Day did!), which meant dispensing the community from the end of our All Souls fast day.
Each year a sister writes a "greeting song" to be sung in the prioress's honor as she is led by the sub-prioress from choir into the decorated community room. Sr. Maria-Agnes has become somewhat of our official geeting song piano player. Although she is not able to play for the community's liturgy, sister was a trained pianist in the Philippines and is magnificent! This year Sr. Denise Marie, Sr. Mary John, and Sr. Maureen went all out in decorating the community room after discovering ridiculously inexpensive end-of-season mums at a nearby nursery.
As usual, this is a '10 & 4' day with recreation in the community room at both 10am and 4pm, as well as 'talking' dinner and supper. Sr. Mary Magdalene's father gave us some delicious steaks that sister was only too happy to cook up on the grill.
Right after prayer in the afternoon the community headed outside for a photo shoot. We've had quite a few changes since our last community photo with sisters entering or receiving the habit, and of course the change of our veil & coif/guimpe, necessitating a new picture. We did things a little differently this time and are happy with the results. Sabina (our golden retriever) was a little impatient and thought it would be more fun to play than stand still for a picture, but she eventually cooperated!
In the afternoon Sr. Denise Marie entertained the community with a "Guess that Summit tune" game. Sr. Denise Marie played a song from the Summit Choir Book while the sisters each wrote down both the season/common/etc. of the hymn as well as the first few words of the first verse. This was trickier than we thought, especially since we don't sing the first verse for a few hymns. Organists had a bit of an advantage, but Sr. Joseph Maria won with an impressive number correct (...with Sr. Denise Marie and Sr. Mary Martin ineligible). Traditionally we would spend evening recreation playing bingo, but all felt in the mood for a more relaxing recreation of sisterly conversation.
