Journeys Ended Journeys Begun - Part Two

On July 22, 1985, Community members gathered at 2413 Collingwood Boulevard for a ritual of parting prepared by Sister Donna Jeanne Frey, “Journeys Ended, Journeys Begun.” They met in the chapel and then processed outside on the famous “recreation walk” with the nuns singing the “Litany of Our Saints.” The procession continued into the auditorium where Sister Mary Lawrence Wilson shared memories, “Places of the Heart.” Then the procession resumed, and the nuns headed for the “Green Room,” the basement refectory, where all joined in with a rousing “This Is the Convent, Sister Jones.” Tears turned to smiles and then to laughter as the nuns accepted their journey.

Sisters Monica Rahrig, Mary Elanor Kennedy, St. Pierre Rochette, Mary Rose Reinhart, and Mary Grace Connolly remembered the long-ago move from the Cherry Street Convent to the “new” Motherhouse on Collingwood. Their steady acceptance of yet another move in their lives encouraged their Sisters.

Twenty-seven Ursulines moved August 14, 1985, to St. Ursula Academy Convent on Indian Road, joining the twelve Sisters already living there. Nine days earlier eleven Sisters had moved from the Motherhouse to the Ursuline Center to join twenty-four others who moved from Ursula Hall infirmary at St.Ursula Academy convent to the Center.



The move was made with a realization of God’s gracious providence. The nuns carried in their memories visions of the red tile corridor; white parlor; bats that too often flew within the auditorium during performances; the stage, the scene of formal and informal entertainment and instruction; trunk room and bakery; summer floods; the old laundry; the dell and trees, especially the dust-mop tree.