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Mass
of Christian Burial
for
Sister Ellen Dolores Lynch, CSC
August
20, 2002
This
is what Yahweh asks of you
Only this, to act justly,
To love tenderly
And to walk humbly with your God. Micah
6:8
Ellen
grew more like a tree than a vegetable.
Most
vegetables grow to maturity, bear fruit and are done with life, to be
replaced by the next crop as soon as the land can be prepared.
Ellen
grew like a tree rooted in the West Virginia and Washington DC soil of her
youth and later days. Marked
with early grieving for her mother who died when Ellen was three, and a
brother who died when she was four. But the tree grew in companionship
with her good brother George, both of them nurtured by their grandmother
and aunts and uncles who lived in DC, and provided a base for their
schooling.
Ellen's
first crop of consciousness was her interest in science, especially
chemistry.
Following
the death of her father, the next major harvest of Ellen's life led her in
1950 to join the Sisters of the Holy Cross whom she had first met at
Dunbarton College in Washington, D.C.
For almost 30 years she taught classes and served as an
administrator.
By
1980 a new harvest was maturing Ellen's expanding consciousness of social
justice, which led her to an internship at the Coalition for a New Foreign
and Military Policy. The work
grew into seven years of Congressional work and involvement in managing
the Coalition, until she retired for the first time in 1987.
That
retirement was blessedly brief. The
Quixote Center's Quest for Peace campaign for Nicaragua was in need of an
orderly hand. Temporary work
grew into twelve years of part-time involvement.
Ellen worked four days a week to avoid having to attend staff
meetings. She traveled to
Nicaragua and brought forth bumper crops of thoughtful contacts with a
vast array of Quest constituents.
Ellen's
style was maturing. Never the
backslapping extrovert, she developed the summoning insistence of the
Canaanite woman. Let's look
for a few moments at the scripture passage, a hard passage if we assume
Jesus was testing the woman's faith.
Far
simpler is the interpretation that the Canaanite woman expanded Jesus'
faith in his mission and ministry. Doggedly
pursuing him and demanding help for her daughter, her persevering love
exposed his narrow prejudices that restricted his mission "to the
lost sheep of the house of Israel."
She confronted him; made him look at her, and listen to her plea.
When he did, he realized his call was universal.
Her summoning insistence gave him a new vision.
Jesus
had prejudices. It’s all
right to have prejudices. Prejudices are part of being human, and in
themselves, are not sinful. It
is when they are brought to consciousness that we are responsible for
them. Jesus confronted his own prejudice in the challenge of the
Canaanite woman and as a result expanded his vision of his mission.
Ellen
was quietly insistent that we had to engage in the political struggle for
social justice in season and out of season.
She encouraged; she invited; she persisted; she praised; she
believed in our power to affect change.
She helped us believe in ourselves, and in what the social
justice political
community could achieve together.
Many
the time my often-faltering faith was pressed into service by inquiries
such as, "Have you called your congressional offices yet?"
“What station of the Economic Way of the Cross is the Quixote
Center going to lead this year?" "Have you signed on to that
letter to Senator X?" etc.
The
style was questioning, summoning and filled with a chosen faith.
It also carried promise that Ellen would check back to make sure my
compliance didn't fall through the cracks.
But
Ellen helped us do what we wanted to do, but couldn't quite summon the
energy, faith or resolve to do, without a nudge from a friend.
Two
wonderful developments affected Ellen in these later years.
One involved her good brother George and the other involved the
Holy Cross community.
When
Ellen came to the Quest for Peace / Quixote Center she felt that her
brother George, with his military service and conservative views, would be
put off by our strong critique of U.S. policy toward Nicaragua and Central
America.
We
prevailed on her to send him the mailings.
Slowly and steadily a new pattern began to emerge.
Good brother George began to respond to every request for funds.
Gradually and excitingly it became clear that George was proud of
his sister and her expanding work for social justice.
He wanted to back her and be part of it.
The
second development took place in the Holy Cross community. Ellen moved from feeling like a voice crying in the
wilderness to the realization that she had become an esteemed and trusted
prophetic voice in a community that she had helped grow into one of the
most involved and socially concerned religious communities in the US. She
loved to talk about the work of Sisters Ann Oestreich and Mary Turgi and
the directions of the Community. And
she was proud to bring members of the international Holy Cross community
to our Wednesday night Eucharists at the Quixote Center.
She
found courage and support from Rose Marie Canty.
Rose Marie shared Ellen's dreams and put her hands to the wheel to
make them possible. Her
admiration and friendship sustained Ellen to the very moment she turned
the page of life into a new chapter of existence as our special advocate
and lobbyist in heaven.
If
you listen softly you can almost hear the Canaanite woman and her new ally
chasing after Jesus and cornering him with the menu of their concerns -
"Help us with our sons and daughters who are grievously afflicted.
You've got to do something about it.
Now!"
This
is what Yahweh asks of you
Only this, to act justly,
To love tenderly
And to walk humbly with your God. Micah
6:8
The
humble can be mighty assertive.
Homilist: Father
Bill Callahan, Quixote Center
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