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“I Disobey the Government!”
Almost six years ago, I wrote a post here titled The Other Woman. It told the story of a tiny, feisty nun, a Sister of Charity who–I believe–eclipsed, and had more influence upon the late Mr. She than almost all other women in my late husband’s life (this includes me, his wife of almost 40 years, as well as the mother of his children, and his own mother). I do believe she had more influence on him even than E.J. Kritz, his USMC Drill Sergeant, and that’s not nothing.
She was Sister Mary Janet Ryan.
In a comment on that same post, I listed what might be referred to as “Sister Janet’s Rules.” Not as many of them as there are of Gibbs’ Rules, or even of Jordan Peterson’s (which came after), it’s true, but still…
Here’s the comment, and together with it, Sister Janet’s rules. I’ve reordered them to suit this latest post, but I haven’t altered the wording at all:
It was my great privilege and pleasure, once we got our schedules sorted out, to have lunch today, and to spend a few hours afterwards, with Mary Janet Ryan, SC.
Accompanying me to what my granddaughter has dubbed “The Castle of Nuns” were Mr. She, my stepdaughter, and our granddaughter.
Sister Janet has not lost a beat in the several years since I’ve seen her. I’m not sure if she’s the oldest nun at the mother house, but there’s no doubt about who’s in charge. Watching her boss Mr. She around, and watching him acquiesce, is absolutely charming.
Herewith, a distillation of the wit and wisdom of Sister Janet, now in her 99th year:
Race Relations–she told the story of how she and her sister nuns, in the summers when they weren’t teaching school in Pittsburgh, would travel to the South (usually around New Orleans) and teach in all-black colleges during the time of segregation. Our Sister Janet simply refused to have anything to do with any of that, and insisted in sitting in the back of the bus, behind the dividing “Coloreds” sign. She was regularly chastised for this, by the drivers and the other passengers, but pretended to be deaf. (She is now extremely deaf, so this is, as she pointed out herself, quite funny). One day, though, she had had enough, and in the faces of a particularly annoying couple who were telling her that she was required, by the government to sit in the front of the bus, she shouted (her word) at them, “I DISOBEY THE GOVERNMENT!” walked to the back of the bus, and sat down there again. She did this for years. No one ever laid a finger on her.
Humor–first, a joke involving Freddie the Frog and Sam the Clam. There isn’t a membership tier with enough words to do the length and complexity of it justice, so I’ll go straight to the punch line, which is delivered by Freddie the Frog to St. Peter at the Pearly Gates, and goes “I left my harp in Sam Clam’s Disco.”
Family–Sister Janet was one of ten children, seven girls and three boys, who grew up in Pittsburgh’s East End. One brother was a policeman. Another brother was in the 28th Signal Corps in WWII, and, while marching towards the Battle of the Bulge one day, fortuitously came across his sister, an Army Corps Nurse, somewhere in France. They broke ranks and embraced, to the amusement of everyone, but were never able to convince anyone else that they were actually related. It was all put down to “young soldier sees pretty nurse and can’t help himself.” Both survived the war.
Her Storied Career–a brief review of the decades she spent teaching in the Pittsburgh Catholic school system, the 25 following years she spent teaching and serving as the chair of the Seton Hill College History Department, and the fourteen years she spent as an advocate in the Westmoreland County Court System (“I really, really, loved that”), where she was the despair of the district attorney for her propensity for describing people she had no time for as “badasses,” and, apparently, worse. (Wait, do I have to redact myself? Will that even pass the Ricochet content filter. I guess we’ll see. This is a 98-year old nun we’re talking about here, after all.)
Finding the Meaning of Life–“Listen. Listen. Listen. And what inspires you. Find your inspiration and follow it. And don’t waste any time with”–pulls a disapproving nun face, and makes gestures with both hands that indicate dicey and dodgy activities (that would be Sister Janet). “And ABC. Always Be Careful. And love God.”
But the best, for me, came at the end. After yet more time spent between Mr. She and Sister Janet in the mutual admiration society that they both find so rewarding, and after being told by her for the thousandth time how “talented” my husband is, she looked directly at me and said “He used that talent to get you.” Impeccably timed comedic pause. Then, “He used his brains to get you.” Another pause. Finally, “He wasn’t about to let you go.”
Then, she gave, what passes for, in such a little person, a huge belly laugh, and gave me a hug.
And suddenly I felt what I’m sure all those little children in St. John the Evangelist School felt, on the South Side of Pittsburgh in 1950, when they thought, “I have pleased this tiny and devoted Roman Catholic Nun. She approves of me.” It felt good.
I must be doing something right.
**The photo is of two of my favorite people, kindred spirits both, separated in age by 90 years, but by not a hairs’ breadth in intelligence, wit, imagination, and spirit.
Sister Mary Janet Ryan, Sister of Charity, died on September 15, 2017, at the age of 99.
A beautiful, brave lady.
As was the woman who inspired this post, Rosa Parks who, sixty-seven years ago today, on December 1, 1955, refused to give up her seat on a bus in Montgomery, AL, to a white man.
Published in GeneralYou must never be fearful about what you are doing, when it is right–Rosa Parks
I pray that someday we will realize what a gift to the nation it was when the Catholic church produced so many well rounded, proficient, and talented graduates (think of places like the Supreme Court).
Perhaps we need to return to a model where parents can more readily chose the place of education for our children and eviscerate the “
publicgovernment school” systemMy grandfather dated a nun. He was a rascally charmer, and I figure that a charitable all-female sub-organization has its own ways of attracting raw resources, particularly as the matter of estate looms. I’m not throwing stones here — she was always perfectly nice to us, and she was very good to him. “Dating” was our word, not either of theirs, but I’ll stand by it.
Age brings a willingness to make common-sense accomodations which would scandalize the ignorant youth, who will after all live forever in perfect health and comfort.
My father diverted my mom from a life in the convent. She already had her trunk and her Habits, but had not pull the cord for the final call. They produced 5 children, who in turned delivered another 12 grandchildren.
Never in the mist of chaos of raising us had she expressed a second thought about a not have chosen a life in the cloister.
What a beautiful story. I missed the original post.
May her memory be eternal.
You could say that I did the same with my wife. At least we used to joke about it that way. We don’t have convents and monasteries in our U.S. Lutheran denomination, but we do have a deaconess program which back in the day was a way that some women, always unmarried as far as I ever heard, would serve in a quasi-pastoral capacity. My wife embarked on such a program when she started college, but quickly decided that she couldn’t handle the Greek language requirement. Greek was an early flunk-out course for aspiring pastors and deaconesses.
When my father was at the seminary in the late 30s or early 40s he had to learn Greek, Hebrew, German, and maybe some Latin. He later did regularly consult the Greek and Hebrew scriptures for his sermon preparation, as I remember from when as a little kid I’d wander into his office. In his early days I think he did sometimes preach in German, but that was before anything that I remember. There were alternative “2nd class” routes to the pastoral ministry that had lesser language requirements, and even at the main seminary in the holy city (St Louis, MO) those requirements have gradually become less stringent. Alternative routes to the pastoral ministry no longer carry any stigma at all that I am aware of.
But back when my wife and I were in college in the 60s, those young women in the deaconesses program had to learn Greek, and in general go through an education very similar to that of pastors. (There are no female pastors in our denomination, and in order to preclude any trend in that direction the main seminary is now all male. Years ago there were always a few women enrolled, but no longer. I’m not sure about the other seminaries.)
Anyway, you could say that instead of becoming a Lutheran nun my wife married me.
There still is a deaconess program, but it’s not just for unmarried women. A young woman we know went to a mission church in Peru as her first deaconess assignment, and there she met a Peruvian man. They got married and she accompanied him to a Latin American seminary. I think he is now an ordained pastor in Peru (or is about to be ordained, I forget which). And they have a couple of children who have been given names that work well in both Spanish and in English. She is still a deaconess.
Beautiful story.
Beautiful as usual She. A true Sister of Life in all ways.
Mr. She used to say that his grandmother (not the barrel-shaped one, but the elegant one) always wanted him to be a priest. When he expressed a desire to get married in adulthood, she gave him a knowing look, and said, “you could always have a housekeeper.”
I can feel her spirit even reading this. And, no, you do not censor the 98-year-old nun, or one so purposefully engaged with life that she easily lifted others with her example.
Sister Janet gets her fifteen seconds of fame starting at 6:53 in this local TV documentary about the vanishing communities of area nuns, and some encouraging news that perhaps help is on the way in the form of young novices:
I went to Catholic school from K-8 (we didn’t have a Catholic high school then in Athens, GA) and every nun of the Missionary Sisters of the Sacred Heart touched my life in different ways.
My first grade teacher was Sister Maureen and after teaching me in first grade she took a sabbatical from the convent and ended up getting married. My parents always joke that teaching me drove her from the convent. I known I was a trying child with a ton of discipline issues (no one understood ADD back then), and she sat me for detention a bunch of times. Still, I heard she returned to teaching after she got married, so I don’t think I was responsible.
Sixth grade was Sister Judith who also attempted to teach me piano. I known she not only despaired my lack of piano skills, but also my inability to pay attention in class.
But the one I remember the best was Sister Edmunda. She was old when she taught religion to us starting in 4th grade. I remember her telling us that she was 18 because you stop aging when you take your vows. She was fierce and strict and was in charge of deportment at our school. As such, she and I became close friends (well we saw each other a great deal through my years at St Joseph’s). For all ofnher fierce demeanor and strict nature I never met a more loving a caring person. She would give you anything she had from food to clothes. Her passion for teaching and caring for children was amazing, but also so common in the Catholic nuns.
A practical issue that stays in my mind with respect to recruiting priests and nuns is the human desire for family life and the declining size of families.
One of my close coworkers a number of years ago had a brother who was a Catholic priest. They were two of six siblings. My coworker was often describing to me family gatherings in which the priest brother actively participated with a dozen or more nieces and nephews. Although celibate, the priest still had an active human blood family life among his blood brothers and sisters and their children. But, it occurred to me that in a smaller family with perhaps only one or two siblings, the opportunities for a celibate priest or nun to have an active human blood family life was less, and so going into the priesthood might come with a greater perception of “giving up” more of the human family connections many of us crave.