Mary Pat Kelly Galway Bay Book

So to St. Mary-of-the-Woods and my great and humbling week-end. As part of the Graduation ceremony I received the Distinguished Alumna Award. My sister Mickey, who attended the Woods, and I arrived on Thursday afternoon for the first of two presentations I did for Galway Bay. So many friends and former teachers of mine were in the audience that I felt a special joy in sharing the stories about Galway Bay. I love the Woods. Both the world of the College and the one on the other side of the bridge, the Motherhouse of the Sisters of Providence. I wrote about my time there in Special Intentions. Every morning I walked the beautiful campus through groves of ancient trees. I and the birds-- more sing here than anywhere else I've ever been. I walk along the rows of graves in the Sister's cemetery and read the names on the white stones--so many Irish--75 per cent at least. I stop at Sister Columba's grave who entered from Donegal in the 1880's. Her niece, a Sister of the Presentation in Galway, helped me find the Kelly's homeplace. Providence!

These women educated generations and now the era of the gigantic Catholic schools they staffed are passing and new missions are rising. The Sister of Providence serve in so many ways now with lay people part of the community as Providence Associates. I've visited the White Violet Center dedicated to ecology. The Woods is such a healing place. Banners of Mother Theodore fly from the ornate street lights along the avenues. Our own Saint! A strong woman who wasn't afraid to stand up to Church authorities when they were wrong. "I sleep but my heart watches" she promises on the stone that marked her grave. Now she has a shrine in the Big Church. I enter some names in the book of intentions. Good friends are fighting cancer and I'll be happy to tell them the nuns are praying and Mother Theodore is listening. Being a Catholic is such a layered thing. "The Faith" we say and I know Honora and the other Irish immigrants survived because they believed. Ah, well, sorry for the ruinations. Anyway visit the Woods for a shot of the peace and uplift it gave me.

Photo: Mary Pat Kelly of the class of 1967 received the SMWC Distinguished Alumni Award from President David G. Behrs at the 168th Commencement exercise Saturday afternoon. Jim Avelis / The Tribune-Star