Our liturgy group invited us sisters in the mother house and St. Clara again to “Introductions to Advent with integrated vespers”. The four sisters beautifully covered the topics of “hope”, “peace”, “joy” and “love”.

On December 5th we invited the employees who are retiring or have retired to a thank you coffee. During the exchange, not only news from retirement was discussed, but also old stories of deceased sisters with whom the employees worked and lived.

On St. Nicholas Day, Sister M. Marita walked through St. Clara as Bishop Nicholas” to delight the residents and remind them of happy childhood days. In the evening, we sisters were able to enjoy punch and cookies, songs and stories about St. Clara. On December 8th, an Advent concert took place in our mother house church, which transformed our church into a romantic sea of ​​lights. Children sang along again and delighted everyone present.

On December 11th, Sister M. Alexa and Sister M. Susanne were invited to the Advent concert at the Michaelsschulen Paderborn, where they reported interesting news about our projects in Malawi for everyone. These schools have been supporting us for a long time, both in Romania and in Malawi. Students from grade 6 then visited us in the mother house and St. Clara with their teacher on December 19th and surprised us with Advent songs, keen interest and packed bags full of little treasures.

Our St. Franziskus retirement home tooks part in the “Advent window” again. On December 12th, the decorated window shone and invited people to have happy encounters. On the same evening, our employees’ Advent service took place in the church at the mother house, followed by a barbecue and discussion with mulled wine in the courtyard. Before that, the St. Clara Advent market had been taking place in the courtyard all week, offering plenty of entertainment, encounters and coziness with punch, waffles and sausages.

On December 15th, we were well represented again at the Lucia market in the town of Salzkotten with some sisters, lentil soup and waffles to collect donations for Malawi.

On December 18th, our Archbishop Dr. Bentz was able to present a check for 100,000 euros on the radio for the “WDR Christmas Miracle” in Paderborn. This sum was raised from 100,000 friendly actions under the theme “Happy”, in which groups and individuals could make others happy from November and throughout Advent by filling bags and giving them away and/or initiating nice encounters. The archbishop thanked everyone involved for these wonderful, light-filled campaigns, as the archdiocese had promised to donate 1 euro per campaign to the “WDR Christmas Miracle”. The fact that this was done on such a large scale made Dr. Bentz very happy and the radio presenters speechless. The donations totaling 12 million euros will go to projects to combat hunger worldwide, and in Germany to “Die Tafel”, which distributes very inexpensive food to people in need.

Written by  Sr. M. Alexandra Völzke FCJM

Photos: FCJM Sisters