Sister Marianne has been a Catholic nun for 60 years and has spent the past 30 years working with the people of the Canim Lake First Nations community.
She will be leaving the South Cariboo at the end of October. Nobody from the Catholic church is coming to replace her.
“I’m the last sister to be here in ministry out on the reserve,” she said, adding that it will be difficult to leave the people who have become her family.
“I really do not want to leave here. I have been here for 30 years. I have been in ministry to the Canim Lake people, whatever their needs are … I have been changed drastically by being part of them. They’re my family,” she said. “So will it be hard? It’ll be traumatic.”
The 81-year-old woman said she chose to leave of her own accord because she recognized that she lives alone and is reaching the stage where she will need someone to care for her.
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She will be going to live in a retirement home in Scarborough, funded by Toronto’s religious communities. The home will include four orders of nuns, including fellow sisters of the Congregation of Notre Dame (CND), two orders of priests, one order of Christian brothers as well as lay people.
“So I will be with my own sisters at the end and I’ll be in a facility where, if I do need care, it’ll be there.”
She said the facility became a necessity because “we’re a dying breed.” The only young sisters left are some of those abroad in missionary.
“When I entered the convent in 1956, we were over 6,000 CND sisters. Now we’re less than 800. And we’re still in seven countries,” she said
Sister Marianne actually grew up in Scarborough, but when asked if she’s looking forward to returning to her roots, she said, “Well my roots are here now, so I’m going to be pulling up roots, really pulling up roots.”
She said members of the Canim Lake band have responded to her departure with sadness, one person even told her, “our hearts are heavy.”
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The Canim Lake band hasn’t had a Catholic mass for years. Sister Marianne didn’t want to get into the reasons why, saying it’s a delicate subject.
Instead, she said she’s made herself available for whatever the people asked for: teaching, tutoring, performing funerals or weddings, etc. Throughout it all, she said she’s been flexible.
“You can’t work with First Nations people unless you’re ready to just go with the flow.”
Sister Marianne made her first vows with the Congregation of Notre Dame of Montreal in Aug. 15, 1958. If she were out east, she would have celebrated her diamond jubilee with the sisters who made their vows at the same time, her ceremony sisters.
“But I’m out here alone, so I planned it according to the fact that my family was here to celebrate with me.”
Three of her cousins from Ireland came to visit her in her 108 Mile Ranch home and she said they had a GRAND celebration. “That’s GRAND, all capitals,” she said. “It’s an Irish term.”
Looking back on her life of consecration, she said it’s like any life, with ups and downs. “Overall, I feel extremely blessed, extremely grateful … I have had a wonderful life.”
She said when her sisters asked if there was anything she would like at her new home, she told them, “Well, I would like a little bit of a view … and I’d like some deer on my lawn,” she laughed.
beth.audet@100milefreepress.net
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