Called to a rare vocation
San Francisco Archbishop George H. Niederauer will preside April 29 at Catherine Wright's commitment to life as a Consecrated Virgin at St. Raphael Church in San Rafael.
"The rite will constitute Catherine to be a sacred person," said Patrick Vallez-Kelly, director of worship for the Archdiocese of San Francisco, noting its ancient roots in the Church. "The symbolism of Catherine as a new bride of Christ is strong throughout the rite."
"Catherine and Archbishop Niederauer have chosen a most appropriate date to celebrate her consecration - April 29, the memorial of St. Catherine of Siena, who is recognized as one of the great Virgins in Church history and who is also a doctor of the Church," he pointed out.
PROFESSING PERFECT CHASTITY
The consecration will be celebrated within the context of Mass and includes calling Catherine forward, a homily by Archbishop Niederauer, examinations of Catherine by Archbishop Niederauer asking her of her resolve to this new life, the Litany of the Saints, Catherine's profession to live a life of perfect chastity, the Prayer of Consecration, prayed aloud by Archbishop Niederauer with his hands extended over Catherine, the presentation to Catherine of the insignia of consecration, including a ring, according to the archdiocesan Office of Worship.
Upon her consecration Wright will become one of only about 200 Consecrated Virgins living in the United States. There are more than 3,500 worldwide.
Wright is 53 years old with a graduate degree in Library Science from UC Berkeley and a career spanning 25 years with the San Rafael Public Library. "My main ministry for St. Raphael parish is acting as contact person for, and leader of, RCIA," Wright said. "I have been steadily involved with RCIA as a volunteer since November 2005. RCIA is truly a labor of love for me. I am also a member of our parish Adult Faith Formation Committee."
Wright entered the Catholic Church at the Easter Vigil in 2003 after what she called "a long journey through numerous Protestant denominations."
"I had come to believe that Christ was truly present in the Eucharist and I wanted to attend Mass on a daily basis," Catherine said. "I had recognized the Catholic Church as the home that I had always been seeking. Throughout that year of waiting to formally join the Church, I attended daily Mass faithfully hungering for the Eucharist that I was not yet permitted to receive."
CALLED TO GIVE HER LIFE TO GOD
Wright said she felt a vocation tugging at her even before becoming Catholic, "a very insistent call" to give her life to God. At about that same time, Wright began taking spiritual direction with Father Paul Rossi, pastor of St. Raphael. In time, Wright revealed to Father Rossi that she "might have a vocation as a nun." The priest was receptive, she recalled, and puzzled. "He had two good reasons to question this notion of mine," Wright said. "I was already 47 years old but more important is the fact that I was born with mild cerebral palsy."
As is indicated by Wright's education and place in the professional community, the disability has not prevented her leading a full, independent life. "God had been moving me ever more completely out into the world since I was ‘mainstreamed' and moved from a special school for disabled children to public school at age eight," she said.
The cerebral palsy did, however, limit Wright's choices of how she might live out her new-found vocation. "I quickly realized that with my physical limitations, I could never fulfill the demands of apostolic religious life," she said. Wright then began to consider contemplative life and in the spring of 2004 took a sabbatical from her job to spend several months as a live-in volunteer with a monastic community of women religious in Washington State.
"This time was a profound gift on many levels," Wright recalled. "I came to see, although I loved being with the Sisters on a temporary basis, I could never live as a permanent member of a religious community. Yet, my sense of being called to a deep intimacy with Christ only strengthened. I wanted nothing so much as to give myself totally to God in a public way."
It was her spiritual director at the monastery who asked Wright if she had ever considered Consecrated virginity. Wright had some sense of the vocation having read about it a few months before. Wright said she tried to dismiss the idea but looked for information about it on the internet. She said that in reading the description of what a Consecrated Virgin's life includes she recognized the pattern of her own days.
"Like a Consecrated Virgin, my deep love for the Eucharist meant that I attended Mass daily," she said. "The only thing a Consecrated Virgin is canonically obliged to do is to say the Liturgy of the Hours and I had been doing that for years even before I was officially Catholic." Wright said she had also realized in herself a call to pray for priests which is a key part of the role of a Consecrated virgin. Any misgivings were overcome. "I knew God was calling me to this vocation and no other," she said. Both her spiritual director at the monastery and Father Rossi affirmed her choice.
With regard to marriage, Wright said she has "fallen in love" but "never had a relationship that had real potential to lead to marriage." She said that "several years before I realized I was meant to become a Catholic, I began to sense that my being single might represent a call to celibacy" that is "someone who makes themselves available to God in a manner that would rule out having an exclusive relationship with another person."
MEETING WITH THE ARCHBISHOP
Wright's steps to the consecration rite included talks with the United States Association of Consecrated Virgins (www.consecratedvirgins.org) to learn as much as she could about the vocation. "Everything confirmed my sense that Consecrated Virginity was indeed my call," Wright said. It would also be necessary for Wright to write a letter to Archbishop George H. Niederauer explaining her reasons for wanting to take this path and asking for a meeting with him to discuss it further.
Wright said Archbishop Niederauer answered her letter quickly and after a meeting, that included Father Paul Rossi, approved Wright's decision. "It was Father Paul's support of my consecration that was a most important piece in this process, I'm sure," Wright said.
Father Rossi will concelebrate the consecration Mass April 29. "Catherine attends daily Mass and prays for the parish daily," Father Rossi said, noting Wright's good work with the parish's English speaking RCIA. "This is truly a vocation she is entering. Catherine is a good steward of God's gifts and I see her service at St. Raphael's as a sign of that."
Wright said she has invited more than a hundred people to attend the consecration liturgy including her parents, Louise and Thomas Wright who will "bring the insignia of consecration into the church." Her mom will carry the ring and her dad will carry his daughter's copy of the Liturgy of the Hours. Also attending are siblings, Tom, John, and Jim with his wife, Janet, and other family members and friends.
ENTERING THE CHURCH WITH FRIENDS AT HER SIDE
Wright will enter the church flanked by Judith Stegman and Gwen Priolo. Stegman is president of the United States Association of Consecrated Virgins and was Wright's mentor as she prepared for the Rite of Consecration. Wright and Priolo, who sponsored Wright when she entered the Church in 2003, worked at the San Rafael Library for 18 years until Priolo's retirement. "Our relationship is such that I think of her as my godmother," Wright said.
"I am delighted to celebrate with Catherine as she gives herself entirely and eternally to Christ as his bride," Stegman told Catholic San Francisco. "I have been working with Catherine for a number of years in this preparation and am very glad to see this come to be. I am looking forward to seeing what the fruit of the grace will be in her life."
About the USACV, Stegman said one of its goals is to provide ways for Consecrated Virgins to interact with one another. The group publishes a newsletter, holds a summer gathering and currently is improving its website to assist in that effort. "Many personal relationships are built among Consecrated Virgins in the country through these various means," Stegman said. The group's "very active e-mail prayer request chain" is another way the women stay in touch, she noted.
Wright said she knows of two other Consecrated Virgins in the Archdiocese of San Francisco but has not contacted them. "I am the first woman from California to get involved with the USACV which signals to me that these local Consecrated Virgins prefer to pursue their vocations quietly and I don't want to intrude upon them," Wright said.
"I can't fully anticipate what taking this path will mean for my life," Wright said. "Such understanding comes only with time. But I know that becoming a Consecrated Virgin is right because I've never felt more authentic or freer than I do now. Being a Consecrated Virgin provides a structure, a ‘container' if you will, for me to grow in love. My deepest hope in becoming a Consecrated Virgin is that I might be a sign of the intimacy that Christ seeks with each individual person."
"What I wish for anyone, men as well as women, is the joy I've found in discovering what God wants for my life," Wright said. "If I were to offer advice to those exploring the question of where God is calling them, the first thing I would say is to examine the places where they feel themselves most strongly saying ‘no' to God and to look at the things that make them most afraid. It is through going into the places that we don't want to go that we create the most room for God to do his work."
By Tom Burke
From April 24, 2009 issue of Catholic San Francisco.
