religious sightings Hispanic outreach in U.S. South draws sister to ministrY Share your sightings
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onticello, Kentucky is a long way from Argentina—a fact Sister Ramona Elena Ponce, S.U.S.C. knows well, having made that 5,000-mile trip herself. Although leaving her native country to minister to Mexicans in the American
South may seem like a big upheaval, the new ministry was a natural fit in many ways. In her homeland, Ponce had worked with immigrants who came to Argentina seeking a better life. Short-staffed in a busy ministry, the U.S. branch of Ponce’s religious community, the Holy Union Sisters, asked the order’s community in Argentina to send a sister to help meet the needs of Mexican immigrants newly settled in Monticello, Kentucky. Ponce was familiar with the issues of new immigrants—marginalization, poverty, culture-clashes, violence—and decided that she, too, would emigrate. She arrived in 2011 to join two U.S.-born Holy Union Sisters in the work. Today Ponce feels at home, visiting families, conducting retreats, preparing young people for the sacraments, and reaching out with her sisters to the Mexican immigrant families of rural Kentucky.
Sister “Neco”—Ramona Elena Ponce, S.U.S.C.—at a First Communion celebration picnic.
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tudents at Boston College who are considering life as a sister, brother, or priest in a religious order have a place to go for discernment and support. Founded in 2007, Manresa House is a location students can gather for talks, prayer, meetings, retreats, and other activities connected to the process of vocational discernment, regardless of which religious communities they may be interested in. “I see it as a place where I can escape the pressures and fast pace of school and take time for myself to figure out where I am in Father Terry Devino, S.J. is director of Manresa House, life,” student Christopher Knoth told the Boston College Chronicle. a center for vocation discernment open to all students Father Terrence Devino, S.J., director of Manresa House and speat Boston College. cial assistant to the president of Boston College, says Manresa House is the only college-based center he knows of giving this type of focused vocational assistance to both men and women students. Devino, a Jesuit, has been a priest since 1987, and when he took his own first steps toward priesthood as a young man, “I was scared to death to talk about it,” he told the Chronicle. He hopes that over the years Manresa House has helped Boston College students quell similar fears and has allowed them to ask themselves a basic question: What shall I do with my life? Learn more about Manresa House at bc.edu/offices/manresa. 6
Caitlin Cunningham/Boston College
Boston College hosts center for students considering religious life
VISION 2013
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