Becoming A Woman in Zanskar

I just saw the full version of this film. It is incredibly moving and visually stunning.

In Zanskar, young women must marry men they do not choose for themselves. Some women choose to become nuns instead.

As I watched the film I found myself identifying with Palkit who, like me, faced a lot of opposition from her family to choose religious life. Interestingly, Palkit finds in religious life what women have found for centuries; friendship, education, freedom and the chance to “dedicate one’s life to religion,” the spiritual quest. This is contrary to the popular conception that convents were and are merely refuges for the brokenhearted or the unmarriageable.

This is a beautiful film. The cinematography is incredible and the story of two friends who take different paths away from each other to womanhood will touch your heart.

more about “Becoming A Woman in Zanskar“, posted with vodpod

Plimoth Plantation

Plimouth Plantation.JPG, originally uploaded by marystrain.

I spent most of the day visiting Plimoth Plantation. I have been there many times and it has always been a good experience, but this time I was very impressed. The museum is making a real effort to present a more balanced and honest picture of the relationship between the Native People and the colonists. Now, in addition to the 1627 English village the museum also features a Wampanoag homesite. Native People staff this exhibit. They share aspects of Wampanoag culture, language, tradition and family life and describe the arrival of the English from their point of view.

Both the Native People and the interpreters in the English village were great with the kids visiting the museum, successfully engaging children as young as four and capturing the interest of teens.

Visit http://www.plimoth.org/ to learn more about Plimoth Plantation.

Also, I recommend Mayflower: A Story of Courage, Community, and War by Nathaniel Philbrick if you want to learn more about the period.

Ellen Mahoney Collins

Ellen Collins.JPG, originally uploaded by marystrain.

This past winter I spent some time researching my family history. One ancestor that I discovered had been right under our noses all along, buried in the family plot, sharing a grave marker with three of my grandmother’s sisters who died as infants. You can see her name at the bottom of the little marker – Ellen Collins. This is probably the first gravestone they could afford. Later when they became more prosperous they got the impressive Celtic Cross.

The family erected this Celtic Cross monument later

Born Ellen Mahoney in Boherbue, County Cork in Ireland in 1820, she married James Collins and gave birth to a son, Richard, in 1847 in Ireland. Richard immigrated to America in 1872. Ellen came with him or followed him here, probably as a widow. She appears in the 1880 census as a member of his household in Springfield, MA. That’s where I found her.

Yesterday, I was in Springfield, Massachusetts and I visited our cemetery plot. I hadn’t been there since my grandmother died in 1968. I was touched when I saw the Ellen Collins’ name there on the stone and knew who she was – my great-great grandmother.

New Leadership for the Passionist Sisters

My religious community, the Passionist Sisters have a new Congregational Leadership Team elected today in Lima, Peru. The new Congregational Leader is Sister Maria Angelica Algorta of Argentina. Her Consultors are Sister Anne Culliton, Sister Rosaleen Murray, Sister Elissa Rinere and Sister Moya O’Cleary.

The Girl Effect

I work on girls’ issues at the UN. This video is a very creative and elegant presentation of why the world should care about girls.

more about “The Girl Effect – Home“, posted with vodpod

Money As Debt

My friend Anita brought this video to my attention. I have never studied economics but have been trying to learn more about it for my work at the UN.

Paul Grignon’s 47-minute animated presentation of “Money as Debt” tells in very simple and effective graphic terms what money is and how it is being created.

Grignon explains that banks create money by making loans, that our monetary system is sustained only by continual growth and that less debt means less available money.

The video left me with a few thoughts.

One of the greatest problems facing developing countries is debt. Most of these countries are unable to meet the basic needs of their people because a large percentage of their income has to go toward servicing this debt. What would happen if these debts were canceled as many activists call for? I wonder, who would benefit and who would be hurt?

If our present monetary system is dependent on continual growth, what are the implications for climate change? Wouldn’t slower growth be better for the planet?

The video made me think about Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World which I reread last month. It’s a novel about a future where the central value is consumerism. In this world everything that doesn’t contribute to consumer behavior is done away with. The great cultural treasures of the past like the pyramids and the Mona Lisa have been destroyed. The Bible and Shakespeare are banned and only pastimes that require people to buy something are allowed. Even people are mass produced and then conditioned from infancy to consume. Anyone who dissents from the system is doped up or banished because the system will collapse if people stop consuming. They have to keep running on a meaningless hamster wheel.

Grignon suggests some alternatives to our present monetary system that are more positively sustainable in his video and I think people should think about them before we end up in a “brave new world.”

BBC NEWS | UK | England | Possible sainthood for nun – Elizabeth Prout

BBC NEWS | UK | England | Possible sainthood for nun.

Elizabeth Prout, foundress of the Sisters of the Cross and Passion (Passionist Sisters) is being considered for sainthood by the Vatican.  She is being described as a Victorian Mother Teresa for her work in the slums of 19th century Manchester, England where she and the first members of our community lived and strove tirelessly to improve the lives of poor workers and Irish refugees, especially women and girls.

Elizabeth Prout is being hailed in the British press as a pioneer for women’s rights because she educated poor women and girls and taught them the skills they needed to find work and support themselves, but she was more than a pioneer she was a visionary. She understood the value to society of educating women and girls long before most anyone else.

In 2004, former UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan said, “Study after study has taught us that there is no tool for development more effective than the education of girls and the empowerment of women.  No other policy is as likely to raise economic productivity, lower infant and maternal mortality, or improve nutrition and promote health, including the prevention of HIV/AIDS.  When women are fully involved, the benefits can be seen immediately:  families are healthier; they are better fed; their income, savings, and reinvestment go up.  And what is true of families is true of communities and, eventually, whole countries.”

Elizabeth’s work among the poor women and girls of 19th century Manchester, even though it seemed insignificant at the time,  must have improved the fortunes of hundreds of families. If you believe in the Butterfly Effect, the difference she made is still being felt today in Manchester, in the U.K and in the world.

People have always known that little things can effect society and change history. As children we learnt:
“For want of a nail, the shoe was lost;
For want of a shoe, the horse was lost;
For want of a horse, the rider was lost;
For want of a rider, a message was lost;
For want of a message the battle was lost;
For want of a battle, the kingdom was lost!”

Today, Passionist Sisters inspired by the example of Elizabeth Prout continue to work among the poor; assisting refugees and asylum seekers and educating women and girls, believing that our small efforts can change the world.