She
was influenced by Sister Angela VanNatta, who often strolled through
the school dormitory in the evenings and took every opportunity to talk
with the students about religious life. "Sister Angela watered
the seed of my vocation that had been planted by the example of my parents'
faith," Sister Clara says.
When
the community superior visited in Sidney, she gave Clara an application
packet. Clara stuck it under her mattress, putting off filling it out.
But she kept being nudged by the call and eventually proceeded with
the application. Arriving in Louisville, she felt like it was the end
of the world. She missed the sunsets and unobstructed views of her western
homeland, and she felt "trapped among the trees of the Ohio valley."
However, her coming to Kentucky helped her get to know her older sister,
Esther, who had entered the community a number of years earlier.
Sister
Clara wanted to be a nurse but trained as a teacher. This turned out
to be the right choice, because she ended up loving teaching. She taught
in Louisville and in the Ursuline mission in Peru, South America. She
also served as community formation director, campus minister and director
of liturgy and peace/justice for the Diocese of Lexington, Ky. She now
ministers as Pastoral Director at St. Paul's Parish, Lexington, Ky.,
a primary place of worship for the Hispanic community. One of her greatest
challenges is seeing the needs but not being able to fully respond because
of limitations within the church today.
Three
women serve as role models for Sister Clara - Saint Angela Merici (founder
of the Ursuline Sisters), Dorothy Day (founder of the Catholic Worker
movement) and her own mother, Clara. The common thread of inspiration
for Sister Clara is that "these women were always concerned about
other people. They had the ability to speak out against injustice. They
were women of deep prayer and had a good sense of humor."
The
witness of faith given by these women sustained Sister Clara through
changing times in the church and during the exodus of friends and classmates
in the late 1960s, when she returned from Peru. Today their witness
still gives her courage and energy in her own commitment to live the
gospel values of love and justice.
