Brideship

“There is nothing a woman cannot do when she knows that she is perfectly understood at all times and that she is loved.”
- Mother Mary Francis

        These words of our dear Mother Mary Francis are true for every woman, but especially so for one called to be the bride of Him who is Love. Father John Burns, a priest of the archdiocese of Milwaukee, has a particular vocation within his vocation to renew authentic women’s religious life and to restore a proper understanding of femininity in “the heart of the bride.”

Bride and Mother

This very rare photograph of Mother Mary Francis holding her newborn niece was taken on November 8, 1948, at the Kansas City train station, as the community was en route from Chicago to New Mexico to establish the Roswell monastery. It calls to mind the virginal maternity that holds the whole world to the heart of its prayer.

        Brideship and true femininity are necessary pillars for authentic religious life and for the well being of the Church. A religious sister is called to embody both of these in a very unique way, and Father John explains it beautifully in the following interview with Abiding Together Podcast.

        Taking his inspiration from the writings of Mother Mary Francis, Father John explains that a vocation to be a nun is a call to be a bride and a mother, and that these can be adequately fulfilled only when there is a proper understanding of femininity. Only the woman who lives and develops her femininity in the way God intended can truly become the bride of Christ and mother the whole world; this is the vocation and the fulfillment of every religious sister.