A Reflection for the 2026 Golden and Silver Jubilee Celebration

It was no surprise to me that our jubilarians, Sisters Becky Keller and Regina Gallo, chose our General Chapter theme, “Sowing Seeds of Hope,” as their own theme for this celebration of their golden and silver jubilee.

After all, they have been sowing seeds of hope for 25 and 50 years as Sisters of Providence. And for that, we are very grateful.

And I think everyone here might readily agree that HOPE is the quintessential need of our time. As wars rage, as solutions seem to stall in response to issues like the Climate Crisis, Immigration, racism or any other ism you wish to insert, we need to cling to HOPE and share it.

But what surprised me about what they planned for their celebration was the Gospel reading from Matthew that we just heard proclaimed, “Come to me, all you who are weary. … and I will give you rest.”

It surprised me because even before I knew which scriptures Becky and Regina had selected for today, I had come to my own sense of how these two had been sowing seeds of hope over the past 50 and 25 years. For me, their efforts are best reflected in the Simon and Garfunkel song that begins, “When you’re weary, feeling small, when tears are in your eyes, I will dry them all. … Like a bridge over troubled water, I will lay me down.” Perhaps the composer, Paul Simon, had been reading the Gospel of Matthew.

Now I thought about just playing the song for all of you, and then sitting down. This is actually what happened at my own graduation from Mother Theodore Guerin High School 56 years ago during the baccalaureate Mass. I have no idea what the priest said before he played the recording of “Bridge Over Troubled Water,” and then sat down. But I have never forgotten that moment and how it challenged my own sense of how I might be in the world beyond Guerin High School.

You might know that Regina also graduated from Guerin High School (a few years after I was there), and that Becky and I worked together there in the early 1980s. I do love the way the Holy Spirit works and the way the Holy Spirit has worked in these two sisters of ours as they have laid themselves down for others.

For the past 50 years, the Spirit has led Becky in and out of the lives of countless students, both as a teacher in various high schools and as a teacher and director of religious education in parish settings. We all know troubled waters, but no one experiences them quite like adolescents do. “I’m on your side, oh, when times get rough. And friends just can’t be found. … Like a bridge over troubled water I will lay me down.”

I cannot resist sharing my favorite Becky Keller teaching story. I’m not quite sure which theology class Becky was teaching at Guerin at the time, but her test question asked the students to comment on the beginning of salvation history. One smart student had obviously been paying attention in Becky’s class because her response was, “When Mother Theodore Guerin came to the United States in 1840.”

We have perhaps known Becky’s most empathetic side in her pastoral ministry settings, most recently in her work in Lourdes as a minister of care. Sister Maureen Fallon, director of Providence Food Pantry, was quick to tell me that Becky’s pastoral skills have been quite evident in her role as one of the intake persons at the pantry for the last three years. Even in her work as the SP volunteer coordinator, Becky was always seeking to meet needs and make sure the volunteers were well cared for.

Regina’s entire ministerial life has been geared toward pastoral ministry. As a chaplain and a bereavement counselor in a nursing home and in hospital settings, particularly in hospice situations, she certainly has met people when they were most vulnerable. “When evening falls so hard, I will comfort you. I’ll take your part, oh, when darkness comes. And pain is all around … Like a bridge over troubled water, I will lay me down.”

Regina’s own reflection on this work speaks of the reality of being a bridge:

“You realize in that every moment when they’re transferring from this life to the next realm that all of this craziness that we experience here, none of it matters anymore.”

She calls it the most profound ministry.

In this role, she also sees herself as an advocate for the vulnerable, for those who don’t have a voice, and she has certainly given voice to their needs by regularly seeking prayers from all of us, posting those prayer needs online or on the SP List.

Regina definitely provides solace, and like Becky, she also offers HOPE. For a combined 75 years, these two women have been God’s Providence in and to the world, offering Christ’s “rest” and serving as a bridge over troubled waters in whatever circumstances life has brought them.

If ever our weary world needed these gifts, their gifts, it is this very moment. Yet, both the Prophet Jeremiah and the reading from Saint Mother Theodore Guerin seem to remind us that holding on to HOPE is essential at all times.

Mother Theodore’s words: “Yes, my der daughters, hope in God, and you will not be confounded. See what God has already done for you.”

Like Mother Theodore, I have tried to recount just a bit of what God has done for all of us through our jubilarians, Becky and Regina. Perhaps each of us would do well to recall what God has done for us in our own lives.

Better yet, what is God asking us to do at this moment? Are there some bridges left to mend? Are there troubled waters to help make calm? Is there someone who needs us to be with them in their pain? Are there seeds that need our tending? Are we seeking the Holy One with all our hearts?

Let us honor Becky and Regina, and our Provident God, by going forth from this church resolved to be HOPE for a weary world – active hope – based on the kind of trust that enables us to continue to serve, to love, and to move forward, like our Mother Theodore did, even when the path ahead is uncertain, confident in that Providence that has never failed us.

And may we, as Mother Theodore suggests in that letter read for us today, written near the very end of her life, “remain attached as you are now and as you have been … to your loving God …” and I would add – for 25 years, for 50 years, forevermore.

At this time, Becky and Regina will renew their vows as Sisters of Providence. They have asked that all Sisters of Providence stand and renew with them.

Let us all stand now and offer our response.