At this past Saturday's Neighborhood Art House Art & Sole 5K run/walk, Benedictine women made a good showing. They were among more than 200 runners and walkers supporting the annual fundraiser that support art programs for children in the inner city. The race route makes a loop through downtown Erie and the east side, the neighborhood where the Benedictines settled in 1856--170 years ago this summer. They were the first community of women religious in Erie and have continued to serve the same area ever since. Benedictine Peacemaker and runner Melissa Pfeifer took first place in the 20-29 age category and Sister Linda Romey, also a runner, took 7th place in the 60-69 grouping. Walkers Sister Anne McCarthy came in third in the 60-69 category and Sister Anne Wambach, first place in the 70-79 group. Oblates Mary Hembrow Snyder and Priscilla Richter placed third and fourth respectively in the 70-79 walkers category. Congratulations to all.

Thirty-five Benetwood residents, along with several staff and board members, joined the sisters for dinner at the monastery on Wednesday--the annual gathering to celebrate the special relationship of the two communities. The Benetwood Apartment complex was dedicated in 1981 on property adjacent to the monastery--it is a 74-unit HUD-sponsored complex. Sister Cindy Hoover, Benetwood Office Manager, shared everyone's sentiment, "The residents thoroughly enjoyed their time with the sisters. They are still talking about the food but best of all being with the sisters."

Elaine Nadeau, the archivist for the Congregation of St. Scholastica, of which the Benedictine Sisters of Erie are one of seventeen member monasteries, was in Erie this week to record stories for an oral history of Benedictines for Peace. Erie Benedictine Sister Mary Lou Kownacki, who died in January 2023, was a leader in the founding and early years of BFP. The movement came into being in 1980 following a weeklong peace witness at the Pentagon by Benedictine sisters during their 1,500th-anniversary celebration. Rooted in the monastic commitment to PAX (peace), BFP was created to transition from being merely peaceful to actively working for peace in society. Sisters from Erie have remained strong advocates for peace and justice. Sister Anne McCarthy is the current coordinator of BFP.

Twenty-eight retreatants, including long-term community friends and first-time guests, participated in “We Are One,” a Holy Week retreat held at the monastery. Retreatants joined the monastic community for the traditional Holy Week services in addition to participating in retreat programming.

Katie Gordon of Monasteries of the Heart interviews Fr. Adam Bucko of the Center for Spiritual Imagination in this webinar. They explore how new expressions of monastic community are bridging this ancient tradition to contemporary seekers in ways that enable more people to commit to lives of prayer, service, and transformation, in and beyond the monastery.

In an interview with Spotlight PA, Benedictines for Peace Coordinator Sister Anne McCarthy says, “We believe that participating in any way in the enhanced enforcement is immoral."

Sister Marcia Sigler combined her passion for peace and her passion for artistic creation in a recent contribution to the Episcopal Church's Asiamerica Ministries peace crane witness.

The Benedictine Sisters are celebrating 170 years...one unique story involves bootleggers on our property--an incident so implausible that we decided to make it the core of the only fundraiser in our mix of anniversary commemorations: MOTHER IGNATIA'S BAN THE BOOTLEGGERS BASH.