'The harvest of righteousness shall be sown i...
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'The harvest of righteousness shall be sown in peace by those who make peace' (Letter of St James)
Friends of The Little Sisters of Joy

an ecumenical foundation of Prayer, Peace and Reconciliation

Newsletter no 10 New Year 2008
My dear Friends
I hope that your time between Christmas and New Year has been a peaceful and prayerful one.

It is a time of transition, the year 'turns' on New years Eve. The Church moves, between Christmas and New Year, rapdily through a series of dramatic events and Feasts, seemingly from long ago, but fresh in the eternity of the moment, until she reaches the New Year, a soleminty of Mary the Mother of God. It is important to remember that Our Blessed Mother guides each and every one of us, her arms held gently round our shoulders, in the right direction through the flow of our lives.

On the 26th December, which most of us know simply as Boxing Day, we have the Feast of St Stephen, the first Martyr in the Church's rich tradition of her Saints and Martyrs. Looking at the Book of Acts, we see the wonderful vision of Heaven, which St Stephen experienced. (He is also immortalised in the carol, rather poignant, of Good King Wenceslaus.) Close to this is the laying on of hands of the Seven, who are commissioned by God and the apostles, to carry out the mission of preaching the Gospel to the whole world.

'For out of Zion shall go forth the Law, and the Word of the Lord from Jerusalem.'

These important words, at the very heart of the Jewish liturgy, are are embedded in the 2 eschatological texts, virtually identical, of Isaiah 2:1-4 and Micah 4:1-4.

With the current news from Israel/ Palestine seeming to draw us towards the latter days more and more,we would do well, with Mary, St Stephen, Isaiah and Micah, to ponder the Mystery of how God will bring about universal Peace, when swords will be turned into ploughshares and there will never be war again.

Always with hope for a good and joyful New Year

Love and Shalom

Sister Gila



Adam lay y-boundenBounden in a bond;Four thousand winterThought he not too long;And all was for an apple,An apple that he took,As clerkes finden writtenIn theire book.Ne had the apple taken been,The apple taken been,Ne hadde never our LadyA been heaven's queen.Blessed be the timeThat apple taken was!therefore we may singen'Deo Gracias!'My dear FriendsI awoke at 6am wondering where to find the inspiration for this Newsletter. Turning on the radio, I heard the above ancient anonymous carol being sung by the Toronto Mendelssohn Youth Choir, conducted by John Rutter! It contains the whole theology of Christmas and the incarnation of Christ, through the Virgin Mary. It succintly links the Old and New Testaments, in stating that it was through Adam's choice of eating from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, and so contravening God's will, that Christ came to save us.From an historical point of view, clearly stated in the genealogy at the beginning of Matthew's Gospel, the Messiah is rooted in his Jewish heritage, as is Joseph, his 'foster' father. The story of the birth of Christ is both particular and universal at the same time.It has to be from this standpoint that the business of Jewish-Christian reconciliation begins. for too long, the theology has tended to be black and white; in reality, and with the experience and hinsight of my own life, brought up as an Orthodax Jew and having been a Jewish Christian now for over 18 years, it is much more nuanced.With the great Feasts of Light of Chanukah, the Winter solstice and Christmas converging, we must ask ourselves what are the underlying human factors that we share, which can lead us to Peace. We are all on a journey of human time,

Newsletter of The Little Sisters of Joy to follow

A long wait but surely worth it! Watch this space over the next week!
Much love
Sister Gila

Travelling

My dear Friends

Just to say that a good pilgrim enjoys the travelling on the journey and hopes to arrive at his/her destination. With God at our side who could fail? Sometimes there are storms and sometimes there is calm and we have to weather everything.

Elijah the Prophet heard the still small voice of calm, while he was in the cave, and we pray that we can do the same. A restful peace out of the wind and storm.

Inshallah. God willing.

Love and peace and always joy
Sister Gila xxxxx

Towards Christmas

My dear Friends
As usual, I will be spending Christmas with my dear friend Caroline. She is a professional dogwalker and we usually have a really special time, eating, drinking, walking the dogs and generally enjoying each others company. She has a lovely house, in Trumpington, near the war memorial and I spend the night there with her.

We enjoy each others companyand look forward to our Christmas together. I wish you one in advance.
Love and Shalom
Sister Gila

More music

My dear Friends
I have just been asked to sing a Psalm in a recording of a CD for another charity. This will take place next week in a local recording studio in Cambridge, and will give me another chance to stretch my fingers over the chords again.
I look forward to it! And thanks for the lady who asked me to do it, for victims of torture. So they need much Peace and Reconciliation.

Shabbat Shalom
Sister Gila

Guitar

My dear Friends
Yesterday I picked up my guitar for the first time in weeks. apart from the odd occasion I had in Canada to play, this was a good chance to stretch my fingers. I twiddled a mixture of Hebrew and english song, in anticipation of a small concert I may be giving, due to the kind invitation of the Manager of Starbucks in the Grafton Centre.

Anyhow its good to play just for oneself also, and I hope the neighbours enjoy it too.

Bye for now
Love and Shalom
Sister Gila

Indian connections

My dear Friends
The Sabbath is falling and I am waiting to join some of the Jewish students for Kabbalat Shabbat, the beginning of the Sabbath. While I was in Toronto, I nearly joined a group of Indian Jews from Bombay for the Jewish New year, did not get there becuase I was ill, but for sure will one day.

As I write, I am sitting beside a very nice lady from India in one of the local libraries-she has admired my shirt, which I bought in Toronto in a beautiful Indian shop, where the family who owned it befriended me. So-having also met some Indian Catholics from Kochin, where the Jews lived for thousands of years, I decided to learn anIndian language-start with Hindi, I decided!

Of course Hindi and most of the Indo-European languages derive from their 'Mother' language which is Sanskrit. Like Hebrew, it comes to life when it is chanted, and the script, used in Hindi is fascinating.
I am in a completely new world, and living every minute of it!

More later
Shabbat Shalom
Sister Gila

Peacemaking

My dear Friends
It is Armistice Day, 90 years since the first World War ended in 1918. On this day, it is usual to remember those who gave their lives in this, the 'Great War' and the Second World War as well.
The Little Sisters of Joy is a Foundation for Peace and Reconciliation, whose starting point comes from a different angle: we first look to the whole human community and its need of healing, in which an anti-war stance is simply part of the wider spectrum. This approach, which encompasses Jewish-Christian reconcilation at the heart, also building bridges of Peace between Arabs and Jews, different Christians and indeed men and women,is both realistic and almost impossible to measure at any one given time.

Sometimes, being asked 'What do you actually do?' and not being able to give an accurate answer on the spot, one can only be consoled by the saying of Jesus:

'You shall know them by their fruits.'

Sowing the seeds of love can be very fruitful when talking to people involved in the Military. I meet them quite often on my travels and there is a large airforce US base very near to Cambridge. My dream is to go and sing there, as I nearly did in my youth at the Faslane submarine base in Scotland. Music is always the best way to make Peace, as is attested by Daniel Barenboim's bringing together muscians, Arab and Israeli , to play together in Israel/Palestine. The Toronto Symphony Orchestra also has a programme of 'Playing for Peace.' But even talking to military personnel I find something in common, and there is usually always mutual respect.

There are those who hold up banners,and those who go on marches, those who sing and those who quietly grieve. Death and destruction is never a celebration, neither is earthly glory. Only the knowledge that death is never the end.

The seed that dies in the ground, buried and hidden in the depths of winter,slowly incubating and germinating, must be gently tended and nurtured, until,at the appointed time and in the harvest of righteousness, it bears enormous fruit.

Shalom

Sister Gila

I have a dream

My dear Friends
Yesterday in the University library I met an American girl who had watched most of the election then got sleepy at the last minute, so I had to tell her the news that Obama had won! I felt quite honoured at pasing on this news.

When Martin Luther King gave his 'I have a dream' speech, I don't believe he ever thought his dream would come true in his lifetime. Visions of universal Peace and harmony take a very long time to mature and ripen, requiring caution, endurance and sheer guts. It may not come to pass that this dream will be realised in the lifetime of Obama either.

But his election is a great start. For it is not the arriving that wins us the Kingdom of Heaven but the journeying, in solidarity and as pilgrimstogether along the way, and this applies to politics as much as religion.

A friend of mine, a simple but deep soul, works in the tearoom of the University library. We were speaking of Obama and she said: 'I know it sounds silly, but he has beautiful eyes!' Not silly at at all because I believe that we really can see the soul of a person through their eyes, and the Gospel is full of parables abut seeming blindness and true sight, usually given to the simple, uneducated and poor in spirit.

Obama has a beautiful heritage and a beautiful wife, who can only help him through this difficult and extraordinary time of his life and the life of the whole world. Like any great leader, he will feel fear, rejection and loneliness; having to make decisions alone and carry them through.

With God on his side and the real desire of all of us to see Peace in our lifetime, he may well succeed.

Inshaallah! God willing!
Shalom from
Sister Gila

Perfect Peace

My dear Friends
I would like to share with you something that I heard from a friend some time ago, when I was staying with her by the coast in East Anglia. It was something that made a deep impression on me and is related to my Peacemaking work.

My friend told me that she had been walking along the sands, near the pier. Suddenly she saw a long line of women, an endless line, shoulder to shoulder and with a look of perfect peace on their faces. Surely a beautiful sign of the future?

In the Bible it is the women who have the tenacity and endurance in their personal relationships and in the hardships they have to face. We only have to take the Book of Ruth, and the covenant love between Ruth and her daughter Naomi. Ruth pledges to remain with her mother-in-law when she has been bereaved and lost her husband and her son, who was married to Ruth, from the Moabite people.

'Do not entreat me to leave you, or to go from following after you: wherever you go, I shall go. Your people shall be my people, and your God my God. Where you shall die, I shall die, and there I shall be buried.'

This capacity to live out different roles as women and to form close bonds, extends to the New Testament, to the relationship between Mary, pregant with Jesus, and her cousin Elizabeth, pregnant with John the Baptist, who leaps with JOY in the womb on encountering Jesus and his mother. In my own life I have experienced very close bonds with my female cousins. The relationship between Naomi and Ruth and Mary and Elizabeth transcends any boundaries of age, as they share a common suffering and a common vision.

It is my firm belief that the peace of this present world will come from the women. In Israel/Palestine at 12 midday each Friday, the 'women in black' stand silently at all the major crossroads, holding up banners of peace. We women from all cultures,religions and ages have the capacity and tenacity in our feminine way to carry a peacemaking process through. We must use all our nuanced resources at the pastoral as well as the intellectual level to bring this about.

Shabbat shalom, rest well
Sister Gila

Haydo

My dear Friends
I hope the group of Swedish people I met the other day will forgive me if the above spelling of their word for 'Goodbye' is incorrect. Ashamed to say it is the only word I now know in Swedish, despite its being my maternal grandmother's tongue. My mother, who lived until 97, but was not well travelled, remembered her childhood trips to Sweden, often across the Sound from Denmark, until just before she died.

She was taken to Joteboy (the Swedish name for Gothenberg) by my grandmother, whose Swedish Jewish family lived in Karlstadt, in the middle of Sweden on a lake, until the end of the Second World War, when we lose trace of them, at least on a family tree. We know that Henri Bergson, philosopher in Paris in the 1930's, and winner of the Nobel prize for literature, came from this part of our family, of which we are very proud. I have since learned that his philosophy of the 'elan vitale', the life force or principle, spans the divide between Judaism and Catholicism.

But it was on a different theme that I wanted to talk about the Swedish connection, and, indeed, the Scandinavian countries as a whole. Including Iceland. Iceland may have gone bankrupt in the world's eyes, but it has not seemed to need Peace and Reconciliation. Why? I have asked myself on several occasions.

The Swedes gave me the clue. SILENCE. Scandinavian countries have a landscape and way of being which invites silence more than most other countries. We have to work at it here. I am not yet in Canada for good, but it seems that that silence is in the blood of those who live in cold countries-silence bred of beautiful landscapes, woods and water. When a friend of mine moved to Iceland, he showed me photos the like of which I had never seen equalled in beauty, I could only think of Paradise.

There are many kinds of silence. The silence which sometimes surrounds me where I live on the estate is an unnatural one, and usually precedes some kind of human storm. I have cultivated an inner silence and solitude through prayer, but which I am not very good at extending to the outside world in Cambridge. That must surely be my task if I am going to have patience to wait it out, before moving to Canada. and even there it will have to remain, cultivating silence.

Silence, in the sense of non-retaliation, can be a good weapon against violence, verbal or otherwise. I have always been one to intervene. For the sake of my sanity and my long term aims, I am going to invoke the help of a wise silence to attain an inner and outer peace.

Haydo!
Sister Gila
Does not a wise silence go with a still or deep JOY?

Feast of Tabernacles

My dear Friends
The primary motto of The Little Sisters of Joy is, as I have mentioned before,

'In the JOY of the Lord is your stronghold.'

Taken from the Book of Nehemiah, (Chapter 8, verse 10), in the Hebrew Bible, the context is a celebration of the newly constituted Jewish community, after they return from the Bablyonian exile. Ezra the scribe and Nehemiah have been instrumental in this: Nehemiah was granted permission by the Persian king, Ataterxes (Xerxes) whose cup-bearer he was, to return to Palestine after the destruction of the First Temple to 'rebuild the walls of Jerusalem.' How appropriate that is for the present day!

Nehemiah describes how the people start weeping with emotion when the Torah is read all day. What I did not realise until this week is that this all took place during the Feast of Tabernacles, one of the 3 'Foot' Festivals along with Passover and Pentecost. Foot Festivals becasue the people were making 'aliyah,' going up, that is a pilgrimage.

And the Feast of Tabernacles is still being celebrated today. The main focus is to remember how the Israelites were sojourners in the desert, leading to a more permanent place and the promised land. But if we read the book of Exodus carefully, we see that the promise of the Land contains a gentle warning: 'that you are sojourners in this land.' That is, temporary residents.

As we all are. As the New Testament states in the Book of Hebrews: 'there is no abiding city in this life.' The only real home is in the Divine, as I must remind myself, when Toronto starts feeling like the eternal city!

A makeshift shelter of beauty, that is what a Succoh, a booth on the Feast of Tabernacles is. But in our temporariness, our reliance on our love of God and each other, is a great JOY.

Love and Shalom and Chag Sameach, Happy Feast!

Sister Gila

Upbeat

My dear Friends
From time to time I pop into my favourite hotel in Cambridge, the Regent, a small family business run by Italians. The former owner, Mrs P, who lives on the premises, handed over the business to her children, a brother and sister, who run the hotel with love and hospitality. If I feel a bit blue to begin with when I come in, I am sure to be consoled with wise advice and pots of tea by the time I leave.

The place has a fabulous view over the green and towards the police station; Anglia Ruskin University beckons nearby. As a former Technical College, this was the very first place I attended as a student in Cambridge, in my first weeks here in 1982. I have fond and happy memories of my Foundation course in Music, and still know many of the people who taught me in those days. When I got to know Alexia, who came here to study, I revisited the place and love to sit in the library, open all hours and very warm and comforting.

Cambridge has many amenities, and it is good to be reminded of them. I am happy that I have just booked myself a cinema ticket at the Arts Picturehouse to see a film on Thursday-relaxing in the tiny bar area upstairs is always nice too. The Fitzwilliam Museum is free, and convenient for the University, Catholic church and a series of Colleges, to say nothing of the Graduate Centre, where I once spent a whole day practising, dressing and resting before giving a concert nearby in Pembroke College.

Gratefulness is happiness-I once read a book by a German monk living in America whith that theme. Somewhere deep inside I must be longing for the other side of the pond, but its not so bad here after all.

Good friends and good wine - nothing better than that-and I shared a glass by the river with a new friend just the other day.

Lechayim! To life!
Shalom from
Sister Gila

Armour of light

My dear Friends
Travelling 'accross the pond' to say nothing of almost crossing the country,East -West takes a bit of recovery time. So its chillout in a big way,with little expeditions out from time to time. I am enjoying the solitude,and there seems to be an Indian Summer in Cambridge, for which I am grateful, while I nurse my heavy cold. I notice about myself that I gaze at the trees which are definitely changing colour; I guess I feel I am in Canada. My dreams have been a little confused, with some lack of orientation, but when I wake I feel quite calm and reassured that some deeper process is gently moving me on.

There were some really tough patches this time on my trip, but I was rescued by 'the armour of light' which St Paul talks of in his Letter to the Romans. The breastplate of righteousness is another image he uses, this is surely the way we are all trying to achieve, as fellow companions along the way.

Words are not coming very easily at the moment; a good sign which means I am allowing my weakness to come through, so that I can regain my strength in the proper way.

A bientot! And thank you!
Shalom from
Sister Gila

Thank you for being my companions in the last few weeks; writing the Blog has been a great source of strength, whether you made your presence known or not.

Till the next time

My dear Friends
Well, its so long for now, the plane leaves tomorrow at 4.30pm and arrives on Saturday at 5 in the morning, sunrise and Resurrection. Happens to be the Feast of St Francis of Assisi, the channel of peace for so many things and people. As we are hoping to be.

It has been a time of Feasts, today is the Feast of the Guardian Angels, we had the Archangels a few days ago, with the Jewish New year in between! For the first time in ages, I have developed a really bad cold, which I have nursing at Gary and Emiko's, the beautiful guest house I discovered early on but in a roundabout way, and to which I will return, at their invitation, every time I come back.

But of course one day I will be here for good. Being ill has some advantages; I have been listening to Canadian radio-the great advantage in Toronto is that it is in English! While I used to enjoy struggling with French radio at home or in Paris, at least I can concentrate all my energies on adapting to the different culture! And I have been reclining in a really beautiful room, complete with a lovely desk which I have been happily writing on each evening.

The guests have been nice, occasionally a bit of a mixed bag, part of the experience. The people who came for the Film Festival have yielded to tourists, old timers, and people who have their elderly relatives in the neighbourhood.

So its so long for now to Susan in her Ten Editions Bookshop, one of the best anywhere, Gabriel in the Joy Internet Cafe, and my friends on Walmer road. Also to the nice girl working in the superior tea shop on bloor, where I met the charming and unusual Jewish elderly lady who said: 'I became myself when I came to live here in Toronto.'

I hope too, to add new dimensions to the self I have know for nearly 57 years. To mellow in this interesting town, and to find new ways of expressing myself and relating to others.

Next entry in England!
Love and Shalom
Sister Gila

The Head of the Year

My dear Friends
Today is the first day of Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year. Unable to get to the Synagogue, as I have a heavy cold, I felt it important to make an entry on the blog so have struggled down to the corner of Spadina and Bloor, to the Joy internet cafe. I have just bought a beautiful big apple and some lovely honey in the Muslim shop further up the street. When I entered the internet cafe, run by Gabriel, we were joined by a guest called Ivona, while I said the Hebrew blessing over fruit, cut up the apple, and poured the honey over, in the hope to have a shana tova umetukah - a good and sweet year. May it be a peaceful one for all of us.

You may wonder why the title of this piece is head of the year. The Hebrew word rosh actually means head, and I have a rather poignant story to share with you about this. Some years ago I was asked to visit a lady in her fifties, who had been completely unable to move for some time. She was born in Russia, been a ballerina, and even when already crippled had directed a ballet troupe. I went and chatted with her by her bedside in Cambridge, accompanied by her four cats! I suggested that I might sing to her with my guitar the next time. She agreed, and love the Jewish music I sang to her.

I told her it might be a little while before I saw her again as it was going to be the Jewish New Year. As I was on the point of leaving and at the door, she called out: When did you say it would be the Head of the Year?' I had not mentined the word head, so I reckoned it came straight up from her subconscious. And her deep association with the Jewish people.

Soon after, she died, and I sang Jerusalem of Gold in Hebrew with my guitar at her funeral.

A new beginning for her, and me, and may it be so for all of you.
With heartfelt New Year greetings and Shalom
Sister Gila

Art among the hoodoes

My dear Friends
I couldn't leave the Badlands (although I am back in toronto) without describing one of the most beautiful aspects of the trip-the art. I met Leila and Dan in the art gallery in Drumheller, and i was struck by their welcome as well as their art. The name Leila in Hebrew and Arabic means Night and this unusual lady has developed a great talent for abstract art. Trained in the Red Deer College, not too far from Drumheller, which is visited by international artists, she paints large canvases on what seem to me to be deeply Biblical themes, with a difference...for example the one I liked best was an angular-faced man with a long beard and body, all covered in 'eyes'...yes, definitely a visionary, like Moses or Abraham.

Leila drove me to Carbon, a 'one-horse' town, but with an art gallery and the best upright piano with smooth silvery keys that i have played on for a long time. Actually I played on another beautiful upright while I was out West, followed by a Steinway Grand when I returned, but that is another story. Carefully observing the exhibits in Carbon, my eye fell upon a beautiful pot which Dan, Leila's husband had made, and i had just enough money to buy it.

Out back of the gallery there is a beautiful garden, with many herbs and resting places. A nice gentleman showed us round. It is Leila's dream to one day visit the galleries of London and Paris, and I hope with all my heart that she will be able to do so.

Shalom for now
Sister Gila

Japanese soup

My dear Friends
Who would expect to find Japanese soup, and delicious at that, in the middle of the Badlands? But tucked away across the street from the public library is a charming coffee shop/restaurant with the quintessentially Canadian name of Molly Brown's Caffe.

Discreet tables and wonderful music lead you to the counter where a smiling Japanese lady takes your order with the greatest respect. Alicia has been running this cafe for several years and came to Drumheller from the little Rocky Mountain town of Canmore, where I went with my cousin Ann many years ago.

Have you ever had the feeling of walking into an 'eating house' and feeling you just 'belong?' That's how I feel in Alicia's place, to say nothing of the soup, whose name I have already forgotten, but whose taste I will always remember.

I leave Drumheller in 2 days and go to the big city of Calgary before returning to Toronto; I carry many beautiful memories with me.

Shabbat Shalom. Peaceful Sabbath
Sister Gila

Drumheller

My dear Friends

The flight from Toronto to Calgary was great. I had a nice companion along the way, and it was interesting to realize how much i recognized the landscape from all those years ago. My cousin's son, who now lives on Prince Edward Island (Anne of Green Gables country) was there to meet me and apparently he had no difficulty in recognizing me. Although he thought he might have to look for a lady in a habit!

Actually it was hot, so i quickly changed into my shorts and we talked all the way back on the 80 mile journey. And then i met my late cousin's husband. Bill, and it was just like old times.

Today i have been wandering round Drumheller talking to people who have wanted to share their many and varied experiences of my cousin Ann, who left her mark on this little town and is remembered in so many different ways.

Time is running out on the computer in the local library so more later!

Shalom from the Badlands in Alberta
Sister Gila

Serenade at breakfast

My dear Friends

I have been staying for two nights with Eleanor in the Annex, the neighbourhood where I will one day live for good. She has a piano, so yesterday I sang a little and played-I am not really a pianist, but my busking is good enough to accompany my singing.

My brother Ronnie, who was 20 years older than me, was a bit of an impresario, and brought over the Omsk Russian Ensemble to Britain to give some concerts. One of their pieces, in Russian of course but translated into English, was 'Willow Tree.' It is a beautiful and simple piece about a girl asking a willow tree if her lover will come back to her. Reminds me of 'Der Nussbaum', a German piece by Schumann on a similar theme.; the girl standing under the Nut Tree hears the leaves rustling, as if her lover is calling to her.

Eleanor's late husband played the guitar; I noticed it standing in the corner of the breakfast room. Also staying was the English producer of a new film SKIN so at breakfast I serenaded her with three songs: Donna Donna, The summertime is coming and Psalm 23 in Hebrew. This film SKIN is important: set around a lady born to 2 white parents in South Afrrica and with a black skin. Try to see it when it comes to your local cinema from the Toronto Film Festival, on at the moment and second only to Cannes.

So we were 2 artists attempting the same thing: to move the hearts of people by our filming and our singing. I told the lady that if you move only one heart in a lifetime its enough.

A few years ago I sang and was interviewed about Joy one Christmas morning, on BBC Radio Cambridgeshire.The interview only lasted 5 minutes, but when I heard the performance later I thought to myself: if I die in the night tonight, I will die happy.

Thank God for music, and art and film!
Shalom from Toronto, the 24 hour city
Sister Gila

My cousin Ann

My dear Friends
In Toronto today, I got the news that my cousin Ann from Drunheller, near Calgary, has just died. Here is the piece from me which will be read out during the funeral next Wednesday- sadly, I will not arrive until the next day.

My cousin Ann

'Come to the Hoodooes!' I can almost hear Ann say. And so I did, nearly 30 years ago - how could I have known that I myself would be emigrating to the other side of the country she went to as a 'pioneer' with her Dad.

Over the years, on the few visits that I made, we dined out in the Rockies, trying different foods, striding out in a canoe on Lake Louise - a first for both of us: 'Throw your camera to the other boat, so they can take a picture, as back home they willnever believe me!' Ann cried.

Bonded together as Jewish Christians, on a later visit she would come to Mass with me and I would go to the Salvation Army with her on Sunday mornings. Like most Jewish Christians, she went deeper into her Jewish roots as she got older.

She was a late developer and an explorer and I am proud that she has carved out the way for me.

Thank you, my friend in Heaven!

Shalom from Gillian

(Sister Gila)

*Hoodooes are strange boulder type rocks which rise up from the ground in Alberta

Toronto

My dear Friends

I arrived on the other side of the pond, as we were landing I lifted my arms and sang Summertime-everyone enjoyed it, a lady said-'Are you a nervous flyer??' but they clapped as we landed which I have only ever seen before coming to the airport in Tel Aviv.

But to me I am on holy ground. today I went to a new neighbourhood, called Eglinton, the whole world was there. First I saw a beautiful Synagogue, founded in 194o's, and they seem friendly, although I was not able to see the actual place of prayer as a wedding was in progress. but I caught sight of the bride!
Then I came across a Catholic Church where Mass was proceeding-as i was not too late, i went in and joined them. In Spanish-and full of Joy, perhaps even a potential for worship and work in the future. Further on the retired members of the community were sitting side by side enjoying the sun and helping each other, Jamaicans, Algerians Jews, goodness who all else. Then I sat in macdonalds and at last my mind was blank after months and years of hopefully fruitful creativity and I felt happy and it was all different but wonderful at the same time.

Now in Dufferin - the first neighbourhood I stayed in when I returned after 20 years, but here is a bit hype and I preferred the more 'ordinary' place of Eglinton, with the Chinese supermarket and the lovely fruit, and the wonderful people.Still-first chance of an internet cafe, and tonight I go to Pyhllis to chill some more, put my feet up and confide how happy i am to a close friend.
Love you all! As I am sure they say in florida...wonder what tha's like??
Bye for now and shalom
Sister Gila

Rainbow bridge

My dear Friends
Life is never dull and every day there links with Canada. I spend time occasionally in a cafe on the other side of town, and a little while ago I met a young woman serving there from Montreal. Montreal is one of my favourite cities in the world, it is incredibly diverse, perhaps more so than Toronto, but it is 20 years since I have been there.

I remember going into a restaurant alone, and being given the best table by the head waiter-this custom of honouring single women who dine was new to me. At the end of the evening I asked the waitress for directions and when she spoke in her lovely French-Canadian style I was very touched. More than all that, it was the place where I went into the Cathedral and was struck by the beauty of the liturgical language of the Mass.

A Jewish friend of Beningna's lent me her apartment in Montreal in that summer of '88, and I used to go down to a cafe by the water for breakfast: halycon days, and I long to 'go home.'

One week from now, I go to my sister-in-law's house near Gatwick, to spend a couple of days with my family. then, on 29 August, I will be in the air and winging my way to Toronto. On Sep 11th, very symbolic, I will flying again, this time to Calgary and my cousins out West. On both journeys I will spend time in prayer, thanking God for all He has brought to me and the wonderful life I have.

Be well! And I will try to do the same!
Shalom from
Sister Gila

Charitable status

My dear Friends

I am delighted to tell you that The Little Sisters of Joy, as an international Foundation for Prayer, Peace and Reconciliation, will one day become a registered charity, based in the UK. The process has begun, with the help of an accountant, and once all the required conditions are in place should reach its goal. My intention is to proceed slowly and carefully, but it would be wonderful if this could be achieved by the time my papers to emigrate to Canada (still some way off) have come through.

The Religious Community of women, living and praying together is taking shape and we will one day live together in Toronto.

What are the advantages of making the Foundation into a registered charity? There are several, and they work together on different dimensions. The Little Sisters of Joy will become an organisation with a proper structure, organised under a recognised body-The Charities Commission-and people will feel that they can make contributions which will allow for tax relief.

Perhaps, just as important, the Foundation will acquire a depth, meaning and purpose, hard to put into words, but which by its very nature, will contribute to Universal Peace.

I invite you to offer your prayers, goodwill and benevolent wishes for the success of the venture.

Love and Shalom
Sister Gila

War and Peace

My dear Friends
You may not know that I have Russian blood - my grandparents on my father's side came from Minsk, now Belarus, white Russia, but I consider it Russia nonetheless. I have never discovered if they actually spoke Russian or just Yiddish; certainly my father, who was the first of the ten children to be born in England after they came over (he was born in Leeds in 1897) was a fluent Yiddish speaker. But I have large, expansive emotions, and have always thought that this was 'in the genes.'

One of my 2 favourite books listed on my blog profile is Dr Zhivago by Pasternak, a poet as well as a writer. He came from a Jewish family. In one of the translations of this book, the translators actually state that they don't feel that they have done it justice; precisely because Pasternak was such a beautiful poet, this imbues Dr Zhivago, a novel, as well, so it is so difficult to capture the poetic rhythms of the book in places.

Anna Karenina is a different book, filled with Tolstoy's reflections and theories about how to solve the question of land and the peasants, who of course did not own the land and were subject to their masters. It is also the story of the passionate love affair between Anna Karenina, a woman married to a high-ranking Government official, and Vronsky, a handsome but unscrupulous Captain in the army, who deserts her and treats her so badly that she throws herself under a train.

It is a noble and sweeping book, dealing with important moral questions of exploitation, infidelity and passion to the point of extreme suffering.In some ways it is a deeply religious book, as religious as his 'Resurrection' which was not well acclaimed by the public of the day.

War and Peace...Benigna has just given me both volumes as a present for my new life. In a world where we seem to hover more and more between these two extremes, we must try to find the via media, the middle way, the balance. Only then can we arrive at real peace.

Have a good and peaceful week
Shalom from Sister Gila

Elijah the Prophet

My dear Friends
Life at the moment is both radiant and difficult. This occupation sort of chose me; at the end of 1999 I lost my job as a carer, and told Fr Brendan, the priest who looked after my spiritual life at that time. It coincided with a feeling I was going to die, probably, as someone said at the time, a death to the self, and a more full expression of living in God and for God. Father Brendan said he was sorry, that sometimes mystics like St John live to a ripe old age, although they yearn to be with the Divine, and I just had to get on with it. And, he said, not to worry - God would find me a new work.

And what a work! Constantly at the 'coal face' trying to help all sorts of people in all sorts of different situations. And this often brings about confrontation, sometimes necessary in order to come to resolution. How I long for a quiet life! But I try to follow God's will and often there is a good result, and sometimes there is no need for confrontation at all. Much of this will only be known in the next life, and thus I am following in the steps of Jesus and am the seed that dies in the ground.

I couldn't do all this without the love of God and the love of my friends, a love, which according to C.S. Lewis, one of the great Anglican spiritual writers (and author of the Narnia Chronicles) is the highest love of all.

My dear friend Rita says she quite understnads how the heart leaps at the thought of Friendship. And it was my heart that leapt in the Jesuit monastery in North Wales in December 1987 when I discovered my greatest and my constant Friend of all.

Shalom deep in your heart
Sister Gila

Muslim connections

My dear Friends
I have found myself in a tiny little cafe with internet in the Chesterton area of town. I often go to the hairdresser here and this morning I popped in to see a friend. Last time I was here was ages ago; as I woke up feeling lousy and had no breakfast, I was delighted to see my friend's cafe was open.
At first he didn't recognise me, but as the conversation proceded he remembered. He is from Iran, always to me a people of gentle Muslims (there are still Jews there, Christians too and the country's oldest religion is Zoroastrianism.) We have had a lovely talk, commiseration about the lack of peace in the world, how much we share, and the fact we are both trying to learn Spanish. And I have had a good sandwich too!

My first friend in Cambridge was from Iran, and we worked together in a large department store . The main link with Iran for me is that Queen Esther in the Bible was an Iranian (Persian) and so the Jews and the Persians go back an extremely long way, thousands of years. Queen Esther was noble and beautiful and saved the Jewish people at what could have been great personal cost to herself, and is immortalised in the Feast of Purim, where a special scroll is read in the Synagogue and children dress up as characters from the story.

As life leading up to my trip to Canada has been too full, I believe I have found a nice little place to chill out.
Be well, prayers cover you all and go out to you
Love and Shalom
Sister Gila

Lebanon and Egypt

My dear Friends
Something beautiful happened about a week ago, and again last night. I went to the Grad Pad, a University Centre, and one of my favourite places because of the superb view of the river from the 3rd floor. It was there that I spotted a young woman, with a concerned friend beside her, bending her head and saying she felt unwell. I asked if I could help and that is how I met my new Lebanese and Egyptian friends.

Of course we have so much in common: they were born in the Middle East, and my roots are there too. I know Hebrew well, and it is the sister language of Arabic, which I studied at Cambridge University during my Hebrew degree of 1988-1992, and on 2 summer programmes at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem.

It is difficult to say how bonds between people are formed: the fact that they are Muslims and I am a Jewish Christian made no barrier between us, so it is really a case of the heart: our hearts resonated, all three of us, as soon as we met. Last night I sang a little in Hebrew for them and then danced a little too, and they said this is exactly how women dance in their countries.

This closeness is something I feel with young Muslim men I have met too, either here or in the Middle East. Doesn't it give us hope for the future, when the situation in Israel/Palestine seems to be reaching its worst? It is such a test of faith and hope and especially love, for God is a God of love and of the impossible; as an elderly Jewish bookseller told me once in his bookshop : God can bring peace very quickly, just like he brought the melted snow two hours after I struggled over it into my shop.

With some people you meet you just know that you will meet them again. WE can't predict where, or when or even how. But that we will , is for sure.

Shalom from
Sister Gila

Getting ready

Mt dear Friends

Slowly, slowly, I am getting ready for the next trip to Canada. Naturally I hope this will be the last before immigration, but I must take each trip as it comes and enjoy its riches. this time a friend has suggested, as I am already quite tired from all my travels, that I plant myself in the Hostel and 'just see what happens.'

Great advice and already my dear Goddaughter, Eleanor, will arrive from the States to spend the first weekend with me. We met in the University library tearoom and I discovered she plays the clarinet. Benigna had many happy hours accompanying her on the piano. And, to my delight, Eleanor was received into the Catholic Church in the beautiful chapel in Grange road. It was there that I lived in the garden house with three other students, to test out my religious vocation in 1991.

It s wonderful to have a Goddaughter and we will have much to share, as it is quite a time since we have seen each other. And I already know my way around the hostel and the environment downtown, having stayed there last March for a month. I now have a map of all the International Hosteling places in North America, and plan to stay for a night or two in Chicago.

Why Chicago? Well, really I will be on my way to South Bend, Indiana, which houses the University of Notre Dame, a famous Catholic University where Elie Wiesel, the French Jewish writer and survivor of the Holcaust, spoke to a group of Catholic priests, telling them that 'we are all waiting for the same thing.'

Gives me hope and the University of Notre Dame apparently houses a replica of the Grotto in Lourdes, where the Virgin Mary appeared to Bernadette. I have never been to Lourdes, and feel it unlikely that I will go now, as I am leaving Europe, so this is the next best thing! And one should never be snobbish...while Lourdes has never been at the top of my personal pilgrimage lists, I would like to see the Grotto in Notre Dame and have even had a kind of 'deja vu' about it.

Lots to think about and lots to plan but its wonderful to have taken up youth hostelling again after 40 years or so...watch this space.

Love and Shalom
Sister Gila

The North of Scotland

My dear Friends
I arrived home safely from the North of Scotland late on Thursday night. Stunning scenery all the way, mountains, lochs, rivers and sunshine, but for the first time I was glad to cross the border and return to England.

I am fortunate in that when I make a major move, I don't look back: perhaps it was all that training in the Bible when I was a child and the story of Lot's wife, which is embedded in my psyche. For those of you who don't know the tale, when the land was divided between Abraham and Lot, his nephew, Lot, is running away from Sodon and Gomorrah and all the fire and brimstone. God tells Lot and his wife not to look back, but Lot's wife caves in, looks over her shoulder, and becomes a pillar of salt. Very different to the pillar of fire, which followed the Children of Israel through all their ways and days, as a guide.

There is a similar episode or injunction in the new Testament: Jesus warns us to put our hand on the plough and not look back, as in this way we are moving forward and looking towards the Kingdom. Very hard to do, but as I have experienced a massive sense of loss with the death of my mother in the last 2 years, and she died around the time of my father and brother in different years, I know how it works, I humbly say-only massive loss can lead to growth, and there has been loss in other areas of my life as well. But the growth has been even more.

On a more mundane level, it was a good holiday, my friend showered me with hospitality and I lazed by rivers and watched the trout leaping. Staying in an independent Youth Hostel in Inverness, I had the chance to meet some wonderful young people, especially a young man called Stephen on the morning I left Inverness, and another young man called Stephen who looked after me as I stepped off the train in Peterborough. If you are out there-thank you!

Plenty to do here and Toronto, Toledo, Ohio and South Bend Indiana to look forward to in about 6 weeks' time. Hooray! Hope you have all been well.

Love and Shalom
Sister Gila

A Little Pause

My dear Friends and bloggers
From now until Monday 7th July, I will be 'off the air' and taking a little holiday in a beautiful place. It will be restful to be away from a mobile, and a computer(although i don't have one at home and do everything from libraries) and to try to do nothing - I used to be good at it, not so much now, but worth another try!
So, until 7th JULY, Be well and
Shalom from
Sister Gila
xxxx

Sainte Anne-de-Beaupre

My dear Friends

In 1988 I was sitting by the river in Cambridge, Ontario. A man, bare-chested and wearing what looked like a St Christopher medal, stepped out of a small boat (another man stayed in the boat) and looked right at me, saying: 'Are you religious?' Taken aback, I stuttered: 'I suppose so.' 'Then you must go to the Shrine of Sainte Anne-de Beaupre.' he continued.



Several days later, having travelled by train, stayed the night in Quebec and taken a bus up the ravishing St Lawrence river, I came to the Shrine.



Not one for large Basilicas, and telling the good Lord as much, I found some small chapels at the back. A light was burning in one of them, and there was a little prayer card, asking for the intercession of the Blessed Virgin Mary. I knelt down, said the prayer, and suddenly felt she was with me. I knew she wanted to go somewhere, Where? I asked.



Stumbling out of the Basilica, I ran up the road and came to a convent. 'Would you like to join the service, my dear?' a nice lady at the desk said. ''It's not a Mass.' So I climbed up and came to what seemed like a trapdoorand poked my head into the chapel - it was full of 40 nuns, all dressed in white, praying for vocations!



All this and more is described in The Moving Swan. It was only the beginning of my journey into my new life. And the beginning of my special relationship with the people of Quebec. Last Friday, almost 20 years to the day later, I returned from London on the bus. Behind me two young women were talking animatedly in a language which sounded joyful, lyrical and musical all at the same time. It sounded familiar, French, no a little different, with English interspersed, yes French, of course-Quebecois!

I turned round and we had a three way conversation. They were delighted when I said how much their language pleased me, and I was sad to hear of its frailty, because it is apparently mainly spoken now only in the Province of Quebec.

I realise now, from my experience in the Shrine of Sainte Anne-de Beaupre, and in the Cathedral in Montreal, when I was on my way into the Church, that God was planting something very special in my heart, which will bear much fruit when I finally emigrate to Canada and live in the country of the Beaupre-the Beautiful Pasture.

Shalom from
Sister Gila

The Moving Swan-Book Cover

My dear Friends
With regard to the article below about The Moving Swan, you can view the cover of the book to the right of the Blog, next to my Profile. Many unseen hands contributed to the production of this book, published by The Little Sisters of Joy, and one of them was the Fitzwilliam Museum in Cambridge, who hold the original painting by the French artist Degas, which I chose for the cover, from their collection. As the painting was not hanging in the public galleries at the time, I asked for a private view: I was amazed to learn that it is a pastel, not oil, and two-thirds of the way down on the cover is a line: apparently Degas joined two pieces of paper, which the Museum expert called 'glorified toilet paper' because he was so poor!

Because Degas did not allow anyone in to the studio while he was painting, we can never know if the 'backdrop' to the painting was a real outdoor scene, or a stage backcloth for a theatrical production. I leave you to guess the deeper meaning of the title, and just hope you enjoy the book.

Shalom from
Sister Gila

The Moving Swan

The Moving Swan is an account of my life so far from the beginning until 1999, when The Little Sisters of Joy was officially founded. It documents, with photos, my Jewish childhood in London, the move to Glasgow when I was 11 and my adolescence and wild youth. Breakdown followed and I came back to God through music, a gift inherited from my very musical Jewish family. Coming to Cambridge in 1982, I studied music and returned to the practice of my Jewish religion, the Joy of which I never lost.

In East Anglia, Wales and Canada, I received some profound mystical experiences which led me into the Catholic Church in 1989. I also received a religious vocation. But The Moving Swan is not simply about my journey in faith; it tells of my many journeys and especially the people I have loved. That is why I started writing and it mysteriously turned into a book.

The Moving Swan was launched on 8th May 2006 in the lovely Impington Church Hall near Cambridge, under the auspices of the Impington Mothers' Union. I talked and sang, in Hebrew and English, about my life, while the gathering joined in. Afterwards we had tea and I signed copies of the book. To date, over 750 copies have been sold and distributed, in Cambridge and other parts of the world.

If you are interested, and would like a copy, I am offering it for £12 worldwide including postage. Please send a cheque, made payable to 'The Little Sisters of Joy' to:

Sister Gila Margolin
The Little Sisters of Joy
The Haven
61 Edgecombe
Cambridge
CB4 2LW
England, UK
and I will send the book out to you as quickly as I can.

All proceeds go to The Little Sisters of Joy, soon to become a registered charity in the UK, and will be used for travel, publishing, printing, admin. for Concerts and all things required to help us continue to work for Peace and Reconciliation in this troubled world.

Bless you and thank you in advance
Shalom from
Sister Gila

Shalom by David Lord

I had the use of a car over the weekend, as I said in the last Blog entry. As it was the Feast of the Visitation, the meeting of Mary and Elisabeth while pregnant with Jesus and John the Baptist, I decided to get away from Cambridge, and go to mass on the Saturday somewhere further afield. This Feast is particularly important for the joy and reconciliation we hope to achieve in The Little Sisters of Joy. And, for a meeting of the Old and the New.

Having phoned the priest the night before, I jumped in the car at 7.45 am on Saturday morning and drove down to Swaffham in Norfolk, on the road to Walsingham.
Feeling the need for a little rest and a coffee in Brandon, I came to a hotel I had not noticed before. Tea and toast was only a couple of pounds and inside I met the handyman, David Lord, known as 'Lordie.'

Not young, but still handsome, I discovered he was Jewish like me. And sensitive, with a keen talent for writing words to express our human condition. His lyrics, for that is what they are, have not been set to music, so I hope to do that, or get my friend Sue, who writes wonderful peace songs, to set it so that it can be accompanied on the guitar. But in the meantime I wanted to share with you his words, which I find very moving.

Never mind, my sons,

They'll write your names in stone,

They'll remember you once a year

While your mother stands there

with a crown of thorns.

I see your night fighters

flying over the Beirut sky;

I know this night

some innocent child will die.

Some people make love in the night,

And some people make war,

But let my children go free,

Let them climb their ladder to the stars

And be in paradise with me.

Shalom by David Lord

And Shalom from

Sister Gila

LIfe and death and life

My dear Friends
This coming Sunday I will drive down to Bushey cemetery, near London, with a close friend. In the Jewish cemetery there my father, mother and brother are buried. My mother died at 97 in June 2006, my father in June 1972 and my brother, who was 20 years older than me in June 2003.

Actually June 18th was the date my father and brother died in different years.
On June 18th 1988, I had gone down to the sea in Cromer in Norfolk, after sitting an exam in Biblical Hebrew . This was to be my entry into Lucy Cavendish College in Cambridge to do a Hebrew degree. On the Saturday, June 18th, I was praying for my mother by the sea, when into my mind came a monastery in North Wales. It was there, a few years previously, that I had a profound experience in the silence, which was to lead me into the Catholic Church.
And then, later on this day, near Cromer, I had another profound experience, on the very anniversary of my father's death - his soul was leading me onto a new path.

I wrote about these experiences in a book, called The Moving Swan, published on 8 May 2006 in the context of a Presentation of My Life so Far. It took place in the Impington Church Hall, just outside Cambridge, with 50 guests, who sang in Hebrew with me, while I also talked about my life and afterwards signed copies of the book.I only realised later that 8 May is the day that World War Two ended in Europe.

I published The Moving Swan under the foundation of The Little Sisters of Joy. Amazingly, over 750 copies have been sold and distributed and it is already into its 3rd printing. I hope to display the cover of the book, and some excerpts from it in my next Blog entry.

If any of you are interested in buying it, I would like you know that it is not simply a book about my journey in faith; it documents my Jewish childhood, my wild youth and nervous breakdowns, my journeys, and, perhaps most of all, the people I have loved. It is quite a personal book and I would be happy to make it available for you.

So, just to tempt you, here is the opening line...

"I always was an unconventional little child..."

Shabbat Shalom
Sister Gila

The Holy Spirit

My dear Friends
We have just celebrated Pentecost, which is when The Holy Spirit descended on the disciples in the early Church and does, every year, during the liturgical commemoration of this Feast. Last Sunday was the Feast of The Holy Trinity, so I thought I would display my little essay on The Holy Spirit, which I wrote for an exam question last year. So here it is:

The Holy Spirit is the bond of love, which keeps the Father and Son together in love in the intimacy of the Trinity. Therefore no sacrament would be complete without the presence of the Holy Spirit, in whom we live, move and have our being. During the Sunday Eucharist, we define our belief in the Spirit by saying:

'We believe in the Holy Spirit, the Lord, the Giver of Life, who proceeds from the Father and the Son.'

The Spirit was sent into the world by Christ as the Comforter and as the one who 'abides forever.' Thus is the Spirit essential to any sacrament and is, with the Word, the Prime Mover of that sacrament. We see the matrix for all this right at the beginning of the Bible, in Genesis, when the Spirit of God hovers over the waters, bringing order out of chaos and the world into existence through the Word. Thus is the Spirit already working in conjunction with the Father and the Son.

In the Eucharist, the words of the consecration 'breathe' and make present Christ on the altar, out of time and space. We can see how the Shechinah, the Divine Presence was already present in the desert with the Children of Israel, in the pillar of cloud and especially in the Tabernacle. And with Moses face-to-face at the burning bush and on the mountain of Sinai. It was the Spirit who knit the bones of the nation of Israel together in Ezekiel 37, in a prefiguration of the Resurrection. Without the breath of the Holy Spirit in the Eucharist, the bread and wine would remain bread and wine and not become the Body and Blood of Christ. And yet it remains a Mystery.

A unifying Force-this is what the Priest proclaims just before the Our Father in the Liturgy, as he lifts the newly consecrated bread and wine:

'Through Him, with Him, in Him, in the Unity of the Holy Spirit, all glory and honour is Yours, almighty Father, forever and ever, Amen.'

But the Spirit does not just 'appear' at a certain part in the proceedings. He/She (the word is both male and female in the Hebrew) is present from the moment the priest says 'The Lord be with you' and the congregation responds 'And also with you' at the beginning of the Mass. We could say that the Spirit is the conductor of the liturgy, which moves like a symphony, in its different parts, variations and cadences, to its natural conclusion, making Our Lord present, and bringing clarity, healing and reconciliation to the world and those present, who must take it out to the world.

The Spirit is the unseen hane who guides the liturgy, movingthe hearts of the faithful and drawing us in Christ to the Father, as we make intercessions for ourselves and others. It is in the Spirit that we feel the JOY of the Eucharist. It is the Spirit, touching our hearts, that makes us feel contrition and gives us the desire to open to our hearts to God, so that we may receive Him in abundance. The Spirit, working in love with the Father and the Son, empowers us to love so deeply in the Eucharist that sometimes it is almost impossible to bear. We may turn with renewed compassion to others, as we allow the action of the Spirit, within the sacrifice of the Mass, to transform our lives.

It must not be forgotten that the central part of the Mass is the sacrifice of Christ on the Cross, re-enacted out of time and space. This is the definitive outpouring of love which intersects the past, present and the future. In the beginning of creation the Spirit intersected the chaos to bring order and temporal time. Here His action is both temporal and eternal, in the economy of grace. Here the very essence of God is made manifest, and transmitted to us through the redemptive action of Christ on the Cross. As we receive the very essence and substance of God, we are divinized as a result.

Every blessing and shalom from

Sister Gila

Ordinary Time

My dear Friends
After all the drama of the liturgical year, Advent, Christmas, Epiphany, Lent, Easter, Ascension and Pentecost, the Church has moved into what is known as Ordinary Time. And yet it is still pierced with Feasts-this Sunday is Trinity Sunday, one of my favourites, then Corpus Christi and so on.
I have been leading such an exciting life that it is quite a relief to calm down for a while. In the corner of my room I have created a little 'nest' of shelves with my Hebrew books, and have placed my big red chair facing them and away from the window, which at other times I enjoy looking out of.
I was sitting having breakfast yesterday and looking out of the window when I saw,right in the middle of the silver birch tree, a bird. He moved around and was making the tree and several of its branches his own. It is the first time I have ever seen a bird in the tree and it seemed a sign for the future that, before too long, The Little Sisters of Joy would be at home in Toronto. And there are plenty of beautiful trees near the 'Motherhouse' over there.

God still speaks, even in Ordinary Time, perhaps even more so when there is less noise. After all, Elijah was told quite firmly (! Kings, 19) that God was not in the fire, nor in the earthquake, nor in the thunder, but in the still small voice. This phrase in the original Hebrew is actually untranslatable, nearest is a thin voice of silence.

I invite you in Ordinary time to listen in the stillness with me, that you may be touched by His Peace.

Shabbat Shalom
Sister Gila

Benigna's 90th Birthday

My dear Friends

Today is the 90th birthday of Benigna Lehmann, my friend of 26 years and my landlady for 16 years. We met in the first week of my coming to Cambridge in August 1982. A talented pianist and accompanist, she was hosting a musical rehearsal in her lovely Cambridge home.

Many people from all over the world have received her hospitality. Her Italian name means kindness and her kindly light has helped to lead me along the way. It was in the upper room of her home that I founded The Little Sisters of Joy, with the help of Maryvonne le Goanvic, on the 7th March 1999. Together Benigna and I began the series of Concerts for Peace and Reconciliation, which I have continued with my guitar.

Only a few months ago I discovered a new talent of Benigna's which I would like to share with you: writing childrens' stories. Composed for a little girl from an Indian family who moved in with her parents to share her house,Benigna wrote the following:

The Lady and her Adventures

Once upon a time when the world was young, a beautiful lady lived alone in a small house in the middle of large fields. Her name was Mystery Lady. She was polite and friendly to other people she met, but no-one knew her well and people wondered why she lived so far from anyone and what she did during the long days.

If they had looked up to the sky at night, they would have seen her among the stars and dancing across a dark sky until she flew onto the edge of the moon. Here she stopped and for a time danced with the moon fairies before flying to the secret moon gardens, all bright gold or silver.

She had many friends here and a tiny room of her own made from moon and star beams. She hoped to stay there for a long time, but the head of the moon people said: "No, dear lady, you must float to earth again and tell the people there that they must dress and have airlungs and come and live with us - go now, dear lady, and come back again, bringing them with you. This she did and there was Perfect Peace.

(Story written by Benigna Lehmann)

A very happy and blessed birthday, dear Benigna!
Love and shalom from Sister Gila

Post Paris

My dear Friends

Paris was everything I expected, and more. And the unexpected happened too: for example I was staying in a busy neighbourhood and it was noisy at night. I have got used to it over the various visits as a nice change from Cambridge, but I was unprepared for the commotion last Friday night around midnight. Gazing over the balcony, I saw 100 people on roller skates!Apparently Friday night in Paris is roller skating night, and they happen to arrive in my neighbourhood around midnight. Following in the wake of the last roller, were three large police wagons to ensure that everyone was alright on the unpredictable roads.

Alexia took me to the Bois de Vincennes, a beautiful park not far from my hotel. The lake was a little like Regents Park, a lone swan hovered over the water and a sole Canadian goose (looking for its partner?) while runners, young and old passed us sitting idly on a park bench. Alexia counted at least 5 laps for a middle-aged man who still went round happliy! Alexia is trying to encourage me to take up a sport, but my maxim at the moment is Mark Twain's:

'whenever I feel the urge to exercise coming on, lie down until it goes away again!'

A bientot!
Sister Gila

Countdown to Paris in the Spring

My dear Friends

I can't remember if, even in my wild youth, I was ever in Paris in the Spring. Now I will finally make it, and I am in the enviable position of making this my 3rd trip to Paris in the last six months. As you know, my work knows no bounds, as I chat to people wherever I go, on buses, trains, planes and especially in the street. So it is difficult to separate 'work' from 'play' or 'holiday' but I think I really will try.

And I just received an email from Phyllis, my friend and mentor in Toronto, to tell me to do just that!I will see a lot of Alexia, but there will also be time on my own to just wander. Only trouble about Paris is that I always get lost! I always like to joke that the good Lord gave me quite a few gifts when I was created, but definitely no sense of direction! But it only makes me find more people to chat to and hopefully find my way.

When I was a child, my parents took me to a Jewish hotel in Ayr, on the coast near Glasgow. We were walking around the local neighbourhood when a lady asked my father for directions to a certain street. With great aplomb and confidence my father directed the lady, first right, then second left, right again and so on. When I told him afterwards that I was very impressed with his directions, my father answered:
'Well, actually, I had no clue where the street was, but I thought it better to tell the lady something rather than nothing!'

I am definitely my father's daughter!

Love and shalom from
Sister Gila

Polish Passover

My dear Friends
This is Passover Week. Passover is an eight day Festival and, along with the Jewish New Year and the Day of Atonement, the most important. Passover is the herald of Spring and full of Joy. Celebrating the Exodus of the Children of Israel from Egypt and their flight through the Red Sea, it is full of meaning and connected to the Paschal Mystery celebrated at Easter.

This Passover is a little unusual as the Jewish and Christian Festivals usually co-incide. but there is an extra month, like a leap year, in the Jewish calendar this year, and so it is a 'month ahead.' Someone told me that this will not occur again for another 150 years. The cycles of the moon are indeed complicated!

My own personal celebration of Seder night, the commemoration of the Exodus, was at the home of my Polish friend, Ania, in Cambridge. From a beautiful silver candlebra we lit the candles to begin the celebration, the three of us, myself, Ania and Asha covering our heads in the traditional Jewish way, according to the custom of many centuries. I sang the blessing in Hebrew. We had wine, including laying out a large glass for Elijah the prophet. Elijah is the herald of the Messiah and at a certain point the door is opened to allow the Messiah to come in.What we can't see with our eyes, we believe in faith!

When Father Piotr, the Polish priest came in, not realising that he was joining a Seder meal, I recounted for the second time a vivid memory from my childhood. Looking at Elijah's glass, filled with wine, with my eyes of a five year-old, I suddenly saw the level of the wine in the glass go down. I shouted 'It's a miracle!' Only then did I notice a very tiny hole in the bottom of the glass, but it remains a miracle in my mind to this day.

Ania, our hostess, was struck by the similarity of traditions, and we reflected how they had 'come apart' in the minds of both Jews and Christians up to the present day. Asha said how happy she was to sit round the table with people from different religions and traditions-isn't this how it should be?

On Monday morning I went to the Synagogue in Thompson's Lane in Cambridge and enjoyed the very beautiful and joyful liturgy . One of the readings described how, if you are a farmer, you must leave the 'corners of the field for the poor to glean.' I will describe this more in my next Blog, as here is a profound connection to the Logo of The Little Sisters of Joy.

Chag Sameach lePesach!
Happy Passover Feast!
Shalom from
Sister Gila

Spring in England

My dear Friends
I am slowly readjusting to the weather, and finally admitting that it is Spring in Cambridge. From the tearoom window of the university Library, you can just about see a row of beautiful cherry trees; I remember one year, as I was passing them outside, a Japanese lady gazing at them told me that it reminded her very much of Japan, where they grow in abundance. You can always find connections in life!
Despite my yearning for Canada, it has been a time of reunions and people seem pleased to see me. Today I had lunch with a gentleman who had been married to someone I knew who was a distinguished Hebrew teacher for many years, and who died after a life of much suffering and much bravery. Carol was a Catholic, but like so many people had a 'Jewish soul', expressed in her teaching of Hebrew and in many other ways. I can remember clearly that David, her husband, brought her over to Benigna's house long ago, and that we all had lunch together.

I am nonetheless finally, in my middle years, acquiring a sense of detachment about places, which I feel will help me to make the last push 'over the pond'. I think I started aquiring a new sense of confidence at the beginning of this year, almost imperceptibly, and the Concert helped.

I am really looking forward to seeing Alexia again, and other members of my 'family' in Paris, when I take the Eurostar for the 3rd time in 6 months on April 30th. In a funny kind of way, I feel it is a present from God for all the hard work in Toronto. I can't remember if I have ever been to Paris in the Springtime, of course it will be beautiful and enhanced by going to people I love.

And it will be one of my favourite religious Feasts-the Feast of the Ascension, really the final part of the story which begins with the Annunciation and Birth of Christ. But the story never ends; just repeats itself in an endless cycle of Birth, Death and Resurrection. It is the time of the lambing in the North of Scotland and I have many happy memories there.

The Lark ascending.. this is a beautiful of English music, and quite an apt metaphor when we think of Christ ascending to the Father.

I hope your Ascension day is full of joy and transcendence.

Shalom from
Sister Gila

The Path of Waiting

My dear Friends

I came back over the pond (Atlantic) safely and to Terminal 4, so avoided all the chaos. Returning has been difficult, some jet lag and trying to find a routine; last night in the middle of the night I got back to my writing.

At the end of 2004, after a very distressing period, and just before the 'call' to go to Canada, a friend gave me a little book entitled 'The Path of Waiting.' This little spiritual gem was written by Henri Nouwen, a Dutch priest, unusual and creative, who lived for a time in Toronto in a l'Arche community. Founded by Jena Vanier,in these communities able people live alongside people with physical and other disabilities.

The Path of Waiting is a whole art in itself; for me it means that the most important thing at the moment is not the 'goal' of emigration, but the consecration of my life along the way, with all the encounters, activities, gifts etc. It is the art of living in the moment, always difficult for one who was born a planner!

My elderly and very wise friend James said to me over lunch in this lovely place that he is glad that we don't know the future-it would take all the excitement out of living.

So the tension, and the challenge, remain.

Have a good Sunday, wherever you may be
Shalom from
Sister Gila