Vocation – Marie Christine

Soeur Marie-Christine

Soeur Marie-Christine

In France, at the time I was born (November 1945), babies were baptized, people married in church, you were buried in church. But I did not receive a Christian education. Nevertheless, when I was about three years old, I was quietly certain that Someone loved me tenderly and was always at my side. It was a love that I wanted to share. When I was 14 years old, I got to know Carmel through the Vie de Sainte Thérèse d’Avila (Life of Saint Teresa of Avila) that Marcelle Auclair wrote. I discovered religious life. That was what I wanted to live. The joy of that light was followed by sadness: I only knew the little I had received during three years of catechism; how could I aspire to that life… which I then thought was reserved to an elite? Five years later, I had the opportunity to meet the Sisters of Our Lady of Sion.

I was captured by the joyful simplicity of their community life, by the quality of their sisterly relations. And I perceived that God really was calling me to this life.

But where? I was looking for a contemplative life. I was greatly attracted by Sion’s charism: To witness to the love of Jesus Christ for his people, and to remind Christians that their roots are Jewish. The Solitude, the contemplative branch of Our Lady of Sion, clearly seemed to be the place that God was offering me so I could blossom every day in a Covenant life with Him, in communion with the Church, the Jewish people, the world. 44 years later, I can only give thanks for the Lord’s attentive and faithful love.

Sr. Marie Christine NDS