July 2022 News - Sisters of Charity of the Incarnate Word, Houston

JULY 2022

Photo by Sr. Ricca Dimalibot, CCVI. Sunset over the chapel at Villa de Matel, Houston, TX

JULY NEWS Pope's Prayer Elderly: We pray for the elderly, who represent the roots and Intention memory of a people; may their experience and wisdom help young for July

people to look towards the future with hope and responsibility.

Far left: Sr. Kevina Keating, CCVI, outgoing Congregational Leader, and Daniel Cardinal DiNardo pray over the new CCVI leadership team in the Eucharistic Celebration July 2, 2022. Left to Right: Sr. Kim-Phuong Tran, General Councilor, Sr. Betty Campos Arias, General Councilor, Sr. Celeste Trahan, Congregational Leader, Sr. Ricca Dimalibot, Assistant Congregational Leader, Sr. Joyce Susan Njeri Mbataru, General Councilor. Photos by Miss My-Ngoc Nguyen.

INSTALLATION OF NEW CCVI CONGREGATIONAL LEADERSHIP TEAM The Congregation of the Sisters of Charity of the Incarnate Word, Houston, Texas, CCVI, recently elected its new Congregational Leadership Team during their General Chapter which took place at Villa de Matel in April. CCVI Sisters from various countries gathered for the event.

The new Leadership Team Members are Sister Celeste Trahan, Congregational Leader, Sister Ricca Dimalibot, Assistant Congregational Leader and General Councilor; General Councilors: Sister Betty Campos Arias, Sister Joyce Susan Njeri Mbataru and Sister Kim-Phuong Tran.

These Sisters have served in various positions over the years including their most recent ministries: Vice President of Mission Integration at Dignity Health St. Mary Medical Center, Long Beach, CA, CCVI General Councilor and Physician, Pastoral ministry to the people of Torola, Department of Morazán, El Salvador, CCVI General Councilor and General Treasurer, and U. S. Vocation Director.

The inspiring Installation Eucharistic celebration took place in the Conventual Chapel of the Immaculate Conception at Villa de Matel, on July 2, 2022. The presider was His Eminence Daniel Cardinal DiNardo, D.D. of the Archdiocese of Galveston-Houston. CCVI sisters, religious of other congregations, and numerous guests and friends were in attendance. A festive meal followed the Eucharistic celebration in the Dubuis Center.

The Congregation of the Sisters of Charity of the Incarnate Word was founded in Galveston, Texas, in 1866, by Bishop Claude Marie Dubuis, second bishop of Galveston, Texas. At that time, the Diocese encompassed the whole state of Texas with its See located in Galveston. The first three Sisters came from Lyon, France to care for the sick, the elderly and orphaned children. In 1926, the Motherhouse was moved to the newly built Villa de Matel Convent in Houston where it still is today. The Sisters serve in the ministries of education, health care, social concerns, and spirituality in six countries: El Salvador, Guatemala, Ireland, Kenya, Mexico and the United States of America.

Congratulations to the new CCVI Congregational Leadership Team! May God continue to bless them and give them the wisdom they need to serve the Congregation and the Church and to respond, “to the needs of our times”. Praised be the Incarnate Word. Forever!

BISHOP NDINGI SECONDARY SCHOOL opens new facility

On May 11, 2022, teachers and students made the muchawaited move into vibrant new buildings in Molo, kenya

Students lead morning prayer at the new site of Bishop Ndingi Secondary School in Molo.

BY SR. ROSE NYAMBURA GITHUKA, CCVI, DIRECTOR OF BISHOP NDINGI SECONDARY SCHOOL Without a building of our own, our new Bishop Ndingi Secondary School in Molo, Kenya, started in January 2020 with 15 students - eight girls and seven boys - in space shared with the Primary School. All the same, we were extremely excited about it. It was a good beginning. We started with seven teachers - four men and three women. We had a principal who is now also taking care of the Primary School since our former head teacher retired on December 31, 2019. We have a school bus that picks up students in the morning and drops them off in the evening. Therefore, we employ a school bus driver and school bus conductor. We have a gardener, a general worker, and a day security person on staff as well. Since the Primary School and Secondary School use the same gate, we share the day security personnel.

Learning for our Secondary School students started in one of the blocks of the Primary School while we waited for the new school to be built. We started by sharing most of the resources that we have in the Primary School, such as the kitchen and cooks, the dining hall, some food from the school garden, the playgrounds, etc.

Learning for the Secondary School was suspended in the middle of March 2020, due to the COVID-19 pandemic. All the students and teachers stayed at home for nine months. Learning resumed in January, 2021.

Thank God all our students and teachers came back in good health.

Our first class completed its academic year in July 2021. They transitioned to their second year successfully the last week of July 2021. The first week of August 2021 we welcomed 14 new students who began their first academic year. We were excited to have two classes of our new secondary school.

Seven teachers served the secondary students in the classrooms of Ndingi Primary while awaiting the completion of the new complex. The new building can accommodate up to 480 students in Junior High and Senior High School.

Students return to classes following morning prayer and assembly time. Landscaping and new shrubs are still growing in.

This long-awaited new complex was finally completed and was handed over to the school management/Congregation on May 4, 2022. There was a lot of excitement as we tried all the keys for each door to make sure they were all working and that all the doors could open without any problem.

All the keys were labeled according to each door.

After the handing over, our teaching/support staff and students started getting very busy preparing to move to the new facility. What followed were final touches of cleaning up and moving the furniture from the Primary School building where they had been housed successfully for two years and four months. The next four days were like a beehive of activities. It was very clear on the faces of the teachers and the students that they had really longed to have their own space.

On May 11, 2022, the teachers and students moved from the Primary School building to their new facility. We were very happy to how have our own Secondary School because this had been our dream. Indeed, it was more exciting for the students who had studied in the Primary School facility for two years and four months. They are now in their third year of High School. Our first students/pioneers of Bishop Ndingi Secondary School, God willing, will complete their four years of High School studies in early December 2023.

Our new academic year started on April 25, 2022. We were blessed to welcome 18 year one students (11 girls and 7 boys). Year two we have 22 students (12 girls and 10 boys). Year three we have 24 students (12 girls and 12 boys). In total we have 64 students (35 girls and 29 boys). We have 10 teachers (5female and 5 male) teaching the 64 students.

Construction of Bishop Ndingi Secondary School began on November 2, 2020. We are very happy it has successfully come to completion and our staff and students are now enjoying the new facility.

More good news is that soon we will have a new entrance for CCVI Bishop Ndingi Schools, Molo.

Beginning March 2022, we hired Pelt Security Company to safeguard Bishop Ndingi Schools. The company provides day and night guards. The guards are trained and we feel more secure because the place has become a complex. Now landscaping is taking place, planting of grass, flowers, shrubs, and trees as can be seen in the pictures.

Words are inadequate to express how grateful we are to our Congregation for this complex of a new high school. Indeed, we appreciate the financial and all the support we received during the construction even in the midst of COVID -19 challenges. As I said before the greatest gift one can give to a Kenyan child is education and of course in a conducive environment.

Praised be the Incarnate Word. Forever!

More photos of the new Bishop Ndingi Secondary School in Molo, Kenya. Bottom photo is view from Bishop Ndingi Primary School.

"Few persons understand what God would accomplish in them if they were to abandon themselves unreservedly to God and if they were to allow God’s grace to mold them accordingly.” - St. Ignatius Loyola

International Conference on Research Inclusivity and Sustainability

BY SR. AGNES NJOKI NJERU, CCVI “Opportunity knocks but once” is a common, wise saying that drove me to engage in a Virtual International Conference June 6-8, 2022. The Conference was organized

by De La Salle University Dasmarinas (Philippines) in partnership with Universitas Katolik Soegijapranata (Semarang, Indonesia), West Bengal State University (West Bengal, India), and School of Education Tangaza University College (Nairobi, Kenya).

The theme of the Conference was, “Creating Possibilities through Research”. I represented my cohort in the school of education, Tangaza, in carrying out research in the area of Education and Humanities. I focused on Teacher Preparedness in handling learners with special needs: A case of language disorders.

I grabbed the opportunity to be fully alive in our College mission: “Teaching Minds, Touching Hearts and Transforming Lives” through education. I focused on the need for inclusivity and sustainability in all levels of learning institutions through adequate teacher training.

In about half an hour, I had lived out my dream! I was humbled on the last day of the conference to hear my name announced as one of the best of two presenters in the cluster that handled Education and Humanities. It was quite a humbling yet life-giving experience to take initiative in discovering God’s gifts in me. Every dream is Valid! Praised be the Incarnate Word, Forever Amen!

Why We Celebrate the 4th of July

BY SR. DEENAN HUBBARD, CCVI

“We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America….”

The beginning of this document declares the basic reasons why the first thirteen colonies of what later grew into the fifty United States declared and established their new nation and independence from England or any other foreign government from controlling it. The Declaration of Independence was signed on July 4, 1776. We celebrate that day as Independence Day. The US culture usually celebrates with red, blue and white decorations in yards and family picnics, and barbeques in the afternoons and big concerts and fireworks in the evenings. I remember my brothers and I waving sparklers around on the driveway and writing our names in the sky with them…ah, magic!

It is a day of families everywhere celebrating our freedoms, our rights, our unity, our diversities, and responsibilities as a citizen. It is also a day of appreciating all who fight to help us preserve our freedoms, both in times past and currently, times like the attack on Pearl Harbor or 9/11 or government officials who do not work for the welfare of the good for all. These events remind us of how quickly our freedom could be lost. It takes vigilance to keep our freedom.

“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.”

- Preamble to the Declaration of Independence