Filling the World with Love

By Elizabeth Bookser Barkley

Since S. Mary Bookser has been active in liturgical ministry in the Sisters of Charity Community, one might assume that her musical theme song would be a refrain from a psalm or a line of Gregorian chant.

Not so. She treasures a song she heard as a preteen from the 1939 movie “Good-bye, Mr. Chips.”

“When I heard the song ‘Fill the World with Love,’ it grabbed my heart, and I have never forgotten it,” S. Mary says. “This song defines the mission of my life.”

It’s obvious to those who know her that she has embodied these lines for 60 years: “In the evening of my life I shall look to the sunset. And the question I shall ask, only God can answer. … Did I fill the world with love my whole life through?”

As a teacher and counselor and in her work in the Community with women in initial formation as well as on Leadership Council, she says, at her core she was called to be “a loving presence to each person who came into my life.”

Born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and raised in Springfield, Ohio, she has spent much of her Community life within the Archdiocese of Cincinnati, as a religion and music teacher at Holy Angels/Lehman High School in Sidney, Ohio, at Seton and Mount Notre Dame high schools in Cincinnati, and at Mount St. Joseph university. But her world view has been enhanced and deeply affected by visits to Mexico, Guatemala, and Armenia, “as well as other places of deep poverty and ecological deprivation.”

Interacting with college students from demographics different from most she has encountered in archdiocesan high schools, S. Mary worked for a few years at Cincinnati State, where she counseled students and advised the men’s and women’s basketball and soccer teams.

She brought to this position the same empathy and concern for individual needs as she does to every encounter. She would listen to their lives—some came from urban poverty and others from poverty situations in other countries, but always she would encourage them to work to complete their education as a way forward into a better future.

One of the gifts S. Mary brings to every interaction is her ability to listen, to others and to the movement of the Spirit in her life.

S. Mary Bookser (left) and her sister Elizabeth Bookser Barkley (right) share a passion for education and enjoyed the opportunity to work together at Mount St. Joseph University for many years.

(Back row, from left) Jean Brinzer, S. Mary Bookser, Cathy Bookser-Feister, Barb Fraze, Elizabeth Bookser Barkley and Susie Bookser celebrate their parents (front row) Wally and Kit’s 50th wedding anniversary in 1994.

“When I am in counseling mode, I love to listen to whatever people want to talk about, an issue of deep concern or something that gives them joy,” she says.

Whatever they share “comes into me and it gets transformed,” she goes on. “I am able to provide a presence where they feel safe, knowing I would never share what they confided. I have a level of peace that they need.”

At times she assumes the role of “spiritual companion” to those who seek her insights. “Some people would say I provide ‘spiritual direction,’ but I prefer the term ‘companion,’” she explains. “The Holy Spirit is really the director.”

Since S. Mary and I worked together at the Mount for years, I have seen how her gifts have touched people I work with. Though she is no longer a fulltime presence on campus (she still touches students’ lives as an adjunct instructor), her impact remains.

Whenever I meet one maintenance employee in the hall, we exchange greetings, followed by “Have you seen your sister lately? How is she?”

He has shared with me the spiritual bond he still feels with her that formed when he would stop in her office when she was coordinator of Service Learning. They talked about “spiritual things,” such as his encounters with deceased relatives as he walked along the waters of his native Hawaii. And she understood.

Her willingness to listen and her openness to wisdom from dreams and the movement of the Spirit has made her special to her five sisters, in-laws, nieces and nephews around the u.S. Somehow, she senses when a card in the mail or a text message is warranted to help them through a rough stretch.

As my daughter Katie once said—and the line has been picked up by family members: “Aunt Mary knows things.”

Another gift she exhibits was articulated by a friend at the Mount who has worked with and admires her. It was during a presentation in a freshman class we co-taught that he attached a name to what I had always observed.

We were exploring various “character strengths” appearing on a screen as we examined students’ self-identified strengths sorted by categories such as courage, justice, humanity and wisdom. Many virtues that emerged as their “signature strengths” were easy to understand, such as kindness, leadership and fairness. One that stumped them, however, was “perspective.” My friend turned to me, with an “aha” look in his eyes, then announced to the class, “When you do Service Learning, you will meet a model of perspective in S. Mary Bookser, who fits the VIA definition so well: ‘being able to provide wise counsel to others.’”

During her eight years on the Community’s Leadership Council, one of her roles was liaison to the Communications Office, and she also helped to develop the SC Liaison program. In all deliberations during those years and even now in retirement, she lends her wisdom to Community committees, including the formation advisory committee and to groups such as Sisters of Earth. It’s an international group, a place for her to pursue a passion for ecological justice fueled by her friendship with the late S. Paula Gonzalez, with whom she helped build EarthConnection and La Casa del Sol, where she lived until it was razed to make way for a new building.

Seeing La Casa come down was painful because it was the home where she had lived the longest during her years in the Community. As in other hard times, she was able to bring perspective to this change, which she applauds as necessary and exciting, a reminder that the Community will keep evolving.

“We have a positive future as a Congregation. We have lots of valuable ministries and good energy among our retired Sisters and our young Sisters, who are committed to working with those on the margins,” she observes.

She plans to be a part of that bright future by contributing her insights to committee work and Chapter deliberations.

She reiterates the “mission” she latched onto decades ago when she first heard what became the theme song of her life.

“In retirement I am trying to bring peace, light and especially love to all I meet.”