PART 4
Continuing the story of the nine County Kilkenny nuns who brought the gift of education to Australia…
BY JOHN FITZGERALD
Shortly before the Callan nuns at the Parramatta Convent, the Monte Sisters had left mysteriously after fifteen years of service to the community. To this day, nobody knows why.
The suspicion at the time was that the Dean had allegedly asked them to leave, and the Callan sisters feared he mightn’t be too happy at the prospect of another batch of nuns arriving on his patch.
Mother Mary Clare and one of her colleagues visited the convent, expecting to find a reasonably furnished interior. To their amazement and incredulity, the sole item of furniture in the building was a dodgy looking bedstead with only two legs.
But a week later, the Callan nuns moved into the building and unpacked after the Ladies Furnishing Committee in Parramatta agreed to help them make the convent habitable…or just about. The kitchen, which had no stove, had been cobbled together from corrugated iron. Their table was a soapbox, and the “chairs” were upturned packing cases.
Their first night there- on December 6th – was disagreeable, to put it mildly. Sweltering heat kept them awake. They tossed and turned in their beds, sweating profusely. This was far removed from the easy-going middle of the road climate back in Callan.
The high temperature was bad enough, but as the night wore on the exhausted women had their patience tested further when an army of mosquitoes attacked their sleeping quarters.
Never having experienced these nasty critters in Ireland, they panicked at first…then they remembered their harsh, ruthless, but effective training in Callan…this had included bug-killing techniques and anti-mosquito protective measures. They used catechisms as both defensive shields and weapons of assault.
Forming a circle, they swatted the invaders with great relish, smearing the walls with hundreds of annihilated blood-spattered carcasses.
Apart from a few bites, the Callan side emerged victorious from the five-hour battle.
And the mosquitoes proved a blessing in disguise. The exertion required repelling them caused the nuns to forget the scorching heat. “The Lord works in mysterious ways”, Mother Mary quipped as she trampled on the last of the bugs.
The nuns cleaned up the building and a beautiful white and gold tabernacle was added to their little oratory, together with statues of their favourite Saints and the Blessed Virgin.
Monsignor O’ Haren, who had travelled with them to Australia, arrived in the early hours of December 8th to celebrate the first mass in their new Convent. The nuns were thrilled when he handed them a freshly strangled goose for dinner. It was still warm.
All he asked in return for this gift, he joked, was a place at the dinner table. “And don’t forget the stuffing!” he pleaded, winking at Mother Mary. He then blessed the building and said mass.
Next day, the nuns commenced what they believed to be their divinely inspired mission, the life of unselfish devotion to helping other human beings for which they had prepared in the spiritual Boot Camp of far–away Callan.
Breaking into two groups, some of them organized catechism classes for children, while others visited Parramatta Hospital and a nearby Home for the Aged. The nuns who ventured out of the Convent had to wear heavy serge habits, cloaks, and bonnets, and have their faces screened by gossamer veils.
Not exactly the most comfortable attire in scorching hot weather, but they bore their daily discomposure in silence. Nuns in those days had a sterner image than today, when the sisters walk or cycle about town as they please, admire themselves in shop windows, and fraternize with the locals…
To be continued…
