August 3, 2021

Events & Retreats – 8.4.21

Author of White Fragility Zoom Session

Finally, the OPSCC Justice Committee will be holding a Zoom Session with Robin D’Angelo on August 15th from 2 pm – 3:30 pm. Interested attendees can learn more and RSVP by contacting Sr. Ceil Lavan at ceilie@aol.com.

Hand of Iowa City makes Sinsinawa Concert Debut

SINSINAWA, WI – Gregory Hand of Iowa City, IA, is making his debut organ concert of the Summer Organ Concert series at Sinsinawa Mound at 7 p.m. CDT Wednesday, Aug. 18. Concert guests will follow COVID-19 protocol, including wearing a mask, practicing social distancing and using hand sanitizer, and attendance will be limited to 125 people. Guests will have limited access to the main foyer and Queen of the Rosary Chapel. The concerts will also be available online at www.sinsinawa.org/live at the time of the concert or later in an archived format by tapping or clicking on “on demand.”

Hand is associate professor of organ at the University of Iowa. Prior to this appointment, he held the position of university chapel organist at Northwestern University, where he also taught in the Music Theory department. Hand was awarded the Doctor of Musical Arts from the University of Michigan, where he studied organ with James Kibbie and harpsichord with Edward Parmentier. He is in high demand as a performer and educator. He was recently appointed to a five-year term on the jury of the Internationale Orgelwoche Nürnberg (ION) and has given recitals and masterclasses in the United States, France, Spain, Germany, and Brazil.

For more information, contact Arrangements at 608-748-4411 or visit our website at www.sinsinawa.org/moundcenter. Sinsinawa Mound, the motherhouse for the Sinsinawa Dominican Sisters, is located in southwest Wisconsin on County Road Z, off Highway 11, about five miles northeast of Dubuque.

Urbi et Orbi: Hold the Date

The sponsoring Dominican schools of preaching in the Philippines, Germany, and United States had hoped for our next global Dominican preaching colloquium to be in Manila in October 2020. Then, the pandemic set in, and the steering committee chose to delay the meeting to this October 2021. But the pandemic continues—and though the colloquium will proceed in Manila this October 12 to 14, very few people will be able to travel, even within the Philippines. And so, we are working on ways to make the content of the colloquium accessible at a distance.

The colloquium is called Urbi et Orbi: Dominican Preaching to the City and the World. Keynote speakers are Gerard Timoner (Master of the Order), Barbara Beaumont (Dominican nun in Portugal), Margaret Mayce (Dominican Sisters International), and Ann Garrido (Aquinas Institute faculty). Keynote speeches will premiere at 8 p.m. each day in Manila. However, 8 p.m. in Manila in the US is 8 a.m. East, 7 a.m. Central, 6 a.m. Mountain, 5 a.m. Pacific! Though we will be sending information about how to link to the live premiere of these talks, we also will make the talks and other presentations available online for later use by the Dominican Family at study meetings and other gatherings. More information will follow.

Mini Retreat Reflects on Pope’s Teachings, Living Cosmology

Sinsinawa Mound Center is sponsoring Living Cosmology Reflected in Pope Francis from 2 to 3:30 p.m. CDT Saturday, Aug. 28, via Zoom. Our living creation story (or living cosmology) reveals the deep-time values of differentiation, interiority, and communion. These universal dynamics provide a comprehensive context from which to reflect on our tradition’s evolving religious consciousness and teachings. In this light, participants will reflect on Pope Francis’ teaching, especially the encyclicals “Laudato Si’: On Care for Our Common Home” and “Fratelli Tutti: On Fraternity and Social Friendship” and look through the doorway of our cosmological identity as a spiritual journey possessing inherent values that live like seeds, constantly activated within us as mutual respect, a culture of care, kindness, justice, and healing. Sister Maureen Wild, SC, will facilitate this miniretreat. She is an educator, speaker, and retreat guide focusing on themes of spiritual ecology and serves as director of two spiritual-based ecological learning centers in the United States and Canada. The fee is $15 per person, and the registration deadline is Aug. 26 at 4 p.m. Please register by contacting Arrangements at 608-748-4411 or visiting our website at www.sinsinawa.org/moundcenter.

Workshop Guides Personal Emergence from Pandemic

Come to Sinsinawa Mound for an afternoon of listening to the Spirit through guided discussions, reflection prompts, and sharing stories. Emerge Gently: Telling Our Pandemic Story will be held from 1 to 5 Saturday, Aug. 21. Please check our website for current COVID protocols.

Participants will deepen their realization of what has been stirring in them and their communities since the spring of 2020. Everyone has a unique, still-unfolding pandemic story. As we emerge from last year’s ways of being and enter new ones, let us help one another listen to our inner wisdom. What has been shown regarding your connections to others? Has anything shifted in your relationship to time? Have you discovered any new desires regarding your connections to land or the sacred? Such tender insights are gifts to be honored. Let us slow down, hold them in reflective care and song together and then emerge to act upon them with our whole hearts. Some outdoor walking on paved paths and sitting may occur, weather permitting. If possible, please bring a journal.

Presenters are Susanna Cantu Gregory and Eric Anglada. She serves as assistant professor of religious studies at Clarke University in Dubuque, Iowa, where she teaches courses in spirituality and ecclesiology. He is the ecological programming coordinator at Sinsinawa Mound and cofounder of St. Isidore Catholic Worker Farm in Cuba City, Wis.

The fee is $25 per person, and the registration deadline is Aug. 16. For more information or to register, contact Arrangements at 608-748-4411 or visit our website at www.sinsinawa.org/moundcenter. Sinsinawa Mound, the motherhouse for the Dominican Sisters of Sinsinawa, is located in southwest Wisconsin on County Road Z, off Highway 11, about five miles northeast of Dubuque.

Zelek of Madison Makes Sinsinawa Debut

Gregory Zelek rounds out our 2021 Summer Organ Concert series with his first appearance of the Summer Organ Concert series at Sinsinawa Mound at 7 p.m. CDT Wednesday, Aug. 25. The concerts will also be available online at www.sinsinawa.org/live at the time of the concert or later in an archived format by tapping or clicking on “on demand.” Please check our website for current COVID protocols.

Zelek is the principal organist of the Madison (WI) Symphony Orchestra (MSO) and curator of the Overture concert organ, where he oversees all the MSO’s organ programming. In addition to concertizing throughout the United States, Zelek regularly performs with orchestras around the country as both a soloist and professional ensemble member. He is artist in residence for the 2021–22 season of a new organ program for the Jacksonville Symphony that will showcase their Bryan concert organ. Zelek received his bachelor’s and master’s degrees, as well as an artist diploma, from the Juilliard School as a student of Paul Jacobs.

Gallery Exhibit Invites Reflection on Water and Early Inhabitants

Sinsinawa Art Gallery presents “Recent Paintings: Isabel Rafferty, OP” through Aug. 26. The gallery is available for viewing 8 a.m. to 7 p.m. daily. Please check our website for current COVID protocols.

Sister Isabel Rafferty, OP, a Dominican Sister of Sinsinawa and artist, studied the medium of water-based oils on canvas the last few years with Professor Bob Tarrell of Edgewood College, Madison, WI. This exhibit showcases her work during that time. Paintings of lakes are from Lake Wingra, Madison, or Spider Lake, Hayward, WI. “I love the way the light and wind are in constant play with the water,” Sister Isabel said. Other paintings were inspired by her reflection on those who lived on the area’s sacred land before settler colonialism and conversations with professors and historians regarding the history of enslaved people. She invites people to reflect on the painting and listen to what they have to say to them.

For more information, contact Mary Kay Kane at 608-748-4411 or visit our website at www.sinsinawa.org/moundcenter. Sinsinawa Mound, the motherhouse for the Sinsinawa Dominican Sisters, is located in southwest Wisconsin on County Road Z, off Highway 11, about five miles northeast of Dubuque.