I was born and raised in South Florida to Haitian parents where I grew up speaking French with my mother and Haitian Creole with my father until my parent’s divorce in my middle school years. Growing up our family attended St. Bartholomew Catholic Church every Sunday where I received my First Holy Communion in elementary school and continued in weekly CCD through 8th grade.
At St. Bart’s, I began my two-year Confirmation preparation program but in the summer between 9th and 10th grade, I was severely injured in a house fire and did not return for the second year of formation. My mother deeply desired me to receive this sacrament but between hospital visits, raising me and my sister on one income, and my own teenage resistance, she chose to allow me and my sister the freedom to decide when we would want to commit to Confirmation. Throughout middle and high school, my sister and I attended both Catholic mass and Baptist services (with my extended family), youth groups, and bible studies with my mom. I generally enjoyed being Catholic and participating in youth activities but I thought the faith was little more than an extracurricular activity and a vague moral compass.
In August of 2013, I left home to begin my freshman year at George Mason University in Fairfax, Virginia. That year I slowly stopped attending Sunday mass through lack of personal conviction. I was soon pursued by the campus ministry to join RCIA for Confirmation. Through formation and accompaniment, my mind and heart were opened to the beauty of the Church. I was sealed with the gifts of the Holy Spirit on April 23rd, 2015 at the GMU Catholic Campus Ministry. I began giving more yeses each year to Jesus as He called me to give more of myself and eventually become a FOCUS missionary.
My heart first opened to the idea of religious life with my RCIA class during a spring break trip my sophomore year of college. We stayed with the Franciscan Sisters of the Eucharist in Meriden, CT. I was already on a “Jesus high” from falling in love with the Church and being just two months away from receiving Confirmation. In that week-long encounter with religious, I
was struck by the total self-gift of the Sisters. Later in senior year, I attended a Come & See weekend retreat with the Servants of the Lord and of the Virgin of Matara. I did not receive a call but left that weekend with a greater conviction to say yes to whatever the Lord called me to.
In February of 2018, the spring of my first year as a FOCUS missionary, two of my best friends invited me to attend a Young Women’s Retreat with the Sisters of Life in Connecticut. I was excited to attend and during the first evening introductory session, I boldly declared that I was hoping to receive a vocation during the weekend! In the Lord’s kindness, instead of a vocational call, He provided me with a vocational grace. During one of the prayer periods in Adoration, I received the following image: I was standing in the middle of a forest clearing clothed in athletic attire. Before me were two open paths with vocations standing before each. On the first path stood a married woman wearing a shirt and jeans. On the other was a woman in a religious habit. Both seemed beautiful in my eyes! I had a strong sense that the Lord said to me, “I have a vocation for you, but I don’t want you to run down the path just yet. Keep warming up. I’ll call you when it’s time.” I was so glad to receive this blessing from the Father and resolved to continue striving for divine intimacy with Him with great trust that my joy-filled future was held safely in His heart.
In spring of 2019 I ended a brief relationship I’d been in with a wonderful gentleman. We’d dated for almost three months but as I recognized some natural incompatibility I also began sensing a deeper pull in my heart to intentionally discern a call to give myself fully to the Lord. When he and I broke up my heart surprisingly felt so joyfully free to be exclusively the Lord’s! I still had a natural draw to marriage, but I could not shake the reality that has remained burning in my heart that the Lord has created me for so much more on this earth. A strong and peaceful fire burns in my heart to live with an unlimited capacity for spiritual children, interceding and laboring for the salvation of souls, and witnessing in this life to the marriage we’re all called to in eternal life.
I spent that fall discussing discernment with my spiritual director, Fr. Paul Werley, and over the course of a few months, I prayed about how the Lord had shaped my heart and which charisms I might be drawn to. I sought an order that was contemplative/active, Eucharist-centered, wore traditional habits, lived with openness to the gifts of the Holy Spirit, and had little to do with medicine. After some time pouring over the Institute on Religious Life’s
Women’s Affiliate database, I narrowed my search down to the Sisters of Life, Dominican Sisters, and a small community in Canada.
I was preparing to contact the Sisters of Life first but a voice spoke to my heart on the topic of chastity that said, “You are not free, you will never be free, and even if you were…you’re not pro-life enough.” Though years would go by having completely forgotten the lie that was spoken to me, I’m grateful that in that season I chose to pause discernment and entrust my
vocation to Mary. I’ve been following Mary ever since, confident that she is ultimately leading me to the loving arms of the Father, and along the way, my vocation will be revealed.
In mid-December 2019, I attended a five-day Spiritual Exercises Retreat with a laywoman as my director. In sharing my prayer (minus the lies spoken), she invited me to consider the possibility of “the single vocation” as one Mary might be leading me to. This was initially met on my part with deep sadness, but I sought to remain open at the time to her guidance because by then I had put religious life on the back burner. I learned about Consecrated Virginity from a book she recommended. The vocation was defined as being rooted in Catholic Tradition and included some distinctly spousal language which I was drawn to. I knew with certainty that my heart longed to belong entirely to the Lord and love Him with an undivided heart.
Early in 2020, I received a grace in adoration of Jesus asking if I would be His bride. I gave a resounding yes but had little understanding of how exactly He wanted me to give myself to Him. I decided to enter a season of intentional discernment of Consecrated Virginity with an indeterminate timeline and I explicitly offered my whole heart to Jesus that summer. In this offering He led me from Connecticut to California to Colorado as a FOCUS Team Director and Regional Director. Over those years of discernment, I saw the Lord close doors and lead me into seasons of prolonged waiting. The waiting and trials included were abundantly blessed as they matured me and intensified the call I believe He placed on my heart from the beginning: to be set apart for Him alone. I had total certainty of my call to consecrated life. The question I wrestled with was, “When and how does the Lord desire me to give myself to Him forever?”
On Mardi Gras 2023 in adoration, I sensed the Lord bless me and tell me He wanted me to begin something vocational that coming August. I shared this with my current spiritual director, Fr. Kevin Dyer, SJ, and we decided to wait to see what the Lord would reveal about what He meant. In the summer of 2023, I had a providential conversation with Sr. Mary Casey, SV and during it, the Holy Spirit brought back the memory of the lies spoken to my heart four years prior. The Father made it clear that I am His sheep who now knows His voice and that it was not His voice that originally spoke to me. Through His abundant grace, I have been living an integrated life of chastity for many years and my identity as His daughter has undergone renewal and continual restoration. It was after I received this freedom that I began to reconsider religious life with a more mature lens. To my great shock and joy, the attraction I’d originally felt was then paired with a clear invitation from Jesus to pursue discernment with the Sisters of Life. I decided to pause discernment of Consecrated Virginity and discern with the Sisters for six months from July to December.
It is difficult to express in words the plentiful flow of graces I received in those six months. Where there were roadblocks and closed doors with Consecrated Virginity, the Father went ahead of me removing obstacles and encouraging me along the way towards the charism of life. Any and all roadblocks (both circumstantial and interior) were clear distractions that have, in the end, just strengthened my resolve to praise and follow Him more resolutely.
On my first visit, August 1-5th, I had the incredible privilege of participating in the preparation for the sisters’ final vows celebrations and attending the wedding itself! Of the many, one of the biggest graces during this time was on the day I arrived and in prayer saw myself as an exhausted little lamb in the arms of the Good Shepherd having done a ton of work leading up to the trip. This imagery continued in prayer throughout the five days. Around day 3 or 4 during the Office of Readings as we sang, “King of Love My Shepherd Is”, I had a distinct image of Jesus holding me as a small lamb and walking me down the aisle to the altar. He placed me on the altar before the Father and trustingly, I lay there in wait. For the rest of the day, I considered this image, questioning whether the Father would receive me as the offering I so deeply longed to be. The next time we were in the chapel praying the sorrowful mysteries, it struck me that nothing offered by Jesus is ever rejected by the Father. This realization led to a continuation of the previous image and this time my life was sacrificed and lifted up as a share in the gift of Christ Crucified. This filled me with joy, awe, and longing. I began asking the Lord, “How do you want me to lay down my life?” I left my visit at peace having taken the first major step and ready to see what movements would take place in my heart in the months that followed.
In the time between my first and second visit, I missed the horarium, the community life, and the purposefulness that seemed to fill every moment of each day. I sought to replicate a bit of what I’d witnessed with the sisters: rising daily between 5-530AM, adding the Office of Readings to my daily practice of Lauds and Vespers, seeking volunteer opportunities, striving to engage my will in the areas I struggle at work, and generally asking the Lord to help me to live my whole life for Him today, each day. I began slowly reading Evangelium Vitae and a novel by Michael O’Brien, A Cry of Stone, which consistently left me in a literal mess of tears. I spent more time pondering and praying about the reality of the sacredness of every human life and the universal call to protect and enhance. In giving talks for retreats and other events I sought to incorporate ways to share the charism of life with everyone I met. As time went on my desire to return to the Sisters grew!
When I arrived for my extended stay November 2-12th it felt like I had come back home. It was as though I got to reenter the steady current of religious life that is always flowing and it was natural and invigorating. From community prayer to washing dishes, stocking shelves at their Visitation convent to dinner at the Hope and Healing mission convent, looking out for raccoons while taking out the trash to playing Press Conference during community recreation, I constantly found myself so blissfully content. Throughout the ten days, I recognized that it didn’t so much matter what we were doing, I just knew I wanted to be with and like the Sisters around me. I wanted to learn to love and serve as they did. I absolutely loved the postulant formation classes and it was so edifying to hear from different convents about their missions. Towards the end of the ten days, I realized that this deep peace in my heart was a fruit of feeling more myself than I’d felt in years. Every part of my heart was alive and thriving. Where there were hesitations or fears, the Father was so present and invited me not to run from the discomfort of vulnerability but to remain with Him and allow the time for Heart to speak to heart.
I went into the visit having asked about a dozen friends and family to pray for the same intention: freedom and clarity in discernment. The Lord did not disappoint. Through homilies, meetings with Sr. Maria Regina, times of contemplative prayer, and apostolic visits I was able to see more and more clearly how the Lord was inviting me deeper. Each day my fears were spoken into and the burning desire in my heart grew to enter the Sisters of Life!
During the Come and See retreat at the end of my extended visit, I read The Jeweller’s Shop by Karol Wojtyla. Many lines pierced my heart but one in particular, “Will you be my life’s companion?” stayed with me. In the midst of a play that illustrates the beauty and the risk of loving and being loved, I experienced an acknowledgement of my fears and deepest hopes. After receiving my application from Mother Mary Concepta that week, I sat in my room and held the package in my hands. I experienced a profound stillness and fullness with the Lord. I was left with the realization that every single thing that happens in my life is ordained by my loving Father not just for my good in the moment but my good as a whole on the continuum of my entire life and His plan for me. And this is true for everyone! We receive an invitation to constant daily surrender, trust, abandonment, and participation with all that He gives. I believe that Jesus planted the seed of my religious vocation in my heart many years ago but He does not stir up or awaken love until He pleases. Upon receiving my acceptance letter I was overwhelmed with peace, joy, and gratitude. The thought, “It is right and merciful.” echoed in my heart. I am beyond grateful to have received the abundant mercy of the Father in this way. In response, I am so excited that on September 7th, 2024, the vigil of the Nativity of Mary, Lord permitting, I will be able to give to Him the gift of my whole life through postulancy with the Sisters of Life!
2024 Grant Recipient