Sister Mary Ursula Mongey
Sister Mary Ursula Mongey1931 – 2015
Born: 26th October 1931
Entered Religious Life: 14th October 1957
Died: 3rd August 2015
Homily given by Sr Úna O’Neill at Sr Ursula’s Funeral Mass
In the Gospel today Jesus asks us to put our trust in him as the way, the truth and the life. He invites us to put our hope in his promise to be with us, steadily and constantly, as we try each day to walk his way, to speak his truth and to live His life. That is surely a fitting description of the life of the woman whom we are celebrating here today.
On the 27th August 1848, our Foundress Mary Aikenhead wrote: “Pray that I may be faithful to the end”. Last Sunday night, at Ursula’s bedside, we recited the formula of the Vows which she took on the 18th April, 1960 the day of her Final Profession. At the end of that formula we ask the Lord to give us all the graces we need to be faithful unto death. And now Mary Aikenhead’s prayer for fidelity has surely been fulfilled in Ursula. Her life was an example to all of us of love and trust in the Lord, of faithfulness to her vows and of commitment to the service of those in need.
For Ursula – May as she is known to her family – today is the completion of a life history that began on the 26th October 1931 in a suburb of Dublin not far from here. From her parents and family she received the gift of faith that eventually led to her decision to become a Sister of Charity. After her profession she spent 29 years in St. Vincent’s in Cork where she fulfilled many roles in one. She was Chief Executive, (before the title was ever invented), manager, mother, carer, counsellor, friend and much more. We will never know how many people she helped, supported, encouraged, advised and stood up for in a myriad of different ways during her years there.
That spirit of selfless service continued in her ministry of hospitality in Bray, Baldoyle and in the Provincialate in Our Lady’s Mount and in St. Michael’s community until, in April 2011, she came to the Anna Gaynor unit in the Hospice. That was a lonely and difficult time for her but Ursula was a very practical woman who called a spade a spade and had little time for self pity or selfishness. So she settled in and became a central presence to many there – participating in the life of the unit as fully as she was able.
Like all of us Ursula knew pain and happiness, disappointment and contentment, loneliness and enjoyment. She suffered greatly – above all through her illness – these past few years and all of us, family, community, friends were saddened as we watched her suffering and her struggle to cope and to hope. It was inevitable that we would ask why: why had this generous, devoted, committed woman to endure so much? There is no answer to that question but in Ursula’s response to her suffering we may find the hint of an answer. She united her suffering with that of the Lord and, while sometimes frustration and sadness threatened to overwhelm her spirit, she never gave up hope.
So today’s reading from Isaiah is particularly appropriate: “Those who hope in the Lord renew their strength . .” and that is what she did. Her focus was on others. She was full of concern for her beloved sisters and brothers, nieces and nephews and the extended family. She prayed constantly for them and for the intentions of the Sisters and of Congregation and she spent much time writing cards and letter to loved ones.
In the Anna Gaynor unit her creative gifts emerged and she entered fully into the various activities offered including the baking and art classes, the crosswords and jigsaws. Her art was displayed in the Hospice exhibition in the art gallery off Grafton Street. She remained on the Hospice Mission committee right up to the end. She enjoyed her Tuesday evenings in Ard Mhuire. She spent happy hours in the rose garden and, as she would say herself, she slept peacefully when she went to pray in the Palliative care chapel! Above all she looked forward to and was sustained by the visits of her family whom she loved so well, as well as those of the sisters, friends, past and present residents of St. Vincent’s in Cork.
In her dying days she has been surrounded by those she loved so deeply and who ensured that her last hours were rich with prayer and presence and peace. The staff could not have been more caring and attentive to her every need and she died in peace.
Ursula trusted in God’s love for her. She did her best in whatever was asked of her as a Sister of Charity. She asked for little and lived simply. She cared for many with devotion and constancy. She gave her life in service of those in need. She did not look for praise or publicity. Now she is with God in the fullness of his life and love. In the words of the 2nd reading, “her good deeds go with her”.
So when times are difficult and when we feel lonely for her, may we remember deep in our hearts the promise of Jesus in the reading: no matter our fears or our restlessness, our doubts or anxieties, He is with us and will never fail us.
As we pray our blessings on Ursula’s final journey we are assured of one thing: her presence with us – loving us, caring for us, willing what is best for us. We are the better for having known her and our best remembrance of her will be to allow her life to be a source of inspiration and thanksgiving for us. May we learn from her life a little of what it means to be faithful to Jesus by doing our best to live for others.
May she rest in peace.
Sr. Joseph Helen Cunningham.
We are standing this morning on holy ground: the place where Mary Aikenhead spent the last years of her life as an invalid – a woman whose vision, courage and practical common-sense gave birth to our Congregation and to our long and graced history of service of the poor, the weak and the vulnerable.Today we are celebrating the life of Sr. Joseph Helen, a woman who cherished that charism, serving those in need with fidelity and generosity, and who also spent the last years of her life here in the Hospice.
The readings this morning are both comforting and challenging.In the Gospel Jesus speaks of himself as the Way, the Truth and the Life.He invites us to put our hope and our trust in Him and in His promise to be with us, steadily and constantly as we try each day to walk his way, to speak his truth, to live his life.It is an apt description of the life and commitment of the woman whom we are remembering here.
In her 103 years of life, Sr. Joseph Helen lived through historical and global changes that are impossible for us to imagine.She experienced seismic shifts in Church and state.She witnessed wars and famines on a world scale.Through all of those yearsshe remained steadfastly faithful to the constant core of who she was as an RSC.She was born Dorothy Cunningham in Ballacolla in Portlaoise on 1st July 1908. She was an only girl, with one brother, and was much loved by all.Her childhood and youth reflected the calm ordinariness of children’s lives at that time.Following her degree studies she spent some months caring for her mother who was ill and then secured a job teaching in Mountjoy St. School in Dublin.Her father was not impressed!His comment on hearing of that place was:“It doesn’t sound like much of a job but you like working for the poor and you’ve always been good at it”.She remained there until she entered the Sisters of Charity on 5th October 1931.
In the first reading we are told that God gives strength to the wearied; that those who hope in Yahweh will soar like eagles, run and no grow weary, walk and never tire.That was so true of J. Helen throughout her active life.She was missioned back to Mountjoy St. after her religious profession and taught there for 12 years.Following a year’s further study in Scotland, she went to teach in a Secondary Modern school inWalthamstow in England for a year.And then came the call to be one of our three founding Sisters of the Zambian Region, or Northern Rhodesia as it then was.
In 1948 they set sail, travelling for four weeks by boat – The Athlone Castle –rail, bus and lorry before arriving in Chisekesi Siding on a dark morning on 28th October 1948. Sr. Helen kept a diary of the journey which was printed for the 50th anniversary and which gives a fascinating insight into their journey and how they coped with, what was for them, such a strange and almost ‘alien’ environment.
One can only imagine the anticipation and anxiety, the challenge and the loneliness, the wonder and the doubts that marked that journey and her first months in Zambia.It was a place and people that she came to love and cherish.She committed herself to the education of girls and brought the gift of knowledge and freedom to countless women who still remember her with gratitude and appreciation.There are many past pupils with sad hearts in Zambia at the moment – their sadness at her passing tempered only by their gratitude that she is free from the debilities of her age.And that mourning is echoed this morning among our sisters there in the Region and here in this Chapel in the sisters who lived with her and shared her life for those 30 years.
Her first 15 years in Zambia were spent in the Teacher training college run by the Jesuits and began her work in promoting the education of girls – beginning with the setting up of a girls secondary boarding school in Roma in Lusaka.Nine years later she was appointed Regional Leader and on Independence day 1978she was conferred with the Order of Distinguished Service for 30 years of outstanding service to the people of Zambia in the fields of Education and Social work.
While she was a formidable woman in many ways, with high standards and expectations, her devotion to her religious life and her commitment to education was recognized and appreciated by all who knew her.She was a strict disciplinarian, spoke the truth without apology and demanded very high standards.At the same time her heart was compassionate and her generosity and hospitality were known and appreciated by all.
Like all of us, Helen has known suffering and joy, tears and laughter, pain and happiness, loneliness and friendship.And she had strong relationships with herfriends – too numerous to mention – but exemplified in the love and devotion of Sr. Mary Bernadette Collins and Catherine Fallon.Up to the end she valued and enjoyed her relationships with her nieces, nephews and other family members and followed their lives with interest, with love and with prayer.
In 1978 she was missioned to Ireland and worked on our Constitutions.Subsequently she was appointed as local leader to our community in Crumlin before her appointment to our Provincial Leadership team and consequent arrival here in Our Lady’s Mount in 1981.
Sr. J. Helen’s commitment to Mary Aikenhead’s charism was single-minded and she never compromised on that.The second reading confirms her attitude to life:nothing outweighs the supreme advantage of knowing Christ Jesus. It is only through Him, with Him and in Him that we can find life and happiness and fulfilment.Rooted in that conviction, she endorsed and embraced anything that served the people for whom she cared in a better, more dignified or respectful way.
She suffered in her growing debility and weakness these last years and all of us – family, community, friends and colleagues – were saddened as we watched her suffering and her struggle to cope.In spite of the wonderful, caring staff who surrounded her and the sisters and friends who were her constant support,she had difficult and dispiriting days.Yet she never gave up .Her faith in Providence was the touchstone of her life.In the midst of all her pain and letting-go she was confident that he was with her, holding her, comforting her and in the end, calling her to himself.And when that call came, sheyielded her spirit to the Lord, peace-filled, calm and trusting – blest with a death that had no struggle, no pain, no fear.And perhaps I can end with some words of hers, written in the diary of which I spoke, on her arrival in Chikuni:“Now that we have reached our Promised Land we must thank God and Our Lady for our very pleasant and on the whole easy journey which we have had . . . . “Those words echo, not only the journey to Chikuni, but her life journey, now at its end as she moves, we believe, into the fullness of the Promised land of God’s life and love.
