"Westward the Torch!"

I’ve mentioned I am working on a biography of Isabel Shepperson, born in 1867, who took the religious name Sister Mary Fides when she received the Black Veil of the Sisters of Mercy in 1901.

She was a prolific writer, and I have been reading her books, newspaper columns, and essays—what a wordsmith, thinker, philosopher, historian!

Some of her writing is “deep”—her Seventeen Crises of World History (1933) for example. She also wrote poetry, and her prose often reads poetic, and today I am sharing a short essay—not deep, but an image of occasional life, an image of bidding farewell.

She wrote this in 1928 when she was Directoress of Studies at St. Xavier Academy in Beatty, Pennsylvania. A number of her friends—fellow Sisters, were leaving Pennsylvania for new assignments in far west Oklahoma. She titled it “Westward the Torch!” It’s a beautiful piece of writing. I hope you’ll agree.

Westward the Torch!

Last Thursday morning, July 5, 1928, an historic scene was enacting at the front entrance of old St. Xavier’s, Beatty. It featured the departure of a little band of Sisters of Mercy for new fields of labor and new homes in Oklahoma.

There were smiling farewells that hinged on tears; there were bantering gaiety, fearful and wonderful prophecies, semi sadness, semi gladness, admiration, hope, humor, and song; yet under it all ran the questioning wonder—what awaits them? When shall we meet again? What lies hidden in the years? St. Xavier’s seemed in sympathy with the scene. A drizzling mist hid the hills and sulked over the grove and the front lawn and over the assembled Community of the Sisters breathing out blessings and farewells. The Sister’s cemetery, not very far away, watched through the weeping willows and echoed the blessings and farewells. But St. Xavier’s chapel, wise with the wisdom of eternal years, sent forth the incense odors of a recent Benediction and infused therewith into the hearts of all the courage of the Cross and the peace of God.

Eighty-five years ago, a pioneer band of Sisters of Mercy came to take charge of a log cabin school not far from the site of the present imposing structure known as St. Xavier’s Academy. It is the old story of the spark that grew into a fire, spreading warmth and light and comfort. And today, from that sacred flame the torch is again lit and carried—westward. May it endure, may it increase, may it give out light and warmth and comfort; may it in turn light the torch which shall carry on to the end of the little day of time! And then—why, the good Explanation of it all, and knowledge of the wisdom of the eternal Plan, and peace forever in God. So, we dream—at old St. Xavier’s in the mist, in this hour of partings, blessings, and—Farewell!