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Mission & Ministry Magazine: Love is Willing the Good of Another

By July 1, 2025July 10th, 2025No Comments

Our Mission is to Love

Dear Friends,

The great Dominican St. Thomas Aquinas defined love as: “willing the good of one another.”

God perfectly wills the good of each of us; therefore, we are to do likewise. By creating us in God’s divine image and likeness, we are created to receive God’s goodness and to share such goodness with others, for “God is love” (1 Jn 4:8).

The Dominican Sisters ~ Grand Rapids remain steadfast in living our commitment made in baptism: to grow in the Love of God and to be Christ in the world.
We are heartbroken at the ways “the good of one another” is being disregarded in recent months, with backsliding on protections for civil and human rights as well as the climate and our planet. This is a time for steadfastness in our faith and our calling and a re-investment in our efforts to be about justice, peace, and relationship with all God’s people.

Deepening spirituality and relationships are core to our ministry at Dominican Center Marywood at Aquinas College. Our team continues to grow and evolve as we respond to the needs and the gifts that reveal themselves. How grateful we are for the fruits of the Spirit inviting us into deeper relationship with God and with a community that aspires to love, goodness, truth, and justice. Enjoy learning about our Foundations in Spirituality course in this issue of Mission & Ministry.

People of Love surround you and me: family and friends, neighbors, and strangers – wrapping us in the Love of our Creator.

My heart is especially full of a sense of the largesse of Love. I recently returned from two meetings in Rome. While there I prayed at the resting place of one Pope and saw in person the announcement of a new one. It is one thing to experience the closeness of community the Dominican Sisters of Grand Rapids share with one another. Can you imagine that presence — almost a thousand-fold? The first meeting I attended was for the Union of International Superiors General (UISG), a gathering of the heads of women’s congregations from all over the world – 1,903 Superiors General (or Prioresses, as we would say) from every continent. Women religious are as vibrant and committed to the mission of Jesus today as the day each of their congregations was founded. The second meeting was for Dominican Sisters International Confederation (DSIC), which gathers the prioresses from 144 Dominican congregations in 109 countries representing 17,544 Sisters around the world. It is a blessing to know that we Dominican Sisters ~ Grand Rapids are members of the worldwide Order of Preachers (OP) carrying out an 800-year mission inspired by the spirit of our founder St. Dominic de Guzmán: to preach God’s love through our lives.

Thankful for you, our companions in mission.

Megan McElroy, OP, Prioress


Learn more and enjoy other articles and lots of photographs in this issue.https://issuu.com/dominicansistersgrandrapids/docs/mission_ministry_summer_2025_

  • Poem: “The Search” by Kaye Ashe, OP
  • “Seasons of Foundations”:  Deepening Spirituality and Relationships with Dominican Center by Stacy Spitler, Director of Communications
  • “Wisdom Sharing” Foundations in Spirituality Experiences by Thomas Eggleston, Bridget Clark Whitney
  • “Rambling Prayer” by Marcia Good, Dominican Associate
  •  “Celebrating our 2025 Jubilarians” 
  • “Justice Ministry Welcomes Promoter of Justice Jessica Eimer Bowen”  
  • “Grantmaking for Mission with Grand Rapids Dominican Sisters Foundation” by Alyssa Morillo Scheidt
  • Together in Life & Legacy: Jack and Rita Kirkwood
  • Welcome Pope Leo XIV

 

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