Salt Lake diocese hosts two Holy Cross novices

Friday, Nov. 04, 2016

SALT LAKE CITY —Two Holy Cross novices are calling Utah their home for the next two months as they continue to discern their religious vocation in preparation for their first vows in May.

Sister Eva Costa, who is from Bangladesh, works in the Saint John the Baptist Elementary School library. She feels called to be a teacher, and assisting in the library is helping her learn to do that as well as how to work with children, she said.

She herself was taught by religious sisters in her village near the Bangladeshi capital of Dhaka, and she used to help them, she said. 

Her home life also contributed to her spirituality; she and her parents and brother would pray together in the evenings, she said. Her mother encouraged her to join a religious congregation, which she wanted to do, especially after attending a “Come and See” program. However, her father insisted that she finish high school before making that decision, she said.

In the meantime, two of her cousins became Holy Cross brothers, and “it is such an inspiration and model for me: ‘Oh, they are living this life. They look so happy!’ and ‘Oh, they work well!’” she said. 

She obeyed her father and finished high school, “but my desire to join Holy Cross and to be religious and to serve people did not go away,” she said.

The international aspect of the Holy Cross order attracted her, she said. She also likes the fact that the sisters don’t wear a habit; she noticed in her village that when sisters wearing habits visited “the people feel some differences, but as a Holy Cross sister I don’t put on any habit, so easily I can mingle with the people and be with them.”

Now as a Holy Cross novice, the training and experience she has received “helped me to grow more in my life and also in my relationship with God and discerning my vocation,” Sr. Eva said.

Coming to Utah has exposed her to a culture completely different from her own. For example, in Bangladesh she is welcome whenever she drops in at a neighbor’s house, whereas here she must call to see if they’re home and able to see her, she said. Also, “We never have snow in Bangladesh, and we don’t have to put boots and coats on. And we eat rice, and fish is our main food, and we eat lots of spices.”

While she is in Utah, she plans to learn more about the American culture and about teaching, as well as the mission and ministry of the Holy Cross sisters, she said, adding that her experiences have strengthened her belief that she has a true religious calling. When she prays, “I just say ‘Thank you that you have revealed Holy Cross to me,’” she said. “I love Holy Cross so much!” 

Unlike Sr. Eva, Sr. Ribilin Thongnibah feels at home in Utah’s fall weather because it is similar to that of the mountain region of northern India, where she is from, she said. 

Catholicism is fairly new in her village, she said; the Church just celebrated its 75th jubilee there. She lived with her grandparents, who were Presbyterian, until she was 9, and then her mother sent her to a Catholic boarding school, she said. It was there that she gradually came to realize that she might have a vocation, she said.

“For me personally, I used to have the desire – when I see the people in my own country, like the very poor people and very ignorant, they don’t have any education. … I wanted to do something. … I want the people to have more education,” because with an education they can achieve a better way of life, she said. 

In Utah, Sr. Ribilin is assigned to Our Lady of Lourdes School, where she is serving as a teacher’s aide in several different classrooms; and also to Holy Cross Ministries, where she assists clients with health care needs, she said; she is discerning a vocation in health care.

The two Holy Cross novices share many more similarities than differences. Sr. Ribilin also has a cousin who is a Holy Cross sister and encouraged her to explore whether she had a religious vocation. In addition, it was a weeklong Come and See program that led Sr. Ribilin to enter the order, because “I felt so much at home there and I liked the sisters and the prayer life and the community life,” she said.

Although she was taught by Salesian sisters, she joined the Congregation of the Holy Cross because “I like the way that the sisters live their charism” to serve the needs of the time, she said. 

She has noticed a difference between the calling of the Holy Cross sisters in her own country and those in the United States, she said. In India, the sisters are heavily involved in education, whereas in Utah, “I see that they are more helping the people in spiritual life, like in the parishes,” she said.

She is contributing to her parish’s spiritual life by helping with an adult religious education group on Sundays, along with other Holy Cross sisters, she said. 

All Holy Cross novices spend three months working in situations similar to those of Sr. Eva and Sr. Ribilin, said Sister Catherine Kamphaus, assistant superintendent of Utah Catholic Schools. “It’s an experience in ministry and community living … to be out in the field, so to speak, to help them with their discernment.

While other novices are assigned in different states, Utah is an excellent place for such an assignment because of Holy Cross’ long history here, where the sisters were involved with so many schools and hospitals, and now also have Holy Cross Ministries, which helps many immigrants, she said.

The two novices will be in Utah until December, when they will head toward the order’s mother house in Indiana. If all goes as planned, they will profess their first vows in May, then return to their home countries to minister.