Student Submission: All Things New: The Chapel Reopening

By Meredith Toussaint

Our Lady of Victory Chapel was the first place I was taken when I toured St. Kate’s four years ago, and before I even decided to go here, I fell in love with it. It was one of the first places I went to when I moved in for my freshman year, it was where I started singing at Sunday masses in my first few weeks here, and it has since become the place in this world that feels most like home to me. I remember so well our last Sunday before the chapel preservation began almost two years ago; for our closing song we sang Canticle of the Turning, a setting of the Magnificat, in honor of Our Lady of Victory. I couldn’t picture us having church anywhere else. But in January of 2023, we moved to the Jeanne D’Arc Auditorium, and almost overnight, unexpectedly, JDA felt like home to me too: not because it was perfect, not because I wanted to be there forever, but because we all kept gathering there. It was proof that our reasons for coming to church on Sunday go beyond time and place. It taught me that we come to church for our shared hope, our care for one another, and our deep human need to be in a community based on love, through the hard times and the good. It taught me that those things don’t just go away, that if we care enough and work hard enough, we can be church anywhere. As we get ready to celebrate our return to the chapel this fall, as I sit in choir rehearsals ready to sing Mary’s song in the chapel again, I’m taking these last few weeks to be grateful for all the places we did have for the last two years, and all the love that they held.

As a CSSJ student worker, I spent so much time in the months before and after we moved out of the chapel sitting on the edge of the JDA stage while we spent hours and hours decorating, and testing out flower arrangements, different colors of fabric and battery-powered candles. I’ve gotten to see just how much the CSSJ staff cares about our community, even throughout so much unsteadiness. I’ve stood in awe as they have put in so much care to make JDA the sacred place it became; their dedication and courage is what helped make it so special. I am grateful to know such amazing people who work so hard for the places and people they love, who are thoughtful and creative and incredibly resilient.

I’ve also watched as members of our Sunday mass community have volunteered a tremendous amount of their time and energy behind the scenes to help make the last two years better. I’ve seen community members step up to help our masses go smoothly, to support all of our different events and programs that were all a little more difficult without the chapel, and to make me and other students continue to feel welcome with them. JDA is where we had Christmas and Easter and all of our other celebrations together, where we had choir concerts and prayer services that have meant so much to me. It’s where we blessed graduating seniors and welcomed new students. It’s where we mourned the loss of one of our priests who passed away last winter. It’s where we were able to keep gathering, week after week, to give each other sign of peace hugs and be reminded that we’re not walking alone. I am grateful to be in such a vibrant group of people. They’ve made JDA so much more holy because they’ve believed in it.

Over the last two years I’ve come to love JDA itself. I love the tall ceilings and the round walls that embrace everyone who enters. I love the curtains that I sit behind every week during mass, and the piano where I’ve heard so many of my favorite songs played. I love seeing the OLV cross that was brought over for our first Holy Week there. I love the little walks from our office over to JDA on Sunday mornings, and I love setting up the stage before mass and taking everything down after. I love looking out the windows at the trees outside.

The Christian faith tells so many stories of holy places. From the Garden of Eden to the ark of the covenant, from the Transfiguration to the road to Emmaus, there are countless stories of people wanting to be in places where God’s presence is unmistakable. But the last couple years have made me appreciate even more the stories we tell about what happens on the journey home. And these stories make clear that God is present on the way there. God’s people spend forty years wandering the desert on the way to the promised land, but they’re given food to eat and water to drink along the way, and they have each other to lean on. In all the different stories we tell on Easter, people think God has left them until they look up and realize God was there in a different way they couldn’t immediately see. Over and over, God makes all things new when people come together and believe. Our faith is a story of holy places, but it is also a story of people determined to find holiness in the places they are given. When I stand on the JDA stage to sing and see so many kind faces singing back at me, I know that God is there. And this Christmas, when real candles are flickering against the newly radiant walls of the chapel, when we are back home to celebrate the birth of Jesus long ago in an unexpected place far from home, I will still be grateful for that.

I am forever thankful to everyone who made the chapel preservation possible. I love the chapel with all my heart, and I’m in awe of the hard work and generosity of everyone who has taken such good care of it. They’ve made it possible for it to be a place of welcome, peace, and compassion for so many people in the future, just as it has been for one hundred years. I’m so excited to join everyone on the bright morning of October 6th when we return to Our Lady of Victory Chapel for the first time, and I’m so excited for every Sunday after. I can’t wait to take in its spectacular beauty, and to gather with so many wonderful people in gratitude, amazement, and love for one another, knowing that our gathering is what makes it a holy place.