California to Connecticut - Cool Historic Catholics of America

Welcome back for more Cool Historic Catholics of America! Today we're adding in California, Colorado, and Connecticut with three amazing women. They are all very different, but they all exemplify how sometimes you might need to get creative to live your vocation.

Mother Antonia, Julia Greeley, and Nazarena of Jesus

California - Mother Antonia

Born to a privileged family in 1926 as Mary Clarke, and raised in Beverly Hills, CA, Mother Antonia had a heart for service from a young age. She participated with her family in a variety of help programs, both international and domestic.

She first married at 18, would eventually be married twice, and raised seven children. She continued to feel a strong call to serve the needy and remained heavily involved in charitable work - while also running her deceased father's business and raising said seven children.

In a documentary made about her life (Faith Inside the Walls) Mother Antonia speaks about a dream she had in 1969. In this dream Jesus appeared to her and offered to take her place. She refused his offer and tells him that she will never leave him. During the 1970s she would choose to devote her life to the Church in part because of this dream.

Within just a few years, she was again divorced, sold her home and possessions, and moved to Tijuana, Mexico to serve the prisoners there full time. She moved into a 10 x 10 cell in the women's wing of La Mesa penitentiary.

As a divorced woman, and being past the age of admittance to most orders, Mother Antonia found herself unable to join most religious orders. So she took private vows, with permission of the bishop, and donned a religious habit.
After a year of serving in this way, her work came to the attention of the bishops of Tijuana and nearby San Diego. The Bishop of Tijuana made her an auxiliary Mercedarian (an order devoted to prisoners) making her a sister at the age of 50.

 After receiving multiple requests to join Mother Antonia and follow in her footsteps, The Eudist Servants Of The Eleventh Hour religious community was founded in 1997 at the urging of diocesan leaders in Tijuana. Accepted by the Bishop of Tijuana in 2003, the order is for older women who feel the call to serve God later in life "a kind of “encore” dedicated to Our Lord."

Mother Antonia is remembered for her ever present smile and love for everyone. She was known to get in the middle of prison riots and diffuse tensions. In a quote to the Washington Post, Mother Antonia said "“Pleasure depends on where you are, who you are with, what you are eating. Happiness is different. Happiness does not depend on where you are. I live in prison. And I have not had a day of depression in 25 years. I have been upset, angry. I have been sad. But never depressed. I have a reason for my being.”

A period of declining health forced her to move out of the prison and into a local home in Tijuana. She died on October 17, 2013 at the age of 86.

Colorado - Julia Greeley - Servant of God

Born into slavery in Missouri sometime in the 1840s, Julia had a very hard early life. She was physically abused, lost an eye during a beating, and became permanently lame. Freed after the Civil War, Julia worked as a housekeeper and nanny. She moved to Denver to follow a job offer by a Mrs. Dickenson. Mrs. Dickenson who would eventually marry William Gilpin - the first territorial governor of Colorado.

Mrs. Dickenson was a devout Catholic and it was through her influence that Julia converted to the Catholic faith. Julia had a faith that would become legendary in Denver. Associated with Sacred Heart parish since it's establishment in 1879, Julia was a daily communicant.

She had a particular devotion to the poor, children, and for firemen (who worked a particularly dangerous job in the 19th century.) She was known to visit every single firehouse in the city of Denver monthly, distributing Sacred Heart leaflets. There was not a single fireman, Catholic or not, in the city of Denver that didn't know Julia. All of this despite not being able to read, write, or even count, herself.

She was constantly visiting the poor and begging for their needs. Her charity knew no bounds. She would often deliver her charitable gifts at night and in secret as she learned that many white families were embarrassed to be seen accepting charity from a black woman. She was frequently seen carrying coal and groceries to needy families, despite being so poor herself she needed assistance from the city charity department for her own fuel and groceries.
She was victimized multiple times by charity fraud, but her obituary remembers that "Julia’s rule seemingly was that it was better to give than to be too careful and deny assistance to someone who needed it."

Her love for children was well known. Julia was always up for taking care of babies, and she was trusted by all in Denver. She was remembered as a loving nanny for her many little charges over the years. The only known photograph of her, taken in 1916, shows Julia cradling a child.

Julia died on June 7, 1918, fittingly on the feast of the Sacred Heart to which she was so devoted. Her funeral attracted huge crowds as people from all over the city came to pay their respects to "the woman with the wide winged spirit."

Connecticut - Nazarena of Jesus

Born Julia Crotta in Glastonbury, Connecticut on October 15, 1907, this is a story of the talented girl next door who was called to a rare vocation.

The seventh child of Italian immigrants, Julia showed a talent for music. She started her studies at the Hartford Conservatory and moved on to study piano and and violin at Yale. She would leave Yale for a small Catholic school, to the dismay of the Yale music school dean, after an event her junior year that changed everything.

Julia is not remembered as a particularly devout person as a youngster. When a Dominican nun invited her to a Holy Week retreat in her junior year, her agreement to go was reluctant. It was an event in the chapel as she prayed alone in the evening of Good Friday that changed her life. She had a mystical experience in which she felt distinctly that Jesus was calling her into the desert.

She would spend years trying to discover what was this desert.

Julia finished college, and found work as a secretary. With her spiritual director she tried to understand this call to the desert. She tried the Carmelites of Rhode Island but find that found that was not the right fit. Her spiritual director sent her to Rome to wait for God to show his plan for her life. She tried the Camaldolese monastery, but felt restless. The superior advised her to try the Carmelites of Rome, where she would remain for five years - through the harsh trials of World War II.

The day before she would pronounce final vows for the Carmelites - Julia decided to leave the order.

She found work in a soup kitchen, but her spiritual director had an idea that Julia should enter the Camaldolese again - but not as a novice. This time as a "private recluse".

The private recluse, or anchoress, is an ancient custom and traditional to the Camaldolese order. But typically only after a number of years in the order, and even then only with special permission. The vocation is rare, almost unheard of outside of the Middle Ages.

A priest friend of Julia's arranged for her to have a private audience with Pope Pius XII. The Pope looked over the one page document that described Julia's proposed rule for her future life.

“Isn’t it a bit too rigid?” he asked, “I wish it were even more so!” Julia responded. The Pope smiled and said, “If this is the rule by which you wish to live, then take it as it is.”

On November 21, 1945, Julia entered the Camadolese monestery as a recluse - taking the name Nazarena of Jesus. She was restricted to a single cell, never allowed herself an idle moment, and attended mass and received food through a grille. She never spoke a word to anyone, except for once a year when she spoke to her spiritual director. These direction sessions could last for hours - with Nazarena talking all day.
She died in the monastery on February 7, 1990 at the age of 82.

Nazarena of Jesus, nee Julia Crotta, isn't remarkable because of the strictness and rigor of her eventual vocation - although it is that. I find her remarkable because she persisted in pursuing her vocation. Despite many false leads, dead ends, years of waiting, and last minute changes. This was not a girl who always dreamed of becoming a nun. She was called to a medieval vocation as a talented, educated, modern Catholic woman. Yet she still said yes. Even to the improbable.

Make sure to check back to the announcement post and scroll down to see other installment of the series!