by Fred Moleck
Sister Suzanne Toolan, RSM
The year 2007 is a year of hymnic anniversaries that are worthy to be celebrated. Several TableTalks ago, I highlighted the three-hundredth birthday of Charles Wesley (1707–1788), whose hymns occupy a significant space of what we sing at our liturgies.I’ve also recently praised the work of the seventeenth-century hymnist Paul Gerhardt (1607–1676), who some think is the greatest German hymn text writer. I agree.
This week, the anniversary hits closer to home.
Sister Suzanne Toolan, RSM, (nee Gloria Ernestine Toolan) marks her eightieth anniversary of living upon the earth. What a blessing for all of us!
In case you have joined the ranks of music ministry for the first time yesterday or the day before and you don’t know who Sister Suzanne is, well—Sister Suzanne is the composer of “I Am the Bread of Life” (and other beloved Catholic hymns), which is arguably the most frequently sung communion piece in Roman Catholic repertory.
It also is a major staple in music for a funeral, but it is not restricted to Roman Catholic liturgical music usage.
For example, it is #485 in the new Evangelical Lutheran Worship hymnal and service book as well as #472 in the 1992 Hymnal: A Worship Book of the Mennonites.
It has been translated into languages other than English, which range from Chinese to Slovak to—no surprise—Spanish.
Since 1981, she has been conducting the Vigil by the Cross Taizé prayer service in the chapel of the Mercy Sisters’ motherhouse in Burlingame, California, on the first Friday of every month.
It is the monthly pilgrimage spot for hundreds of people, who gather for quiet prayer and interior solace.
From this center of quiet prayer, Sister Suzanne and her entourage took the prayer service to three other places in the Bay Area.
(Did I hear someone say, “Musical missionaries”?)
What some of you might not be aware of is her special ministry to the inmates of San Quentin Penitentiary.
For eight years now, she and Sister Marguerite have traveled with some volunteers to the prison to pray with some of the inmates, to lead faith sharing, and, basically, provide a quiet anchor to the inmates who make up their prayer community.
A new book by Sister Suzanne and Elizabeth Dossa entitled I Am the Bread of Life, celebrating the life, wisdom, and music of Sister Suzanne Toolan, has been published by the Crossroad Publishing Company, New York (2007).
Elizabeth Dossa is director of communications for the Burlingame Regional Community of the Sisters of Mercy.
Throughout the book’s 183 pages is an underlying current that Sister Suzanne is more than a veteran musician, composer, and woman in religious life—she is a herald of the Gospel.
From her Taizé evenings in the Sisters’ chapel to an NPM gig to her visits with the imprisoned, she has taken up the mission cross as only musicians and their circle do: they sing and play.
Their mission statement is summed up by Sister Suzanne’s “Mission Hymn,” which she wrote in 1964 to send off four of the Mercy Sisters to Peru.
It could also be the anthem of every church musician.
Great is the Lord, worthy of praise;
What a blessing for all of us!
Tell all the nations God is King!
Spread the news of his love!
The Spirit of the Lord is upon me
Because the Lord has anointed me.
He has sent me to bring glad tidings
To the lowly, to the lowly.
You can reach Fred Moleck via email at fmoleck@comcast.net