One Dominican sister’s call came gently; two others fought it 

By Tim Puet
Catholic Times Reporter

There is nothing uniform or predictable about God’s call to serve him through the life of a religious sister. That is evident in the vocation stories of the three Dominican Sisters of the Immaculate Conception Province who live in the St. Dominic Convent at 2575 E. Livingston Ave., Columbus.

For Sister Leonarda Zielinska, OP, the desire to become a sister was something she slowly embraced as she became more aware of it. Sister Wenancja Disterheft, OP, and Sister Paulina Porczynska, OP, both scorned the thought of entering religious life, experienced life-changing moments, then struggled with the possibility of spending their lives in God’s service.

 “When I was starting high school, a girl from my neighborhood entered a community of sisters, and I began thinking more and more about doing the same thing,” Sister Leonarda said. “By the time I was a senior, the feeling became strong enough that I began looking for a community. I learned about the Dominicans through a book, felt they were a good fit, started corresponding with them and entered the order in 1996.”

“I never wanted to be a sister,” said Sister Wenancja, who like the other two sisters is a native of Poland.  “Then about 15 years ago, I attended a night of prayer sponsored by Dominican friars at around the time of Pentecost. During that experience, I began to feel that maybe God wanted me to serve him, but I put up a lot of resistance. 

“The thought that he was calling me was a little frightening, so I fought it. But as I kept searching and praying, the feeling grew stronger, and I came to a point where I couldn’t fight it anymore. I became a Dominican sister in 2005.”

“I was a very rebellious teenager,” Sister Paulina said. “To be honest, I was a punk. This period of rebellion lasted almost until the end of high school, and the last thing I could imagine was becoming a sister. But it turned out God had a plan for me. A friend convinced me to go on a pilgrimage to the Shrine of the Black Madonna in Czestochowa, where I went to confession for the first time in six years. The moment the priest gave me absolution changed everything. I felt loved, happy and free.

“A year later, I attended the same pilgrimage and knew something was going on in my heart,” she said. “A friend saw me and asked if I was thinking of becoming a sister. I told him, ‘No,’ then realized I was standing in the same place where I had been given absolution a year earlier. That question was a pretty clear sign from God, though I tried to run from him and went to college hoping to distract myself. But God’s call was too strong, and I joined the sisters in 2005.”

The Dominican congregation the three sisters entered was founded by Venerable Mother Kolumba Bialecka in Poland in 1861 and is part of the worldwide Dominican community, which traces its roots to St. Dominic de Guzman in the 13th century and includes two other branches in Columbus.  

The Polish congregation came to Chicago in 1925 to serve the city’s Polish immigrants. In 1936, it opened a motherhouse on farmland in the Chicago suburb of Justice, Illinois, which is why the congregation sometimes is known as “the Dominicans from Justice.” Today, the sisters’ Rosary Hill complex in Justice includes the motherhouse, a nursing home and a retreat center. The sisters began ministries in Milwaukee in 1946; Calgary, Canada in 1968; and Mountain Home, Arkansas, in 1996.

They came to Columbus in 2013, about a year after Father Stash Dailey, diocesan vicar for religious, who has helped bring five orders of sisters to the Diocese of Columbus in recent years, first contacted the congregation. He and Father Michael Mary Dosch, OP, pastor of St. Patrick Church at the time, then visited the motherhouse. Following the visit, Sisters Leonarda, Wenancja and Maria Vianney Kysely, OP, arrived in Columbus to establish a convent on Sept. 4, 2013. 

Sister Leonarda has lived in Columbus since then. She originally served at the Holy Family Soup Kitchen and now is religious education director at St. Patrick, a position formerly held by Sister Maria Vianney, who has been at Justice since 2017. Sister Wenancja attended Ohio Dominican University, taking an English-language class for one semester in 2014, then was transferred to Calgary and later to Mountain Home before returning to Columbus in October. She is now working at the soup kitchen. Sister Paulina, who came to Columbus five years ago, worked in the kindergarten of St. Mary School in Columbus’ German Village and now directs the preschool at Gahanna St. Matthew Church.

Sister Leonarda’s religious education program at St. Patrick conducts classes for about 330 students from 4 years old to high-school age that meet at 10:15 a.m. on Sundays. The program includes the first two levels of the hands-on, Montessori-style Catechesis of the Good Shepherd, for children age 3 through 9, on Wednesday mornings; a monthly Children’s Hour of Mercy, which includes Eucharistic Adoration and Reconciliation, from October to April for children 3 years old to sixth grade; and a one-week Vacation Bible School in the summer.

Sister Wenancja’s work at Holy Family every weekday includes “lots of moving around,” she said. “I do everything I can, mostly in the pantry.”

Sister Paulina said the most important part of her involvement with the St. Matthew preschoolers is “preparing them for kindergarten and making sure the children know that we have one God who loves and cares for them every day. I try to teach them how to pray and encourage them to build a deep relationship with God. I want them to love Him and all of His people.” 

When the sisters came to Columbus, they initially lived at 957 E. Broad St., in a Victorian-era residence that includes a distinctly modern addition. “That house was really too big for us and the work we wanted to do,” Sister Leonarda said. “Father Stash also was in touch with the Little Servant Sisters of the Immaculate Conception,” another Polish-based order, which has a motherhouse in New Jersey. “They wanted to establish a pre-kindergarten here, and sisters from both congregations agreed the house where we were living was a perfect location for them,” she said.

The Dominicans then began looking for a new convent, with the help of a real estate agent, and found a former dentist’s office near Christ the King Church that would provide sufficient living space, a basement, and room for a chapel, guest accommodations and a meeting area.
After sharing quarters at Christ the King with the sisters of the Missionary Servants of the Word during a short period of transition, the Dominicans moved to their Livingston Avenue location in late 2016. The East Broad Street building now houses the St. John Paul II Early Childhood Education Center, operated by the Little Servant Sisters, who also have a convent there.

Sister Leonarda said renovations to the St. Dominic Convent are nearly complete. “We’re very grateful for all the donations we have received from people belonging to various parishes in the Columbus area, with special thanks to The Catholic Foundation for establishing a fund for remodeling the convent and for awarding a grant allowing us to buy liturgical items for the building,” she said.

The sisters sponsor several activities in the convent chapel and meeting areas. A Holy Hour of Eucharistic Adoration takes place every Monday and Wednesday from 6:30 to 7:30 p.m. On the second Saturday of every month, the rosary is prayed at 8 a.m., followed by Mass, with an emphasis on prayer for vocations and marriages. A high school girls group meets on the fourth Saturday of the month. The sisters and four young women from Columbus traveled to Justice in late October for a vocations retreat.

The sisters encourage people to join them for Adoration and the second-Saturday Mass and welcome anyone who would like to visit the convent, especially young women or men  discerning whether they are being called to religious life. They ask to be notified in advance because of their daily prayer schedule. The convent may be reached at (614) 826-1619, and the congregation’s website is www.sistersop.com.