Answering God's Call
Sister serves through support and song

By Tim Puet
Catholic Times Reporter

Sister Susan Olson, OP, says that after a busy lifetime of involvement with music as a teacher and singer in Ohio, Louisiana and Texas, her role as mission group coordinator for the Dominican Sisters of Peace has taught her the importance of slowing down and being present for others.

“Since 2019, I’ve served as a pastoral support to the 72 sisters of our congregation who live in its Columbus motherhouse,” Sister Susan said. “Many are elderly, with about a dozen aged 90 or older. It’s important for them when facing a crisis to have someone who is there to be by their side and help them in whatever way is most suitable.

“I’m used to pitching in and taking action in stressful situations, but with the sisters in most cases, the most important thing I can do is be with them. There are times when you can’t fix anything, where your presence is what matters most. These are sacred moments.”

Sister Susan, 54, is the youngest sister in the motherhouse and often drives its residents to medical appointments or performs other tasks for the older sisters. “The times when I’m driving the sisters somewhere give me a great opportunity to hear their stories and to appreciate all the things the Dominican sisters have done in the diocese” since coming to central Ohio in 1830, she said.

“These are really holy times when I get to hear them. They’re allowing me to share the legacy of which I am now a part.”

Besides her work at the motherhouse, Sister Susan has a second position 1,150 miles away. She has been a professor of voice in the music department of the University of Texas-San Antonio since 2009. She has been teaching online from Columbus since moving to the city two years ago and currently leads classes in the literature of art songs and of opera and a course in diction for opera in English, German, French and Italian. She also has eight private students.

She is a mezzo-soprano and has been a soloist with several symphony orchestras. She also has been a part of many professional choral ensembles and opera companies and has been featured in roles in Gilbert and Sullivan’s Pirates of Penzance and HMS Pinafore, Bernstein’s Candide, Sondheim’s A Little Night Music and many other musical productions.

“I started teaching online before the COVID pandemic occurred, and when that happened, everyone was joining me,” she said. “One reason I teach in Texas is because I have tenure there, but I’d love to be able to teach at either of my alma maters, Capital and Ohio State.” 

Sister Susan was 10 in 1977 when she and her parents, Allen and Jeanne, an older brother and sister  and a younger brother came from the Chicago area to Newark, where her father’s employer, Resinoid Engineering Corp., was opening a plant. 

She attended Newark St. Francis de Sales School and Newark Catholic High School and received a bachelor’s degree in music from Capital University in 1989, a master’s degree in vocal pedagogy from Ohio State University in 1991 and a doctoral degree from OSU in vocal performance in 2004.

“Some of my earliest memories are of going to Mass with my family,” she said. “I can’t think of her name now, but I remember one member of the Sisters of the Living Word who sang when I was going to St. Martha School in Morton Grove, Illinois. Hearing her love of singing made the whole idea of church music catch my attention. I didn’t start thinking of being a sister until several years later, but that sister was the first to plot my course.”

The sisters who taught at her schools in Newark were members of the Columbus-based Dominican Sisters of St. Mary of the Springs, which joined with six other Dominican congregations in 2009 to form the Dominican Sisters of Peace. “I was extremely involved with music in Newark, first in the children’s choir, then in the adult choir once I entered high school, and also as a cantor,” she said. 

“I recall getting up at 6 a.m. to ride my bike to church for 7 a.m. Masses, and I enjoyed it. We had some great priests and sisters in Newark. Being with them started me thinking of being a sister, particularly a Dominican, because I enjoyed studying, and studying is important to Dominicans.” 

While attending Capital, her sense of being called to the religious life grew and she stayed in touch with Sister Ann Schmid, OP, one of her former teachers, who now lives at the motherhouse. “While I was at Capital, she was stationed in Grosse Pointe, Michigan and attended a concert our choir gave there,” she said. “I was a little afraid to, but after the concert I gingerly asked her if she could give me some information on the Dominican sisters. She was delighted to, and we kept corresponding.”  

Sister Susan decided after receiving her master’s degree from OSU that she needed experience living on her own before committing to religious life, so she taught voice from 1992 to 1995 at Kalamazoo College and Western Michigan University, both in Kalamazoo, Michigan. 

“I was discerning with the Dominicans here in Columbus and with another Dominican congregation in Grand Rapids, Michigan,” she said. “I spent more time in Grand Rapids, but being with both congregations solidified my desire to be with the St. Mary of the Springs Dominicans,” she said. “Through my experience with them in Newark and during discernment, they exuded such joy that I wanted to be a part of it and be of service to them. With my past connections, it was the right move.”

In 1995, she entered the St. Mary of the Springs congregation and returned to Capital as a teacher in its community music school for a year. That was followed by a year in the Dominican novitiate at St. Louis. In 1997, she returned to Columbus, where she taught at Ohio Dominican College (renamed Ohio Dominican University in 2002) from 1997 to 2004 and was a graduate associate at OSU from 2001 to 2004. She pronounced her first Dominican vows in 1999 and her final vows in 2004.

She was on the music faculty at Otterbein College (now University) in Westerville in 2004 and 2005, and then spent 14 years away from central Ohio, teaching at the University of Louisiana-Monroe from 2005 to 2009 and at Texas-San Antonio from 2009 until returning to Columbus 10 years later.

From 1996 to 2002, she and three Dominican brothers formed a choral group known as Veritas in Cantico (Latin for “truth in song”), which conducted parish missions, presented concerts and recorded two CDs. After one member died of leukemia, the group continued with three members before disbanding when one of the brothers was elected prior of his province. The three united in 2017 for an anniversary concert.

In 2000, Sister Susan was liturgist for the Lands of Dominic pilgrimage for the Jubilee year declared by Pope St. John Paul II. This special event allowed Dominicans to follow in the footsteps of their founder, St. Dominic, through France, Spain and Italy.     

While in Louisiana and Texas, she lived by herself. Teaching was her main focus, and she sang in choirs. “A couple of years ago, I began thinking about a change because I wanted to live in community with other sisters again,” she said. “I had interviewed with another community about becoming a liturgist when I was offered the opportunity to come here. 

“I accepted the position as mission group coordinator because it was a great opportunity to serve the sisters who served me for so many years and to continue teaching online. Then COVID hit, and I didn’t have to make an adjustment to online education because I already was doing it.” 

The pandemic has limited her in-person contact with people in the community, but a grant awarded to Sister Susan allowed her and other sisters in the motherhouse to pack 50 backpacks for the homeless in Columbus. The backpacks were donated to the United Methodist Church for All People on the city’s south side, where they were distributed to those in need. She used another part of the grant to help a local graphic artist whose business has been suffering during the pandemic.

“This grant allowed me to offer some support to two populations that are near and dear to my heart,” she said. “What I hope has been a hand-up for these two groups will be experienced by the good works rippling out to our larger community.”