Saying ‘Yes’: Katie Anders Professes First Vows as a BVM
Katie Anders, BVM, with her son Alex and daughter Lauryn, during the service where she professed First Vows.
by Kari Litscher
Katie Anders felt called—to teach, to serve Christ, to care for a family. “That was the path I chose,” she says. “I continued to serve God, just in different ways: as a wife and a mom, working for the church, and as a BVM associate. I was living the God-community connection in another way.”
After her marriage ended and her children, Alex and Lauryn, became adults, the call to religious life returned with conviction. Having worked closely with sisters as a spiritual care coordinator for the past seven years, Katie decided that this was the right time.
Freedom and Formation
In 2023, Katie’s “Yes” to religious life began as she entered the community. Now, after completing her novitiate, she has professed her first vows as a Sister of Charity of the Blessed Virgin Mary.
“What has been both surprising and formative for me as a novice,” Katie shares, “has been the continual support and affirmation I have received from the congregation.”
During her discernment, Katie received encouragment and support through cards, letters, prayers, and many check-ins. Yet she never felt pressured to make a decision, and knew that the relationships she had forged would last no matter what path she chose.
“I felt safe and loved knowing that no matter what I decided, those connections were not dependent on my decision,” she says.
That assurance gave her the courage to let go of doubt and trust where God was leading.
“I have learned that this is the gift of community,” she says. “It is not about what I do but rather who I am. Receiving this gift has also helped me learn how to offer it to others more deeply.”
At the InterCongregational Collaborative Novitiate in Chicago, she deepened her sense of calling.
“My calling is both specific to the BVMs, and it is much bigger as I connect my life to the global sisterhood of religious women around the world,” she says.
Vows and Vision
During the vow ceremony, words from the reflection of Pat Bombard, BVM captured the spirit of the day: “The spiritual poet Mark Nepo says at a certain point for each of us, talk evaporates. Words cannot bring love into the open. Only the soul’s presence coming from us can attract the soul’s presence in others.”
Katie also reflected on her many life experiences and the “Yeses” she said along the way: “The amazing thing is that my ‘Yeses’ were where they needed to be at each stage of my life. I never chose incorrectly.”
She remains hopeful, not only for her own future in religious life, but for the unfolding future of the BVMs.
“One of the things I am most excited and hopeful about is that we do not control the charism,” she says. “While religious life is changing, there is also an unfolding happening. The BVMs have been bringing the message of Jesus’ love and life into the world for more than 190 years beginning with Mary Frances Clarke and her circle of friends, and it has been changing ever since.”
Katie believes the unfolding continues as BVMs allow it and trusts that through Mary Frances’ spirit and love, God continues to create a pathway for it to happen.
To those who may feel the tug toward religious life, Katie offers this advice: “Talk to the people who know you best and let them help you explore all the possible ways religious life leads you, and the world, to greater wholeness. And spend a lot of time in quiet and stillness listening to yourself and to God.”
As for what anchored her through these past months, Katie says, “I have tried to spend the most time
just listening.”
And it is in that listening that her deepest “Yes” was found.
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