Coming Home

By Sr. Mary Deighan, O.L.M.
May/June 2011

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Sr. Mary Deighan (right) with family friend Ruth Halladay.
Photo by Carol Gauthier

Two years ago I returned to Canada after living in Nigeria for 30 years. Life there was full, exciting, dangerous, and challenging. I felt fully alive and grateful to be on the front line, training Nigerians to be village health workers, teaching trained medical staff how to do primary health care and, when time permitted, doing direct nursing among the poor in the villages of Benue State.

By 2009 I knew it was time to come home. The Nigerians were ready to carry on the work. My staying on in the country I loved would have undermined their independence and ability, so the decision was made to join our Rosalind community in Toronto.

Once back in Canada, life immediately seemed to shrink. Perhaps this is the experience of all people who have had the privilege of working in developing countries where the need is endless and no talent is wasted. Adjusting to life in Canada has taken longer than I expected, but my energy has returned and I see that there is so much one can do here to make life better for others. Travelling on the subway and buses, feeling the fleeting glances of friendliness in the eyes of newcomers from different countries, I long to welcome them to our country. I know how it feels to leave my home country and arrive as a stranger in a strange land and I want to ease their adjustment as they struggle to settle in a country so foreign to what they have known. I have returned to Canada where I started my missionary journey and I have discovered again that my sisters and brothers are everywhere. In fact, mission can be found in all places.

Mission in my life is
...loving God and loving people.
Sr. Mary Deighan, OLM, Toronto

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