Former member of diocese seeking life as religious

When she was a junior at Rutgers University, New Brunswick, life changed for Franciscan Sister of Penance Lisa Marie Shatynski. She began discerning religious life that year when her spiritual director suggested she read, “Discerning the Will of God,” by Timothy Gallagher. “By the end of that book, it was just blatantly clear that the Lord was calling me to religious life,” Sister Lisa said. She recalled telling her spiritual director, “I feel like God is my boyfriend.”
 

Sister of Jesus Our Hope Ellen Kraft, who ministers at the Catholic Center at Rutgers, also had a “huge impact” on Sister Lisa’s discernment.
 

“She was my first real introduction to a religious sister,” Sister Lisa recalled. “She’s such a joyful, happy religious.” She remembers thinking: “I could be happy if I went this route.”
 

She added that she felt the call to be a religious sister in many ways, even while watching movies with her friends. “Normally, by the end of ‘chick-flick’ movies, you want to fall in love,” she said. “But I already felt like I had that. I felt so filled up with love, by God.”

When she thought about dating a fellow student who seemed to have a crush on her, she felt a sense of distress — when she decided not to date him, she immediately felt at peace.
 

On Aug. 6, Sister Lisa’s vocation journey led her to profess her first vows in religious life, joining the Franciscan Sisters of Penance of the Sorrowful Mother, whose motherhouse is in Toronto, Ohio.
 

“Being in religious life and professing vows, I feel more myself than I ever have been,” Sister Lisa said. “Going through postulancy, going through the novitiate, the Lord has slowly uncovered me and helped me to become more me.”

The youngest of three children of Pamela and William Shatynski, Sister Lisa grew up in Monroe Township, where she attended public schools. She and her family went to Mass every weekend at Immaculate Conception Church, Spotswood.
 

After graduating with a bachelor’s degree in animal science from Rutgers in 2015, Sister Lisa continued discerning religious life, traveling to France and visiting Lisieux, the hometown of St. Therese Martin, where Sister Lisa “fell in love with her idea of being at the foot of the Cross, being there with Jesus.”
 

She also visited Lourdes, the site where the Blessed Mother appeared to St. Bernadette Soubirous and revealed a healing spring of water. “I basically entrusted my vocation to the Blessed Mother, and just asked her to lead me to the living waters of Christ,” Sister Lisa said.
 

After returning from her trip to France, she went to a conference in Minnesota hosted by St. Paul’s Outreach, a Catholic organization that ministers on college campuses. While there, she met some of the Franciscan T.O.R. Sisters of Penance of the Sorrowful Mother. “They checked everything off my list, and then some,” said Sister Lisa, who remembers thinking: “I wasn’t expecting this.” She was hoping to find a religious community that was both active and contemplative in lifestyle.
 

Shortly thereafter, Sister Lisa visited the community’s motherhouse, Our Lady of Sorrows Monastery, in Toronto, Ohio. In their chapel, the image behind the altar is of Mary at the foot of the Cross, pointing at the waters flowing from Christ’s side.
 

Immediately, Sister Lisa Marie remembered the prayer she had been saying ever since her trip to Lourdes: “Lead me to the living waters of Christ.” “This is it,” she thought at the time. “This is what I asked Mary for.”
 

But even with this clear sign, the monastery did not feel like home. “There was so much more that God wanted to show me, and that’s why it didn’t feel like home — because I wasn’t ready yet,” Sister Lisa said. “I needed to grow more and learn more before I was ready to enter religious life.” She decided to work as a campus minister at Florida State University, Tallahassee, Fla., for two years.
 

“Those two years were very formative for me,” Sister Lisa said, adding that she grew “as a woman and in maturity in the spiritual life.”
 

In 2017, she returned to Our Lady of Sorrows Monastery to join as a postulant, a candidate for admission. She will renew temporary vows each year for about four to six years, and if she discerns that this life is definitely her vocation, she will profess permanent vows. For the next year she will work as a campus minister at Franciscan University of Steubenville, Ohio.
 

Sister Marie’s parents and siblings have struggled with her choice to become a religious sister because they miss her, but have supported her all the way, even celebrating her departure for the monastery with a special Mass and four-course meal, similar to a wedding.
 

Sister Lisa will be allowed a two-week visit home once a year, and her family is allowed to visit a couple of days a year, as well. They are permitted to write as many letters as they wish to one another, and to have a phone call about once a month.
 

“In a sense, we’re giving up our family so that we can be family for other people,” Sister Lisa said.
 

Becoming a religious “is a big change. It’s the cross, but it’s also the resurrection,” she said. “It’s a place of healing. It’s a place of deeper life. There are difficult times, and working through those difficult times is where the relationship deepens. …
 

“It is hard living in community, but it’s really beautiful, too. The Lord has prepared me in the last few years for a deeper community life. I think I’m just starting to learn what true, pure love is. He is still teaching me that.”
 

For young people who may be wondering whether they have a religious vocation, Sister Lisa Marie offered this advice. “You will know, because God will tell you,” she said. “There’s nothing to fear. He’s not going to lead you in the wrong direction. It’s okay to discern, and then leave. God’s plan is perfect, and it doesn’t always make sense to us, but it’s perfect. … He’s going to bless whatever you decide to do.”