Gift of Peace House: A Different World

By Betsy Lizotte

December 2016 –Every month Marymount students get to travel to a unique destination. It’s just over the Potomac River, but it seems like a different world.  “Inside the building was very beautiful,” stated Noel Larino, a freshman majoring in communication. “It was very plain. And that’s what it’s meant to be,” said Larino about the Gift of Peace House, a Missionaries of Charity convent and nursing home located in Washington, DC. Larino was one of seven Marymount students that visited the convent/nursing home on October 15, 2016. Alison Tett, a sophomore majoring in psychology found the trip to be a unique experience. “I had never experienced anything like it. I had never been to a convent and served in the past. So when I saw the trip, I thought, ‘Wow!’”

As the van carrying Marymount students drove up to the old brick hospital building, it was still dark. Despite having to leave Marymount at 6:15 a.m., none of the seven students seemed to mind. Erica Fountain, a Marymount transfer student laughed when she said she woke up early. “My alarm went off at 4:50 and I jumped in the shower. It was just kind of hard being at Marymount at 6 o’clock, but it was worth it.” One of the things that made the trip worthwhile is that this is a Mother Teresa convent.

When they entered the building, one of the first things the students saw was a display case containing a wheelchair. The wheelchair was Mother Teresa’s. According to Nobelprize.org Mother Teresa did most of her work in Calcutta, India taking care of the poorest of the poor. She won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1979. According to Sister Tanya, the Mother Superior at the convent, Mother Teresa opened Gift of Peace House as a Missionaries of Charity convent and nursing home in 1986 with a focus on serving AIDS patients. Sister Tanya said that Mother Teresa became a Saint just last year, on September 4, 2016.

Mother Teresa’s wheelchair

Around the corner from the wheelchair is a large foyer with many doors leading off of it. The foyer contains several other display cases. “These are artifacts from Mother Teresa of Calcutta,” said Sister Tanya. Some of the items in the display cases include a prayer book and some sheets and towels that Mother Teresa used during her visit to Gift of Peace House before her death in 1997. The display cases also hold pieces of stone from her tomb. As the students look around the foyer, a bell rings three times. It is 7:00 a.m. Time for mass.

The first door to the right off of the foyer is a small, plain chapel. Straight ahead is the altar covered in a white cloth. The wall behind the altar is made of wood paneling and a large sculpture of the crucified Jesus hangs on it. The other three walls are painted a light blue color and the carpet is blue.

There are about 30 nuns kneeling on the floor to the left. They have three blue stripes on the border of their white saris. The saris wrap around their heads and bodies. Kiersa Polley, a recent graduate from Ave Maria College, and full-time volunteer at Gift of Peace House, has lived in the convent for five months. According to Polley, the blue stripes on the sari are significant. “When Mother Teresa made the sari, she did it because that’s what the poorest of the poor wore. Street sweepers were the poorest of the poor and they wore this same sari,” said Polley.

According to Sister Tanya there are 32 nuns living in Gift of Peace House. The convent/nursing home has three floors: the basement, the ground floor and the second floor. Ten female residents live in the rooms in the basement, 41 male residents live on the second floor and the nuns live in the convent on the ground floor, said Sister Tanya.

Hannah Camerota, a live-in volunteer who recently graduated from Ave Maria College, has lived in the convent for a month. She is in awe of the nuns. “Whenever we’re in mass and I look at them, I think ‘they have absolutely nothing, they own nothing material: no cars, nothing fancy, the same clothes every day,’” said Camerota. “The nuns are awesome!” she said, with a smile on her face.

Across from the nuns, on the right side of the chapel, the students, other volunteers and residents sit in folding chairs. The students feel a variety of emotions during mass. Larino finds that going to mass in Gift of Peace House is different from attending regular mass. “It’s very sacred and I get a feeling that is hard to describe: I get more faith, more humbled by it.  Being there next to the nuns praying in mass was just amazing! It’s an experience you don’t get a lot,” she said.

During mass, the students pray, sing hymns, and take Communion. The sequence of events for the whole mass is handwritten on a chalkboard that is cantilevered off the wall to the left and in front of the nuns. According to Polley, almost everything is done by hand. “We don’t have ordinary things; there is no TV here,” she said.

After mass, the students walk to the breakfast room. To get there, the students go upstairs and through a long hallway.

Both walls of the hallway are lined with hand-made posters filled with Mother Teresa’s words of wisdom. Larino is inspired by Mother Teresa’s quotes. “Her words of wisdom are just amazing! She really emulated mercy and humility,” said Larino.

One of Mother Teresa’s most famous sayings, “We can do no great things, only small things with great love,” sits on a hand-written note card below a photograph of Mother Teresa tending to a young Indian man. The Indian man is lying on a table looking at Mother Teresa. With her hand resting on his arm in a comforting way, Mother Teresa is looking back at him with an expression of compassion and love. The many posters, made in a simple, loving way, seem to represent all actions and life in the convent/nursing home. One of those actions was the volunteer breakfast.

The breakfast was very simple, but thoughtful. There were two loaves of freshly made challah bread, one plain and one chocolate chip – and fresh coffee in a rare mechanical device in the convent: an automatic coffee maker. During breakfast the volunteers shared information about the nuns.

Live-in volunteer Camerota and Marymount student volunteer Tett had nothing but praise for them. “They’re the most joyful people in the whole world,” said Camerota. Marymount student Alison Tett has been volunteering on these trips to Gift of Peace House for over a year. “The sisters that you meet here are really kind and happy; peaceful. And they are really funny too,” said Tett. According to the Marymount volunteer, the nuns will always answer your questions but might tease you. “They might give you a hard time because you’ve been there for a while and maybe you still can’t remember how to make the beds,” she said, “but it’s all in good fun.”

Making the beds is just one of the jobs that students perform to help the nuns serve the residents of Gift of Peace House. “I hang out with them, I mop and sweep the floors, I wash the dishes, feed them lunch, and sometimes do the rosary with them,” said Stephanie Juan, a Marymount junior majoring in biology. Erica Fountain and Odaris Santos, a freshman who is also majoring in biology, painted some of the residents’ nails. Santos said that she enjoys helping people. “It’s something I like to do,” she said, “Just make people smile; and they always say ‘thank you.’”

Sometimes volunteers do work outside in the garden or other areas on the convent grounds. “I was outside cleaning out the trash area. There were a lot of old furnaces and pipes and they needed to be cleaned up,” said Larino. Tett said that the volunteers never know what the nuns will have them do. “One month it could be raking leaves, the next month it could be sweeping and mopping,” she said. All volunteers felt like they were making a positive impact on the residents’ lives. “I like the simplicity of it. We think, ‘oh, it’s nothing,’ but to the residents, it means a lot,” said Tett.

Kate Castellano works for Medstar Georgetown University Hospital as the Gift of Peace House Coordinator and social worker for all of the residents. “It can get pretty lonely here and a lot of clients are managing depression and anxiety,” said Castellano. She said that the volunteers “Make residents’ lives easier and happier.” According to Sister Tanya, the residents need material, physical and spiritual help. “They need to be loved and cared for,” she said. None of the residents have the material or physical ability to live on their own.

Joseph Sam has lived on the second floor of Gift of Peace House for one and a half years. He has diabetic neuropathy, which weakened his body and caused him so much pain that he couldn’t walk. His social worker at the time, Bill, recommended that he come to Gift of Peace House and he has lived here ever since. He is very thankful for the volunteers who drive him to his doctor appointments, serve him meals, and check up on him throughout the night. He said that the volunteers are “just like the sisters: caring, loving, and considerate.”

Sister Tanya is also thankful for the volunteers. “We are very grateful, because we need help. The young people who are coming in here have a lot of potentiality to give and share,” she said.

Sister Tanya gives Mother Teresa
medallions to volunteers.
(Photo by Betsy Lizotte)

Not only do the students provide valuable assistance to the residents and nuns, they learn life lessons. Castellano said that volunteering here “will provide great nursing and social work experience.” Sister Tanya feels that “It’s good for student volunteers to experience how they can be of service to others who are less fortunate than them.” Some of the students realize this and it is part of their motivation for coming on the monthly mission trips. “You forget that some people may be worse off or not have it as good as you,” said Fountain. She feels that serving the residents at Gift of Peace House is a way of giving back. “It keeps you humble and puts things in perspective,” she said, “I can definitely see myself doing this another time.”

To find out more about trips in the Fall 2017 semester, contact Ashton Mallon at amallon@marymount.edu. Come and experience a different world.