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50 Years: Patricia Vartanian, SP
(Sister John Marie)
SPOILED? Why is it that when one is the younger in a family she often is asked if she were SPOILED? I always answer, “No,” because I clearly can recall how I had to “toe the line.” However, several years ago a director told me, “Patricia, you are SPOILED by God.” So when the going gets tough, instead of subscribing to “the tough get going” philosophy, I ask God to SPOIL me again and, in His time, He generally does. Now I will tell you some of the ways.
 Born six weeks premature in Sacred Heart Hospital in Hanford, Calif., I believe I was baptized, and therefore given the gift of faith, shortly after birth. SPOILED. I guess there was question of whether I would make it. Ha! I like to tell people, “You are lucky to have me.”
After seven weeks in the hospital I was taken home by my parents John and Mary Vartanian and my older brother Johnnie. One needs models of God’s love and my brother and I had ours in our loving parents. SPOILED.
I didn’t live very long in the San Joaquin Valley before we moved to Burbank in the San Fernando Valley of Southern California. How else could I have been taught by the Sisters of Providence, for seven years at St. Finbar grade school and four years at Providence High School? SPOILED.
By the sixth grade I knew I wanted to be a Sister of Providence. I don’t know how I knew, I just knew. For some, making this decision is torturous, but not for me. SPOILED. I don’t imagine anyone goes through life without going through knotholes, mine just came later.
We were thirty-three, with one coming, when we were received as postulants by Mother Judith (Sister Teresa Lang), provincial superior, on August 15, 1960. We were the last class to enter at Mount St. Vincent and the first group to receive the Holy Habit at Providence Heights on July 18, 1961, the beginning of the countdown to this Golden Jubilee celebration.
I recall a conference Mother Judith gave us sometime during our postulancy. We were encouraged to be ready to leave a mission in 10 minutes and to have a hobby for our older years. Hobbies I have, so I guess one can say I am batting 500.
Spoiled by Sr. Carla Montante's sixth-graders
On August 19, 1963, twenty-seven of us pronounced our first vows. After two more years of study in the juniorate, I first was missioned to St. Joseph grade school, Vancouver, Wash. I taught seventh grade, which meant I got Sister Carla Montante’s sixth graders. SPOILED. My years of teaching were far too short to be called a career, six years in total. However, one of them was in Fairbanks, Alaska. SPOILED.
Attending both the University of Washington (BA) and the University of California at Berkeley (MBA/MPH), I was prepared to go into health care and religious community finance. The former took me to Anchorage, Alaska, for two years. SPOILED.
I worked eight years at Providence Hospital, Oakland, Calif., and continued to live there while a student at Berkeley. That local community exercised much patience and gave me unconditional love in my maturing years. SPOILED.
From September 1989 to April 1996 I served as provincial treasurer of the former Sacred Heart Province. In that capacity I had the privilege of a brief visit to Bernard Morin Province in Chile.
At no less than a General Chapter it was said that “the smallest and nicest province” is Holy Angels Province, in Edmonton, Alberta. I experienced the truth of that statement from November 1997 to December 2003. SPOILED. I was the provincial treasurer there through March 2003. The office afforded me the experience of spending three weeks in the Philippines. That was surely the most poverty I ever have seen.
Enters third phase of ministry
In Edmonton I did what provincial treasurers do, but the gift of those years was the relationships and, yes, lasting friendships formed in Marian Community. SPOILED. SPOILED. SPOILED.
I never returned to Sacred Heart Province. By December 2003 Mother Joseph Province was almost four years old. I then began a third phase of ministry, alternative/complementary health care. Through the religious community’s generosity I obtained a massage license and a certificate in reflexology. Also, if you give me your arm I’ll show you what can be done with muscle testing and herbs. SPOILED.
“Time flies when you’re having a good time.” From the vantage point of hindsight it does seem as if these 50 years have flown. Living through them, of course, is a different story. As a dear friend once told me, “every day is a struggle.” In its own way, knowing this is a blessing; I am SPOILED in her friendship. In the living through, the blessings are discovered; the faithfulness of God is experienced. SPOILED. That is what I celebrate as a golden Jubilarian.
I’m living this year very conscious that it is my Jubilee year. Truly, I am experiencing God alive in my life. SPOILED.
As you have read this I hope you will note that you, too, have been SPOILED by an unconditionally loving, provident God.
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