An early photo from an archived album.
In the summer of 1985 Sister Sean Fox and I were invited to Patricia Crowley’s home, high above Chicago in the Hancock building for a women’s Eucharist celebration. It was a special occasion for Sean, her 25th jubilee as a Servite nun. For my husband Patrick Racey and I, it was also a splendid year as it was our 25th wedding anniversary.
Before the service started, I looked out the window. Down below in all the Catholic churches I knew that they were collecting for Peter’s Pence. I remembered that during the debate on birth control a labor lawyer told me that there was not a chance that the hierarchy’s stance on birth control would change. ”You see,” he said, “each baby is more pence for Peter.”
That is what I was thinking when I looked out the window and then I thought, we need something for women who are told that they must bear as many children as “God gives them.” That in case of the death of the baby or the mother, the mother must be sacrificed. I thought of all the women who were mothers, who did what they were told to do, and lived in anguish and poverty unable to provide for their children. At this moment, the Holy Spirit sprinted to the rescue and put the thought in my head, “We need a Mary’s Pence.”
As soon as I said it, Sean Fox and Maureen Gallagher answered a resounding “yes.” Later we discussed it with all the women present for the Eucharist celebration and Maureen volunteered to “do it.” Pat Crowley was very enthusiastic about it.
Maureen had no help, but she had envisioned this independent of our meeting. She was ready and began at once with a mighty will to move forward. She set up a most wonderful Board, and Sean, an excellent lawyer, wrote the by-laws and we began having meetings. Our meetings were held at the Catholic Worker house and a series of convents where we were given hospitality.
Board member Janemarie Luecke, OSB, commented that a Bishop she communicated with was absolutely delighted that we had formed Mary’s Pence. She said that the longest heresy of the Roman Catholic Church was its treatment of women.
The way the Board decided issues was entirely new to me. In all my committees and organizations, we voted and the majority ruled. Not at Mary’s Pence. Each issue was aired totally and no decision was made until there was consensus. Imagine going from a power place, to a totally inclusive place. It made sense. It brought balance instead of egos to the forefront.
It had a powerful effect on me. I now teach Restorative Justice at John Marshall Law School in Chicago. We teach our students the Mary’s Pence way of sitting in a circle, letting each person talk with no cross talk and when there is not consensus, doing the same thing until we all agree.
Imagine a world where consensus reigns, not power….a world where Mary Magdalene’s words, “He is risen,” trump the “rock” of Peter and everyone else.
Since the consensus way of thinking was introduced into my brain, the real work has been done not from the ears up, but from the heart out. This is the Mary’s Pence way…to give our pence from the heart out, so that those who were hopeless and voiceless could have hope and a voice. It is one voice all together from Mary’s heart to the world.
Hon. Sheila M. Murphy has long been an active presence in international, national, state and local bar associations as well as judges’ associations and has presided over death penalty cases during her tenure on the bench. She has served as Chair of the Judges Forum of the International Bar Association, she as an adjunct professor at John Marshall Law School since 1992. Appointed Associate Judge in 1989, she was elected to the Circuit Court of Cook County, IL in 1992. She served as Presiding Judge of the Sixth District until 1999 when she retired from the bench. A frequent guest speaker, she is the founder of Our Children in the Courts Foundation. Judge Murphy holds a JD from DePaul University School of Law, and a BS from Marquette University.
