Saint Clotide of California
During the Liturgy of the 10th August, Bishop Mael canonised Sister Clotilde.
Her feast is on the 25th October.
Her life
Helen Quast was born on the 12th September 1912 in Seattle, Washington state, USA. We do not know anything of her childhood but as a young girl she entered a convent of the congregation of Franciscan nuns. Helen had to leave to nurse her sick mother which she did until her mother’s death. Having become a member of our Church in our parish of Davis in California, whose bishop at the time was Mgr Elijah and his auxiliary Mgr Nathan, Helen expressed the desire to enter the monastic life and to become a nun in the spirit of Saint Francis.
She was clothed as a novice in 1979 under the name of Sister Clotilde. She made her monastic profession in front of Mgr Elijah on October 4, 1981, which she renewed in 1982 before Mgr Mael, the only abbot then of the Celtic Orthodox Church. Mgr Mael became her spiritual father; she wrote to him regularly raising relevant questions about her daily spiritual life. Her health no longer permitted her to live alone, and she had to enter a small retirement home for the elderly to Sacramento, California. However, she expressed as a condition that she be permitted to keep her monastic dress at all times, which was granted to her.
In 1990, Mgr Mael was sent as a delegate by Mgr Seraphim, then patriarch, in order to carry out the establishment of Mgr Nathan as the new local and bishop of the American Eparchy. At this ceremony Sister Clotilde felt very proud and honoured with her role as sacristan. She emanated the purest simplicity of a child of God in a faith without shadow. When she received a gift, she covered it with kisses before opening it to thank whoever had made her the present. When she asked council in her letters her spiritual father concerning the various small difficulties which could occur in her daily life as a nun, she liked him to answer by giving her scriptural references which referred to these cases and which could help improve the situation.
She expired gently in the peace of God on October 25, 1993 at the 83 years age. She was canonized on August 10, 2008 in the cathedral Our-Lady-of the Sign a Saint Dolay.
Saint Clotilde’s is on the 25th October
