‘You Formed Our Souls’: Denver Priests and Laity Reflect on Sr. Prudence Allen’s Spiritual Motherhood

(Photo by Danielle Coon)

By Danielle Coon

Last month, Most Precious Blood Parish in Denver hosted a special celebratory Mass and luncheon honoring Sr. Prudence Allen, RSM, for her incredible legacy as founding chair of the philosophy program at St. John Vianney Seminary in Denver. 

From 1998 to 2014, Sr. Allen helped establish the philosophy program in which she also taught. A member of the Religious Sisters of Mercy, whose apostolate is largely in medicine and education, Sr. Allen previously taught for 30 years at Concordia University in Canada before coming to Denver.

Besides being well remembered for things like competitive croquet games in Washington Park and strolling around St. John Vianney in a large straw sun hat, Sr. Allen is acclaimed for her authoritative three-part volume “The Concept of Woman,” which traces the philosophical conceptions of gender and gender relations from 750 BC to 2015 AD. A massive work totaling 2,792 pages over four books and three volumes (volume two has two parts), Sr. Allen methodically examines how writers and thinkers throughout history have regarded womanhood and manhood, from pre-Socratic writers like Sappho and Parmenides to modern figures including Alfred Kinsey and John Money. The sheer breadth of philosophical anthropology covered by Sr. Allen is staggering and understandably took her roughly fifty years to complete; in its completion, it is a priceless gift to philosophy, theology and all Catholicism. 

However, for the seminarians, now priests, who knew her at St. John Vianney, Sr. Allen’s greatest contribution will always be her formation of their souls.

“We learned the discipline of thinking clearly and quickly as philosophers,” a priest and former student recalled.

“How we care for people as priests has been formed thanks to your contributions as well,” said Father Matthew Book, pastor of Light of the World Parish in Littleton and soon-to-be the new Vicar of Clergy in July, to Sr. Allen at the March celebration. “Having that philosophical mind, we can bring enlightenment and understanding to others.” 

Thanking Sr. Allen for her commitment to teaching seminarians philosophy, Father Book noted how this education has aided them in their pastoral ministry now as priests. 

“I think very fondly of writing our paper on medieval philosophy about one of the passions and going deep and knowing how does my heart and soul work, my humanity, delving into that and not being afraid of that and finding freedom in my understanding of it,” Father Book remarked.

“I would just also note simply your feminine genius of being a woman who is strong yet gracious, and your humanity itself was a gift, and I think it was a very valuable gift for seminarians to have you and have other women there as well,” he added. 

The appreciation for Sr. Allen and her feminine genius that she brought to the seminary echoes the principle of integral complementarity between men and women, which Sr. Allen proposed and defended in her work. The principle refers to the great flourishing of life that can arise from relationships between the two genders.  As Sr. Allen often describes it via mathematical analogy, men and women’s complementarity means 1+1=3. Together, they are more than just two individuals; their relationship results in a superabundance of life. This complementarity is certainly exemplified in marriage, when two spouses come together to become something much greater — a family — but also can be present in spiritual relationships. One can think of the great friendships between St. Francis and St. Clare of Assisi or St. John of the Cross and St. Theresa of Avila.

As I sat at Sr. Allen’s celebration, miraculously ending up at the table of the guest of honor herself, I had the distinct impression that I was crashing the birthday party of a mom with many, many children. Like boisterous sons, priests told stories and jokes about Sr. Prudence’s time at St. John Vianney. Somehow, every priest in the room seemed necessarily young in the presence of the woman who taught them the value of philosophy, the importance of verbal precision and how to properly allocate one’s time while taking an exam — the last one through given recommendations for the amount of minutes to take with each test question. I watched as person after person knelt next to Sr. Allen at our table to reconnect over former stories and current occupations, and viscerally felt that this was a woman who embodied spiritual motherhood.

Besides Sr. Allen’s many spiritual sons present, there were also many spiritual daughters. 

In 2003, Marilyn Coors, Betsy Considine and Terry Polakovic approached Sr. Allen to teach them St. John Paul II’s encyclical Mulieris Dignitatem, and the content and style of sister’s teaching later became the basis for Endow (Educating on the Nature and Dignity of Women). Endow now offers 18 different adult studies on many papal encyclicals and Catholic saints, including St. Thomas Aquinas and St. Edith Stein. The group has extended its reach over the past 22 years across the country and globe. Polakovic was present to speak and honor Sr. Prudence for all she did to help them begin their important work.

Speaking of the first year of Endow’s existence, Polakovic said, “The energy in the office was electric, and we would share every success with Sr. Prudence; it seemed like she was always more thrilled than we were.” 

Sr. Allen, in her work at the seminary and her aid in starting Endow, gives a beautiful example of flourishing femininity and spiritual motherhood. By bringing the wholeness of her person to her tasks and teaching, she precipitated so much life and spiritual growth. 

At the end of the Mass before the luncheon, all the present priests, at the instigation of Bishop Jorge Rodriguez himself, sang “O Most Pure and Loving Heart.” Written by Mother Teresa and sung by the Missionaries of Charity, this song is sung daily by seminarians at lunchtime. As voices from priests, young and old, raised in harmony, the song took on the singular tone of a hymn of love to mothers, both the Immaculate in Heaven and her representatives here on earth.