The Sinsinawa Mound Saga #3
Real-time Updates Begin Now!
2025 has been a pretty horrifying year in our world (and particularly in our country). Nevertheless, my world here in the Southwest corner of Wisconsin is a rich tapestry of meaningful relationships, bustling activity and grace-filled developments at Sinsinawa Mound.
The Renovations
The most prominent activity at the Mound is without a doubt our Renovations of the so-called vintage buildings - soon to be the NEW Sinsinawa Mound Center. The new elevator—what I think of as the “spine” of the project—is fully assembled and installed. It was unveiled when the scaffolding came down last week and will be the thing that ties the two buildings together seamlessly…even where the floors don’t actually line up! The elevator has eight stops—both front and rear ones between the Stone (c. 1846) and Convent (c. 1899) buildings.
The full renovation project includes residential living areas, offices, conference space, an historical exhibit and worship spaces. It has been ridiculously complicated, just like it sounds, and has presented its fair share of challenges and surprises! It’s also been super interesting to facilitate the construction process from start to (God-willing!) finish. Our recent post features the crazy vintage memorabilia we unearthed!
We’re so close to furnishing, occupying and opening up the new Mound Center and will not be deterred by any 11th-hour challenges on this mammoth, protracted project! Starting in July, we’ll host a series of opening events culminating with a Public Open House on Sunday, August 3rd. Come visit! And please pray for us!
Once we move our offices out of the current (eastern) section of the Convent building, our hope is to find a sustainable, mission-aligned occupant to become our neighbor. The Stone (c. 1846) and Convent (c. 1899) buildings—along with the Academy Apartments to the west—are the Congregation’s focal points of new life at the Mound.
The 1964 Buildings
There are still no solid plans for the spacious, multi-use facilities on our campus that are gradually getting shut-down and cleared out. While previous negotiations fell through, I’m still hopeful that something great might take shape in these buildings. We’ve successfully “hooked” the right people—a couple of key developers in the area who have built their careers on audacious, challenging projects that bring a vibrant new life to abandoned or underutilized historic buildings. These developers are responsible for success stories like the Dubuque’s Steeple Square and the Milwaukee Soldiers Home and they are intrigued by the Mound and taken by the beauty and significance of the Queen of Rosary Chapel, in particular. You can see why in this video (complements of William Krueger).
The Sinsinawa Mound was featured at an architecture conference on sacred spaces last fall at Frank Lloyd Wright’s Taliesin in Wisconsin. I went to a recent networking event in Milwaukee with folks from the UW School of Architecture’s Historic Preservation Institute and the Wisconsin Historical Society and was encouraged how many folks remembered the Mound when I introduced myself. It made an impression at Taliesin, that’s for sure! Through UW’s network of historic preservation professionals, they are thoroughly documenting the buildings with laser scanning. The hope is that baseline data like that will support efforts to drum up interest with additional partners, investors, preservationists, etc.
I’m confident that these are the right people if anything is meant to grow in these buildings; but they are also very…busy…people. Their talk of campus masterplans and strategic exploration makes my professional heart SING. In the meantime, the buildings sit vacant, the deterioration accelerates with the changing seasons, and the fatigue and impatience on the part of many of our sisters and leadership continues. There is a real pressure that has been decades in-the-making to finally deal with them.
Honestly, they never actually served us as intended: the Congregation has been creatively “repurposing” the facilities to meet our needs since they were completed in 1964—the same year that number of women entering dropped precipitously.1 The throngs of women never manifested. Instead, for six decades the buildings got emptier as the numbers dropped and harder to inhabit as the residents aged.
Unfortunately, “dealing with them” right now would mean a long, painful and expensive deconstruction process. I live with a sister who described the sound of dynamite blasts during early construction on the buildings when she was a novice—they literally built into the Mound (pure limestone)! The idea of taking down these massive, mid-century buildings in the same lifetime as they were constructed feels obscene. Then again, I’ve only been wondering what to do with them for a mere decade! So, I’m doing what I can to support the Holy Spirit as She moves. I pray a lot that the path forward becomes clearer and that we can collectively recognize it.
The Sisters
I moved from DC to the Midwest to live closer to the critical mass of Sinsinawa Dominican sisters as we move through this pivotal moment in our 175-year history. These days, the Sisters are scattered mainly in WI-IL-MN-IA with approximately 2/3rd’s residing in the Milwaukee area at Stair Crest or with the Racine Dominican Sisters. They are living their best lives well into their late 80’s and 90’s and still enjoying community together.
That said, coordinating between the needs of each sister, the different levels of care, and the limited spaces available in these facilities is a logistical challenge, for sure. There’s a whole cadre of sisters (including leadership) that devote themselves to identifying, coordinating, communicating and aligning those needs as best as possible. Given the demographics and this reality, so much of our collective energy is devoted to discerning if, when, how, and who should be moving to where.
Our leadership recently called all of us together for a really hard zoom call in which they made an impassioned plea for each sister to consider moving somewhere that there is more support available. Especially the sisters who are still living individually, out on mission, were encouraged to look at one of the facilities near Milwaukee where there are currently units available. If you’ve had parents and broached this conversation you understand how emotionally fraught it is. Sisters are no exception.
My own “neighborhood” at Sinsinawa Mound consists of an extended community of 34 Sinsinawa Sisters. That was the most sisters living here since the mass exodus in 2023! I think of us as “the remnants” at the Mound—those of us still holding down the fort, so to speak. About half of us live on the Mound in the Academy Apartments and the old rectory (aka West Knoll). The other half—those needing full-time care—live across the road at St. Dominic’s Villa nursing home with laypeople from the surrounding area.
After that difficult congregation-wide zoom call some of my Sisters living at the Villa asked my thoughts about it. I told them I’m simply grateful to know that we can rest-assured that we’re in the right place so that we can focus our prayers on our Sisters and leadership: that God helps them find their way to where they’re supposed to be.
Since Sr. Patty died right before my profession, it was the longest stretch in a decade without a death! The four months ended with a rapid-succession of hard-hitting losses, all Sisters living at the Villa: Sr. Diane (Mar. 30th), Sr. Ginger (Apr. 1st), Sr. Liz (Apr. 4th), Sr. Ellie (Apr. 10th), Sr. Tink (Apr. 14th), and Sr. Mary Catherine (Apr. 19th). It feels like a special gift to be here to companion them and witness their grace in the final stage of life and in dying. That said, that level of loss is pretty devastating.
Fields of Sinsinawa
Finally, the push to invite area farmers to consider regenerative agriculture continues at the Mound! As the spring kicks in, field training events are picking back up and people are noticing the fruits of the regenerative techniques applied last year. Curiosity is spreading as the improved health of Sinsinawa land is becoming visible after a single year. And those who farm our land are enthusiastic about continuing the work! Planning is underway for the next Soul of the Soil Conference in the Fall and we’re very excited to offer our newly renovated spaces to the event!
Life at Sinsinawa Mound is good for me. I am exactly where I’m supposed to be. The days and weeks feel woven together by the Spirit and instilled with a sense of hopefulness. My daily life here is a welcomed counter-balance to The News.
In the early 1960s, 7000 young women a year joined religious life in the U.S.; by 1990 there were only 100 a year.