Sister Faustina Kowalska: Her LIfe and MIssion

to the parlou r when the girl, on h e r arriva l in Warsaw, came to ask to be allowed to en ter. The word "skinny" alone does not mean much, and may have various meanings not connected with hea lth alone, when placed in the context of the Mother’s opinion. Mother Michael had added th a t she seemed "shabby". A t all events, it was the f irs t warning sign, which we m u s t note. A yea r la ter, when Helen had come to th e convent, h e r com­ panions also though t she looked poorly. We learn th a t she was always, from the beginning, weaker th an her other contemporaries, and th a t she performed her duties with a certain difficulty. Why? we m u s t ask. W ha t could be the cause of th is? After all, she was a country girl, used to manual work. Bu t after ju s t a couple of weeks of the religious life she looked so poorly th a t Mother Superior sen t h e r for re s t and recuperation to nearby Skolimow, where the nun s h ad a small house. The f irs t supposition th a t springs to mind is th a t the rap id exhaustion she was suffering from was in large measure of a nervous origin and arose from h e r en try into th e convent, the total change in life-style, and Helena’s hes ita tion as to whe ther she had chosen the righ t community for herself. I t seems probably to be so. All those factors could have had a marked effect on the sensitive constitution of the young postu lan t, b u t a t the same time i t m u s t be obvious th a t the hea lth of Helena when she crossed the thresho ld of th e convent was no longer of the best, if its equilibrium could be so easily shattered . Something m u s t have seriously underm ined her hea lth already. But what? Her n a tu re was au s te re and self-denying, and to lim it her food or hours of sleep, or to have some g rea te r or smaller mortification was som ething she was quite used to. Throughout h e r religious life she was constantly inhibited by her superior and he r confessor from undertak ing too severe ascetic practices. Her employers s ta ted th a t th is asceticism was early developed in her character. The teenaged Helena amazed he r employer 256