Catholic News Around Indiana

Diocese of EVANSVILLE

As veterinarian, Sister Vivian sees ‘how exquisite all of God’s creation is’

By Mary Ann Hughes (The Message staff writer)

Benedictine Sister Vivian Ramos keeps a small prayer card and medal of St. Francis of Assisi in the pocket of her lab coat. He’s the patron saint of animals, and she says they are buddies.

“I keep him busy,” she said. “I pray for his intercession a lot.”

Sister Vivian is a veterinarian and works in a clinic in northern Vanderburgh County. She’s also a Sister of St. Benedict from Monastery Immaculate Conception in Ferdinand.

She was born in Florida, the daughter of a Navy man, and she grew up in California. She’s a cradle Catholic, but didn’t have a special connection to the Church or the religious life when she was a child.

“I saw a car full of nuns one time. My parents pointed them out, and it looked like they were having a good time,” Sister Vivian said. “That was it.”

She did have a special connection to animals, and enjoyed the dogs, cats and goldfish that were family pets.

“When the goldfish died, I would cut them open to see what they looked liked inside,” she recalled.

Her parents told her they expected her to become a doctor, “but they didn’t say what kind. My brother is a dentist, and I thought the animals would be a little more interesting” than people.

When her father retired from the Navy, the family moved to the Philippines, where she earned her doctor of veterinary medicine degree. She followed that work with clinical rotations at Purdue University, and that’s how she arrived in Indiana.

And that’s where she had her “conversion” experience.

“I was agnostic,” she said. “I doubted. Since I was a teenager, my parents couldn’t get me into a church.”

On the eighth anniversary of her father’s death, she decided to do something special to remember him.

“It was the first one alone without my family, and I went to the Catholic Center at Purdue,” she said. “I wasn’t sure what to do at the Mass, but I smelled the aroma of roses. And I had that comforting feeling—you know, when you are hurting and your mom hugs you.

“That’s when the scales were peeled from my eyes.”

During Mass, she felt God was telling her not to worry about her dad because he was fine.

“I started smelling the roses, and then I saw a picture of Our Lady of Guadalupe with yellow roses in front of it.”

The comforting feeling that started in the church followed her into her life.

“You know what it’s like when you are infatuated with someone, and you think about them all the time. It was like that with God.”

One day, she returned to the church and, as she stood in front of the picture of Our Lady of Guadalupe, she realized that the yellow roses were “dusty silk flowers.”

She soon became acquainted with several other Catholic students and became active in the church.

One day, the pastor asked her if she had ever considered becoming a “religious.”

She didn’t understand the term.

When she found out about a “come and see” weekend at the Benedictine monastery in Ferdinand, she decided to attend.

“It was a free weekend with free meals, a time to get away,” she said, laughing at the memory. Her first contact with the Benedictines was “great.”

But not great enough to make a commitment to stay.

“I went to California, and my career was going great. I had a beach-front condo, and I enjoyed dating. It was great.”

But in the midst of that wonderful life, she would often pause and ask herself, “I wonder what it would be like at Ferdinand?”

A year later, she went back.

“I came to see. I came to get off the fence.”

Up to that point, she said, “I had it all. I was happy, but I knew there was more. Life was already good, but I knew there was something better.

“God wouldn’t leave me alone.”

She wondered if the Benedictines would be interested in accepting a woman who was a veterinarian since they were known as a teaching order.

“I thought being a vet would be a hindrance because I didn’t do anything useful. The sisters were all teachers and nurses.”

She discovered that her career choice didn’t matter.

“That’s why our community is thriving because it doesn’t matter what you do as a Benedictine. Our main focus is seeking God, and you can do that as a nurse, as an accountant, as a vet or as a teacher.”

She made her final vows as a Benedictine sister in 2005.

Today, she lives out her days as a vet working in a clinic and joins her fellow Benedictine sisters in the evenings.

Her work as a vet has become her ministry, and working with the owners has become as important as working with their pets.

“This is the only practice where I ever worked where the clients tell us, ‘Please pray for us.’

“It’s a very privileged place to be—that trust is there.”

The work is hard, too, she said, especially the deaths.

It also strengthens her faith.

“When you think about how these different bodies work … a cat shows you how clever God is.

“You see how exquisite all of God’s creation is. We see the Creator and the creature and, yes, it’s very exquisite.

“I think God is a scientist as well as an artist.” †