The moving story of Sister Sebastiana, mom of a bishop

From the heart of Brazil, in the state of Mato Grosso do Sul, comes a unique story. Maternal love, faith, and vocation unite the bishop of Dourados, Henrique Aparecido de Lima, and his mother, Sister Sebastiana Onofre Lima. A widow and mother of eight children, she’s now a nun in the Congregation of the Sisters of Abundant Redemption.

Joining the community was a childhood dream that Sebastiana was able to fulfill thanks to the support of her eldest son, the bishop.

The community was founded by a Redemptorist priest in Brazil (its name in Portuguese is Congregação das Irmãs da Copiosa Redenção), and one of its members recently made the news for her beatboxing skills. They welcome widows as candidates to join the community.

Sebastiana began to feel the call to religious life when she was 12 or 13 years old, she told Evangelizar TV. However, she was married at the young age of 18, as the Pai Eterno website reports. The marriage was arranged by her father to help the family overcome financial difficulties. Still, she wanted to serve God.

“Since I got married,” Sister Sebastiana told the ACI Digital news agency, "I always asked God to act in my life and in the lives of my children.”

Her daughter Maria Salete told Paulinas that within married life, her mother was very active in her parish. She was a catechist and missionary, and practiced herbal medicine, which was all that was available in the remote region where they lived.  

She was only able to fulfill her childhood dream after 36 years of marriage and at the age of 55, once her husband had passed away.

“Ever since I was a child, I heard her say: I didn't want to get married, I wanted to be a nun,” recalls her son, Bishop Henrique.

Her father, who became Catholic thanks to his wife, told him before he died, “Help your mother go to the convent. It's her dream.”

Now she’s 80 years old, and she devotes herself to prayer and helping women who are struggling with addiction.

Sister Sebastiana told ACI Digital, “I’m happy as a religious! I love work, adoration, and helping people recover from addiction, because my desire has always been to restore lives, to bring these people out of the desert and guide them to a dignified life.”

“I’m passionate about my congregation. I’m very happy and I feel closer to God each day,” she told Paulinas.

“At home, she always prayed the Rosary every night and read the Bible with us. Then everyone went to bed, and my mother continued to pray,” recalls Bishop Henrique.

In turn, he felt God's call at a very young age. When he was around 14 years old, he decided to enter the seminary, where he was able to complete his primary education.

His family was short of money, and at one point he had to leave the seminary to help his parents. He also saved up some money so that he could continue his studies. He worked in the rural sector and as a truck driver to support his vocation. In 1991, at the age of 26, he was able to continue his training and, at the age of 35, in 1999, he made his solemn vows as a Redemptorist and was ordained to the priesthood.

He worked in parishes for several years and held various responsibilities at a diocesan level before becoming the provincial of the Redemptorist province of Campo Grande.

He was appointed bishop of Dourados by Pope Francis and received his episcopal ordination on January 30, 2016. It was a great joy for his mother. “The family is the cradle of vocations,” Sister Sebastiana says. She still visits her son frequently.

Bishop Henrique, for his part, says that he feels his mother's support and prayers in the exercise of his ministry: "I’m sure she prays a lot for the diocese, for me and for my work. So it’s certainly a great support.“

Today, mother and son live their ”yes" to God on parallel but deeply united paths. She serves the most vulnerable; he guides his diocese. It’s a rare and touching story, where the faith passed on by a mother becomes a shared vocation.