Spiritual Exercise

Sisters of Charity of Cincinnati

Associate Brother Gary Sawyer has had a varied, nearly 40-year career in education—from pre-school to college—and now he’s teaching 10 aqua fitness classes each week to people of all ages at community centers in Denver, Colorado.

For Gary, swimming “is where I meet God most deeply and most presently, and it’s become my spiritual exercise.” He noticed that as he swims laps each day, he finds himself praying for particular people or groups of people with each lap. That practice was “such a place of peace and intimate connection with each one of the people or groups of people on my list,” he said. “I would ask God to bless the intended each time. That has grown to a centeredness where God and I together bless them.”

He finds that the charism of St. Elizabeth Ann Seton uniquely fits in with his aqua fitness classes. He ends each session with a call to gratitude and a reminder to love those near and far, and, in the “Culture of Charity,” to seek and give forgiveness when and where needed.

Gary first met the Sisters of Charity as a fifth grader at Sacred Heart School in his hometown of Denver. “The Sisters were so kind, loving, and nonjudgmental. They smiled and laughed and hugged, spoke softly, and loved freely,” he said. He went on to attend Cathedral High, also a Charity school in Denver, and Loyola Catholic School, a predominantly Black Catholic school in the Archdiocese of Denver, also run by the Sisters of Charity of Cincinnati. It was there that he met his friend of 56 years, S. Sue Verbiscus. He was later hired to teach at Loyola and become part of the blessed ministry with Sisters Sue, Mary Ellen Roach, and Janet Marie Wehmhoff. “I knew I was home. I felt nested in grace, love, and undeniable charity for more than two-thirds of my teaching career,” he said.

Gary became an SC Associate in Mission in 2002 under the guidance of S. Vincent de Paul Grilliot, and made his lifetime commitment as an Associate in 2015 under the companionship of Sisters Mary Ellen, Sue, Janet Marie, as well as Jackie Leech, Virginia Bohnert, and Catherine Erger.

In more recent years he has been on a “personal spiritual journey filled with love and care with my dear companion and friend, S. Nancy Hoffman,” he said. “Nancy so lovingly and so gracefully reintroduced me to the God that lives in me; hence, total freedom took hold.” Gary first met S. Nancy when she was a program director for an intercommunity novitiate program at the College of Mount St. Joseph in Cincinnati, now Mount St. Joseph University, while he was a novice with the Brothers of the Poor of St. Francis in Belleview, Kentucky. He later left that community and joined a newly formed diocesan group of Augustinian Brothers in New Jersey and when that community disbanded in 2012, “my religious life became integrated with my lifetime commitment as an Associate of the Sisters of Charity.” Gary continues to acknowledge his vocation to religious life and seeks ways to freely express the fullness of God’s presence into the lives of those he meets and works with daily.

In addition to his many years in education, Gary has been a director of religious education at two parishes, served in the Office of African American Ministries for the archdiocese, and for five years as Sunday Eucharistic Minister at St. Joseph Hospital in Denver, Colorado. “Ministry is a place where we make a difference,” he said, “where we bring hope, charity and forgiveness.”

Gary is also a photographer and uses his camera to “capture the living God” in his subjects. He has offered his time and talents to the SC Communications Office on numerous occasions and plans to do so again for the upcoming Community pictorial directory.