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Spirit of Ministry: Mary Ellen Haupert pairs music with ministry

Covenant affiliate Mary Ellen Haupert shares her gift of music with others.

The Spirit of Ministry feature celebrates the Ministry Renewal Program launched last year to refresh affiliates in their current ministry or stretch them to embark on new ministries. As a part of this series, Perspectives highlights covenant affiliates and their ministries. This is the second story in the series.

Music plays a large role in Mary Ellen Haupert's life, and becoming a covenant affiliate with the Franciscan Sisters of Perpetual Adoration has helped her realize the importance of her musical gift. "I love the idea of acknowledging the gifts that you have. The Franciscan stance on that is taking that gift, acknowledging it, and then sharing it with others. I love that, and it helps me stay grounded."

Mary Ellen made her covenant with FSPA in July, and says she felt drawn to the common purpose of the community, with which she became familiar through her friendship with Marci Madary, affiliation co-minister. The emphasis on appreciating one's gifts especially resonates with her. She says, as a musician, it's easy to lose sight of the real value of the talents we have. The FSPA attitude toward talent is different. "It's an attitude adjustment: recognizing a gift and then doing something with a gift-it's not for bloated egos, it's for a purpose. We make links and inroads and connections with people, often through our gifts."

Mary Ellen shares her musical gifts with many people, including students at Viterbo University, choir members and congregations at Roncalli Newman Center, and the general public through concerts and benefits. Several days a week, she teaches piano proficiency and music theory classes at Viterbo University. She also works part-time at the Roncalli Newman Center in La Crosse as music director, planning all music for liturgies, and leading the children's choir in the fall and other seasonal choirs, as well as the brass group.

"The Roncalli Newman job has been a terrific growth experience for me. A couple of years ago, I completed the Diocesan School for Biblical Studies, which was a great thing in terms of helping me hone those liturgical skills. Understanding the Word [Gospel] better has helped me pick out music that I think is meaningful and helps them connect the Word to the whole liturgical experience as they sing it. Working with the Word in the rhythm of weekly and seasonal liturgies, as well as interacting with terrific people, continually help me become a better person and a better minister. That's part of the reason why I couldn't let that piece go in my life when offered a job at Viterbo in 2003," she says.

Mary Ellen explains that people are the best part of her work, and she especially enjoys working with children. "That beginning, fresh, first seed, I think is so important in getting them to connect and love music." The liturgical choir also rejuvenates her and allows Mary Ellen to appreciate the good that she's doing, something she says is important in ministry. She senses that choir members experience a similar rejuvenation. "They like that choir practice in the middle of the week. It becomes kind of an oasis in an otherwise busy, sometimes hectic world."

As a part of the acknowledgement of her gifts, Mary Ellen participates in community-building projects through music ministry. Last year, she and the choir she leads sang spirituals for a Place of Grace (a Catholic worker house) benefit and liturgies throughout the year.

Much of her ministry involves an "intermingling of teaching, performing and service," and that means ministering through music throughout the year. In 2002/2003, she used Marty Haugen's musical, The Song of Mark, to help develop deeper understanding of the lectionary readings, and the choir has performed it at liturgies and other events since then. She's doing an encore performance of the first portion of Song of Mark with the children's choir, made of teens and college students, for a Thanksgiving potluck this NovemberAffiliation, says Mary Ellen, was a natural connection. "I work at a Franciscan college, I work at a church, I have friends who are Franciscans. I think affiliation is a part of my daily life very naturally because of what I do. I see my presence there as a very natural extension of that theory."

Mary Ellen also feels that by being an affiliate, she is helping continue the vision of the FSPA. "It feels like by becoming an affiliate I am honoring a very definite purpose, especially in the role of teaching a music ministry. There's a purpose in which these women laid a foundation. Their influence has a ripple effect in the lives of a lot of people in La Crosse."

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