When she first joined the Lovers of the Holy Cross at the age of 12, Sister Anne Lanh Thi Tran would have never imagined that years later she would be forced to leave her homeland --- or that she would one day become the head of the 330-year-old religious order's largest group outside Vietnam.

Today, some 58 sisters comprise the Lovers of the Holy Cross congregation in California. They own three houses in Los Angeles, two in Santa Ana and one in San Bernardino, and a Gardena convent. In 2005, the sisters celebrated 30 years of service to the communities of Los Angeles and Orange County.

In Gardena, the residents range from ages 19 to 98, with two postulants and four novices among the group. Over recent years, anywhere from two to four new candidates a year have been accepted into the order's program of spiritual formation; during that time, they live in community, where they participate in internovitiate studies with novitiates from other congregations.

Their mission is to serve the poor and needy, especially women and children, focusing on faith, morality, education, health care, and cultural and social work.

"To be a sister involves a whole package," explains Sister Anne, serving her second four-year term as Superior General. "We follow the rules of the community; we give up our freedom because God requires that. I know it is hard to choose that lifestyle."

Beginnings and exodus
The Lovers of the Holy Cross was founded in Vietnam in 1670 by French missionary Bishop Pierre Marie Lambert de la Motte. Centuries later, as a result of the civil war that afflicted the Asian country, many of the sisters fled to other countries, including the U.S., where they settled in California and Boston.

It was 1975, when the communists took over Vietnam. Religious people and institutions were persecuted and killed.

"Everybody said to leave the country, afraid that something might happen to the sisters," Sister Anne recalls, dressed in her navy blue habit, talking with a visitor at the religious community's convent in Gardena.

It was a far cry from the Vietnam of her youth, when she first felt the desire to become a nun. "Actually, I wanted to be a priest," she smiles, "but since that was impossible, being a sister was all right."

There was freedom of religion in Vietnam then. Raised in a poor but devout Catholic family, one of six children, Sister Anne grew up with priests and sisters visiting her home. In 1954 she started attending a Catholic school across the street from her house. (Years later one of her sisters followed her path and a brother became a priest.)

When she told her parents she wanted to join the Lovers of the Holy Cross, her parents had mixed feelings. They were fine with her becoming a nun, though they hated the fact that the convent was 100 miles away.

While in the convent, she finished high school, and as a novice completed nursing school. As a nurse she worked for an orphanage administered by the order in Vietnam.

And she always responded with joy when beggars knocked on her family's door asking for food. "I've always liked helping people," she notes.

Her life changed, though, when the sisters were forced to leave as the communists assumed control.

"We left in small groups," she continues. A very small group of sisters could leave with their family members, but others, like Sister Anne, had to leave relatives behind. With three other sisters, she boarded a fishing boat heading to Thailand, landing in a refugee camp.

When Thailand's mayor learned that they were staying at the refugee camp, he invited them to stay at his house. During those months in Thailand, the sisters organized Mass and prayer time with the refugees and taught religious education classes for the children in the camps.

To the U.S.
After six months, they left for the U.S. in late 1975, assisted by a Vietnamese priest already living in the U.S. who was a relative of one of the sisters. He had ensured that the whole group could enter the country legally.

Sister Anne was placed at Camp Indian Town Gap, a refugee camp in Pennsylvania. Again, she and other sisters organized Mass and prayer time and led classes in Catholic teaching to small groups of children.

After leaving the camp and staying at other religious orders' houses, finally the sisters could regroup and settle in Philadelphia, where Sister Anne pursued a bachelor's degree in social work at LaSalle University. Upon graduating, she spent 1983 and '84 working in New York with Indochinese refugees in a program coordinated by a Vietnamese priest.

In 1985, Msgr. John Languille, then director of Catholic Charities, asked the Sisters, Lovers of the Holy Cross to come to work for Good Shepherd Center for Homeless Women, a program of CC in Los Angeles.

The congregation brought Sister Anne to California to work at this center as an associate director, remaining in that position until 2002, when she was elected Superior General for four years. While working at the Good Shepherd Center, she went back to school at the University of Southern California, graduating in 1991 with a master's degree in social work.

She admits to "doubts of worthiness" when she was nominated as Superior General. "I wasn't sure if I was worthy enough to lead the whole community in the U.S.," she said. "But once elected I had to obey."

She met the qualifications, including that of setting an example to her sisters in striving for a life of virtue. Her second four-year term will end in 2010.

Discernment processes
Things have changed since Sister Anne joined the community. Today the minimum age is 17, which is the age that postulant Lieu Nguyen, now 22, entered the congregation when she was still attending high school.

Growing up in Oxnard, she never knew about the order until she attended an annual Marian Vietnamese celebration in Missouri and met a sister who invited her to spend a few days at the order's house there.

Her middle-class family was very religious, and liked doing good deeds, so her parents supported her when she told them about her desire to become a sister. She is the middle child of six children.

Novice Deliah Nguyen's experience was totally different. She was in eighth grade when the idea of dedicating her life to a full-time ministry arose. She had seen the example of her catechism teachers (all sisters) at St. Polycarp Church in Stanton.

When she volunteered at a nursing home as part of a school requirement while in tenth grade, she was deeply touched. Soon after, she attended a vocation workshop organized by the Diocese of Orange and confirmed her desire to become a nun.

Her parents wanted her to become a pharmacist or a medical doctor. So she obeyed, went to school and majored in biological science at the University of California, Irvine. Then came the time to decide: med school or religious life.

When she announced her decision to become a nun after graduating from college in 2006, Delilah says her parents were disappointed and reluctant to let their only daughter go, even though they have relatives who are priests and nuns.

"It is still hard for them (parents) to let go," says Delilah, 24. "But God can take care of my family better than I can."

"When you encounter Christ life is more meaningful," she noted. "Life outside doesn't last. My thoughts and my actions are for Him; all is centered in Christ."

The new sisters or postulants have a period of reflection. During this time silence prevails as well as constant prayer. The only time they can speak to another person is during meals or during mid-afternoon recreation period.

The candidates need to finish a four-year academic degree before they can join the novitiate. A temporary vow period follows (about five years) before taking final vows.

From the beginning all candidates are involved in any of the congregation's programs, either in the education or health care field, according to their gifts and vocation.

"Vocation is a lifestyle," says Sister Anne. "You deny your freedom by following obedience, and you like it because that's what you freely choose. It is much more than ministry."

For more information about the Lovers of the Holy Cross community in California, call (310) 516-0271 or (310) 768-1906.