From NATO to Norfolk: Sister Gabrielle Marie Oestreich accepts new role as prioress

The new prioress of the Missionary Benedictines Sisters-Norfolk Priory could be imagined as a tough-as-nails leader.

She has leadership experience both in religious life and in her prior career: serving in the U.S. Air Force for 26 years, retiring as a colonel, with her last assignment at NATO headquarters in Brussels.

Yet it is not with the toughness of a military leader that she accepts her new position as prioress of the Norfolk community. Instead, Sister Gabrielle Marie Oestreich takes on her new role with a Benedictine attitude of “humble acceptance.”

Sister Gabrielle was prayerfully elected by her community and installed as prioress on Nov. 30. During her five-year term, she will help lead and guide about 35 sisters in the community, who come from a variety of countries.

Sister Gabrielle filled a vacancy left after the previous prioress, Missionary Benedictine Sister Rosann Ocken, was elected on Oct. 8 as superior general of their worldwide religious community. Sister Rosann will begin in her new position in Rome on Jan. 20 and leaves her Norfolk community this weekend.

In choosing their new prioress, the sisters considered what qualities they wanted in a leader and were able to hear from the sisters who were eligible for election.

“I was given the opportunity to express what my hopes and dreams for the community were, how I felt about my qualifications and also what limitations I may have,” Sister Gabrielle said. “We tried to give each other a full picture of what the future is looking like, what we need in our leadership – and for those who were qualified or who had the potential for being the next leader – the opportunity to look at them and to listen to them.”

The process also included prayers to the Holy Spirit for guidance and a time of discernment.

On the morning of Nov. 30, Sister Gabrielle was elected as prioress. And during evening community prayers, she was formally installed.

Sister Gabrielle Marie Oestreich COURTESY PHOTO

The new position “significantly changed my life, that’s for sure,” Sister Gabrielle said in a recent telephone interview.

But like most missionaries, she has learned to accept changes and new assignments. For Sister Gabrielle, a native of Lansing, Michigan, that process began with a career as a teacher before she switched gears and entered the Air Force. That phase of her life took her to places like Korea, Spain, Germany and Belgium.

In 1994, she made a more permanent transition, to become a Missionary Benedictine Sister.

In Norfolk, Sister Gabrielle served as director of adult formation at Sacred Heart Parish and as a novice director for the Missionary Benedictine Sisters. She also has served as a spiritual director and has helped with retreats at the community’s Immaculata Monastery Spirituality Center.

At the time of her election, Sister Gabrielle had been serving in Sioux City, Iowa, as the superior of a smaller community of the Norfolk sisters there. She helped with adult formation at Sioux City’s Holy Cross Parish by giving retreats, offering classes and helping people enter the Catholic Church through the Order of Christian Initiation for Adults (OCIA). She also was a sacristan and an annulment advocate at the parish.

“I fell in love with Sioux City and the ministry and the people who I was working with there,” she said.

But after her installation as prioress, she had two weeks to move back to Norfolk and begin her new duties there.

“One of my major jobs is to be there for the support of the sisters,” which can be difficult to plan for or include in a schedule, she said.

During her first weeks as prioress, Sister Gabrielle has benefited from the experience and guidance of her predecessor, Sister Rosann.

“We’ve been in kind of constant communication in the transition,” Sister Gabrielle said. “It’s been extremely valuable because she’s right here. I can talk to her about various issues, and she can get me up to speed on what’s happening and help transition the paperwork, and things that are part of a normal office environment.”

“And, of course, thank God for today’s communication because I already know that if something comes up that I really need to talk to her about … even though she’s half a world away, she’ll be there to help and assist us. That’s very comforting to know that that kind of guidance is always available.”

After living in Sioux City, Iowa, for six years, with the smaller community of four to six sisters, she’s getting to know her sisters in Norfolk better.

“I must admit, I’ve enjoyed rediscovering my community here in Norfolk, getting to know the sisters again at a different level,” Sister Gabrielle said. “Being gone for six years, things change.”

Sister Gabrielle compared her previous living arrangements – being part of the Norfolk community but based in Sioux City – with having relatives in another city that you might visit occasionally for an afternoon.

“So that’s been a joy to really experience my sisters again,” she said. “Also, we have a number of lay employees here in the community, and many of them are new. So there’s the joy of meeting new employees and getting to know them.”

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