Sr. Germaine Corbin's Story

Early on, Sister Germaine Corbin’s family went through some trying times, so much so that someone quipped that she could start her biography with this line: “My mother married my father when I was nine years old.” The suggestion was made in jest by one of her siblings, but it hid the pain of her father’s death when the then Miriam (Sr. Germaine) was a toddler. At the same time, it reaffirms the care and support she received from her stepfather.

Things were settled and steady when the young six-grader met the Incarnate Word Sisters in Metairie, Louisiana. “They were highly educated, wonderful teachers, and good people…I felt they were really the ones that I wanted to be a part of.”

The family lived near the church, and she and her mother went to daily Mass. Sr. Germaine remembers, “It was just a strong sense within me that becoming a Sister is what God wanted me to do. It was just simple….no drama [beyond the usual ups and downs]/” And she likes to add: “ I am God’s spoiled brat [getting what I wanted, to become an Incarnate Word Sister].”

God “spoiled” her in another way. When she professed in the convent, she was given the name Germaine in honor of a holy and dedicated long-deceased Sister. Miriam didn’t like her new name but a friend of that Sister became her tutor and friend and told her so many stories of the original “Germaine” that when she had a choice of returning to “Miriam” she chose to remain “Germaine.”

Like many other Sisters, Sr. Germaine taught in various grade schools, then was assigned to the Registrar’s Office at Incarnate Word College, before she was sent to Catholic University in Washington, D.C. to study Speech and Drama and American theater history, which she has taught at the University for the most part since 1972.

Around that time, she had a “desert experience” of sorts in a retreat house in South Texas. The silence and solitude there inspired her to spend four years of prayer and study as a contemplative Religious. But she was called back into the world to attend to her elderly parents in New Orleans. After that, she was drawn into the Prison Ministry before the staffing needs in the Theater Department brought her again to the University.

She returned with a deeper spirituality, determined that the students “had to see Christ in me,” and Sr. Germaine did this in ordinary but meaningful ways: opening every class with a prayer, often for intentions suggested by students, and simply greeting everyone. She let everyone know, “I see you and I am glad to see you.”

Connecting, then, is crucial for the Mission, notwithstanding the many changes at the University. “If we can continue to educate young people and instill in them an appreciation for the values that we hold. Even if they don’t necessarily subscribe to our beliefs…[we need to do this because] human dignity is universal. The appreciation for the other person is universal. If they [students] can experience that or begin to experience it, or ascribe it and inculcate it within themselves, then I think it doesn’t matter how big [the University is].“

Sr. Germaine has continued her Theater Arts profession in retirement with some new acts: Interviewing acquaintances who had been in theater touring company in their younger days and interviewing World War II veterans; and now recruiting other retirees to join the Extend Run Players and continue performing.

In all her work, the Mission is nourished by spirituality, as Sr. Germaine explains.