Recent convert thanks friars and Shrine of St. Anthony for helping her find Christ
Every day, fresh flowers are arranged (or rearranged), bulked up, or trimmed down in the Shrine of St. Anthony in Ellicott City, MD for placement near the tabernacle and at the feet of the Mary and St. Anthony statues flanking the altar in the Chapel. Behind these arrangements is Karen Sympson, a volunteer who uses this way to give back to the place she says has given her so much.
“I’d been to more churches than you can imagine in search of the Lord, and many of them, I turned around and walked right back out,” Karen said. “I walked in here and the Lord’s not letting me walk out.”
Karen was confirmed this Easter (2026) at the age of 65. She grew up in a house that did not have a faith tradition, but said she discovered who Christ was, as well how saints can pray and intercede for us, at the Shrine of St. Anthony.
The Shrine of St. Anthony is a ministry of the Franciscan Friars Conventual of Our Lady of the Angels Province and home to the Companions of St. Anthony. A private novitiate for decades, the Shrine building began being used for public Masses and retreats in the 1990s before being established as the Shrine of St. Anthony for the Archdiocese of Baltimore in 2005.
Karen first came to the Shrine in 2021. At the prompting of three customers in the same week – she worked at a local grocery store chain at the time – Karen decided to visit the Shrine despite her long-held skepticism for Catholicism.
She didn’t get very far, she said, sharing that she left before entering the Chapel, but something drew her back the next day and the day after that.
It took months before Karen would attend Mass, but she still found solace on the Shrine’s grounds. For a long time, Karen would come to the Shrine property and pray after work.
“I walked the eternity garden until I wore holes in my shoes,” she said, referring to the St. Anthony Garden of Eternity just west of the Shrine building.
With the help of friars, staff, and volunteers at the Shrine, Karen started to learn more about Catholicism and eventually went to her first Mass. Months later, she received her first Communion on All Saints Day in 2023.
“I was broken when I came here,” Karen said, referencing years of seeing specialists and needing medications for health troubles. “The friars have totally changed my life. When they pray for you, you feel it!”
As for St. Anthony and the Blessed Mother, she held on to some skepticism for a while even after she started to feel Christ’s presence at Mass and in receiving the Eucharist. She described her interactions with the saints as “snarky,” before they each showed her their way of interceding for her journey in their own way.
Now, arranging flowers in the Shrine’s sacristy for refresh the vases in the Chapel, Karen said she talks with Mary while she works.
“It’s like I’m hanging out and chatting with a girlfriend,” she said, the thought of never returning to the Shrine a distant memory.
“It took this whole community to get me here,” she said, with a special thank you to the friars who live and minister on this site. “Whatever I needed, they were there for me.”