The last thing she expected to be was a member of a Catholic religious congregation.
She was from a Protestant nation, and her interests were far from Catholicism or consecrated life. But then she traveled unexpectedly to a Mediterranean country, and her religious experiences there changed everything. Now, after dying young, she is one of the best-known religious sisters to young people in America.
Of course, those words describe both Saint Elizabeth Ann Seton and Sister Clare Crockett — but the two have more in common than just the broad outlines of their lives.
Go to a Catholic college, and you will see how popular this Northern Irish sister is.
A number of healings have put her on the path to beatification but that’s not why Sister Clare Crockett is famous. YouTube is why — or, better, her larger-than-life personality that comes across so well in the age of social media.
“All or Nothing” is the documentary on YouTube of the life of Sister Clare, and it has nearly 3 million views, even after it was accidentally deleted for a month.
Its title comes from the words of a sister who knew her. “When she did something, she did it to the best of her ability, with all of her strength, keeping nothing back for herself,” a fellow religious tells the camera in the opening minutes of the documentary. “When I saw Sr. Clare do things, she really was all or nothing.”
Clare Theresa Crockett was born in 1982 in what was, at the time, the majority Protestant nation of Northern Ireland.
“I’m from Ireland, from a wee town called Derry,” she introduces herself on camera. “Ever since I was little, I don’t know why, but I always had this desire to be famous.”
She grew up a “drama queen” focused on becoming a famous actress. When “Wannabe” by the Spice Girls was climbing the Irish charts in 1996, Clare began acting, writing and even directing on Irish television.
Two years later, what could have been her big break happened. “When I was sixteen and had already done some work on television, I began to experience an emptiness inside me and I didn’t understand what was going on,” she said in one testimonial. “‘This whole thing of being a host isn’t for me,’ I thought, and I declined a job offer for a well-known channel, Nickelodeon.”
Around this time, a friend offered her a free trip to Spain. A self-described “wild child,” Clare pictured herself drinking on a Spanish beach. But the trip turned out to be a Holy Week religious pilgrimage. Sister Grace Silao, S.H.M., a Servant Sister of the Home of the Mother, describes how delighted everyone was with Clare — and how unhappy Clare was with them.
“Whatever she said made us all laugh,” she said, but Clare skipped most of the activities.
But she didn’t skip Good Friday’s liturgies. She sat in the back, and after venerating the cross, Sister Grace found her “trembling and crying profusely” outside the church, and asked her, “Clare, are you okay?”
Clare just stared back and repeated through her tears, “He died for me. He loves me!”
Next, she spoke to the priest and said, “I have plans to be a famous actress, but after this, I am confused, because I think God wants me to be one of — them.” She pointed to the Servant Sisters in their habits.
Soon, she entered the convent, and never left.
Her life was filled with joy.
The sisters assigned her at various times to the United States and Ecuador, where she was a hospital chaplain, a teacher and a missionary. She was popular everywhere she went, and she even kept a toe in the entertainment industry, voicing a character in a children’s show for EWTN.
The documentary shows her truly charismatic personality — and her tragic end.
“Thanks to the original footage of her, I think people are truly able to get to know her as she was: full of joy,” the postulator of her cause, Sister Kristen Gardner, told the National Catholic Register. “We have many clips of her laughing and joking around, and I think this permits the viewers to see the true happiness that only God can give.”
Crockett died at age 33 in the April 16, 2016, Ecuador earthquake when the school building she was in collapsed. She was finishing guitar practice with her students when the earthquake hit — two minutes before the 7 p.m. evening rosary would start. One sister ran to the tabernacle to retrieve the Blessed Sacrament; others ran to the stairway, which is among the worst places to be in an earthquake.
“All the ones who died were on the staircase,” explained Sister Kristen. Sisters “who did not make it to the staircase are the ones who survived.”
Sister Crockett was found in the stairway rubble, still holding a piece of her guitar. She was rushed to the hospital but soon died.
Sister Clare’s reaction on that first Good Friday summed up her life, says Sister Kristen.
“She had a very radical personality, so her immediate reaction was like, ‘Okay, he’s on the cross for love of me. I have to give my life to him,’” said Sister Kristen.
In 2006, after taking her first vows, Sister Clare wrote:
“My heart is Yours, my mind is Yours, my thoughts are Yours. Ask me for anything. Nothing matters now, since nothing I have is mine! Possess me, Jesus.”
One sister notes in the documentary that while Clare was vivacious and outgoing, “she preferred to remain hidden. … She always looked for times to be alone with the Lord.”
She loved to spend time with the Blessed Sacrament, and at her consecration, Sister Clare was given the religious motto, “Alone with Christ Alone” — which became the title of her spiritual writings.
That combination of vivacious personality, eager generosity, and love for solitude and the Eucharist are also hallmarks of St. Elizabeth Ann Seton.
When Elizabeth lost her husband while in Italy, during the trip where she discovered the Catholic Church, she wrote, “My poor high heart was in the clouds roving after my William’s soul and repeating, ‘My God, you are my God, and so I am now alone in the world with You and my little ones, but You are my Father, and doubly theirs.’”
Her intensity and joy also came from solitude with the Lord. “He never disappoints me but repays every instant with hours of sweet peace and unfailing contentment, and the tenderest interest you ever can bestow on me is only a stream of which he is the fountain,” she said.
Both women lost the love of their lives — the stage and a spouse — and found a source of love and joy that far surpassed both.
TOM HOOPES, author most recently of The Rosary of Saint John Paul II, is writer in residence at Benedictine College in Kansas, where he teaches. He hosts The Extraordinary Story podcast about the life of Christ. His book What Pope Francis Really Said is now available on Audible. A former reporter in the Washington, D.C., area, he served as press secretary for the U.S. House Ways & Means Committee Chairman and spent 10 years as editor of the National Catholic Register newspaper and Faith & Family magazine. His work frequently appears in the Register, Aleteia, and Catholic Digest. He lives in Atchison, Kansas, with his wife, April, and has nine children.
Image Credit: Servant Sisters of the Home of the Mother