Sisters offer pastoral presence through social media
Catholic sisters have always gone to minister where the people are: they’ve crossed prairies and oceans, entered slums and prison cells, healed the sick and taught children, prayed with and counseled those discerning big decisions. In today’s global culture linked by digital media, the people instead can come to the sisters, especially Srs. Julie Vieira and Maxine Kollasch, whose brainchild, A Nun’s Life Ministry, is an online gathering place for thousands of users from all over the world.
Sisters making mainstream headlines
GSR Today - Women religious were represented at the Academy Awards on Sunday. “Ida,” a movie about a novice nun in the ‘60s that we have mentioned in this column frequently in recent months, won the Oscar for best foreign language film. It became the first Polish movie to ever win the award. We start this week’s round-up with more Oscars week wrap-up.
"There is no greater joy nor greater reward than to make a fundamental difference in someone's life."
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Tales from the garden: Sisters share stories of going vegetarian
NCR Eco Catholic blog - Catholic sisters extend their care for Earth into a very specific lifestyle choice: Having a vegetarian or vegan diet is gaining popularity. “[Food] tells a lot about your values. It’s a spiritual act because it connects you back to your soul.”
Laity and nuns train to reduce dangers for climate change victims
After helping farmers last summer to develop climate-resilient livelihood options in central Vietnam’s Thua Thien Hue province, an area that is particularly vulnerable to effects of extreme weather, local nuns have taken another major step in providing health care to people who have fallen victim to diseases flourishing in new weather conditions.
UISG planning effort enters new phase
GSR Today - The International Union of Superiors General (UISG), the world’s most representative women religious leadership organization, is moving into a new phase of drawing up a comprehensive strategic plan aimed at revitalizing the group and giving it direction in the coming years.
Sharing God's love through the circus
From A Nun's Life podcasts - As Missionaries of Joy, what are some ways that people in circus ministry extend the love of God to others?
Disproportionate prison population
Three Stats and a Map - If you’re like Global Sister Report’s U.S. sister liaison, Franciscan Sr. Jan Cebula, on Monday night, you were watching Independent Lens’ documentary about race on PBS. It’s a timely piece – it seems that we’re talking about race now more than we have in decades.
‘Show them that they have special abilities’
The Naromoru Disabled Children’s Home, started 33 years ago by Elizabethan Sisters from Italy, organizes surgery and rehabilitation for 100 children annually now. The sisters’ work has been a catalyst for changing community perceptions of disabilities in Kenya’s interior.
Related - In Kenya, 'shop locally' extends to prosthetics
Lucky to have you
See for Yourself - At health fair day at the mall, I grab a seat on a bench and check emails on my phone. I rarely go to the mall and just happened to pick today – health fair day. That explains why it was tough finding a parking place. It wasn’t long before an older lady sat down next to me on the bench. Her health fair goodie bag was getting heavy and she needed a rest.
In the image of God
GSR Today - It’s a big thing to understand that you – just as you are – are beautifully and wonderfully created in the image of God. It makes me cherish the work of people like the Kenyan Elizabethan sisters profiled in Melanie Lidman’s latest piece for Global Sisters Report.
Flexibility, bravery and steadfastness
NCR Today - Sr. Houda Fadoul is a Syrian-Catholic nun who presides over a congregation of women religious near Nebek, Syria. Nebek a city of around 50,000 inhabitants, is 50 miles north-east of Damascus and about the same distance south the ancient Christian center of Homs. There are about 120 Catholic families there, served by one Syrian-Catholic parish and one Melkite parish.