Columns

By the end of the retreat week, I knew coming without "stuff" was the best thing I could have done. I would have used my stuff to keep myself distracted, instead of letting myself sit with the questions.

In my 30s, I was ready to encourage women to refuse to serve the institutional church in any way. But I have learned to keep on in the church I both love and sometimes feel very angry at.

Recently, the recollection of one of my past experiences made me ponder over the figure of the father in the parable of the prodigal son — and his father. What does true reconciliation look like?

I needed to let Señora María welcome me into her life and her family. I needed to be fully present to life with her family. I needed to let them be a conduit of Jesus' love to me.

Horizons - Aware of his creaturedom, St. Francis proclaimed a mutuality with all God's creation. In the face of the climate crisis, the message of his life is incredibly relevant today.

Religious life was never meant to be a bounded, closed system or a tribe, but a life lived on a new level of consciousness of belonging to the whole earth, in love with the whole Body of Christ.

I met some someone who helped me realize how much I judge others by appearances and not substance.

To "repair the church," but even more to be witnesses of Christ in the cultures and languages of the 21st century, all the faithful are called to discern and chart together their paths of mission for today.

Contemplate This - Describing a program I co-lead called Enter the Chaos: Engage the Differences to Make a Difference is a bit of a challenge. It brings people together to address the importance today of understanding the development of the various stages of consciousness through which people view the world. Recently I have found a more down to earth way to explain it.

Horizons - We ask for gifts from God, but we know exactly how we want them to come to us. Nicely. Neatly. Without any pain or suffering or difficulty or effort. Just a heavenly infusion, please. But that's not at all the way it works, is it? 

When I used to think about my own journey of trying to stop the evil effects of human trafficking, often I felt I was only a drop in the ocean, especially since I am getting on in years.

I recently spent a week at the Catholic Charities Humanitarian Respite Center in McAllen, Texas. I went primarily to meet and serve the migrant families, but also in hope of returning as a credible eyewitness to what is happening at our border. My week left me heart broken, but "The wound is where the light enters." 

We Dominican Sisters of Bethany have lived Riga, Latvia, since 1995. It was our practice to offer short-term housing for women. We took in a trafficking victim named "Baiba." Little by little, she told her story.

Horizons - It was November of 2007 when I first met Sister of Charity of Cincinnati Janet Gildea. She would have been 63 years old September 11. The world just feels different without her.

The Gospel life was never meant to be lived enclosed, but on the edge of a new future in God. Francis of Assisi was a materialist in the best sense of the word, realizing that divine love incarnated all reality. 

Being faithful to anything requires much generosity. It is the behind-the-scenes activities that might not seem glamorous or important.

In this 21st century, as many ponder the future of religious life, the challenge to "be the change" encourages possibilities, such as a place where "be the change" becomes a daily conscious choice.

Horizons - I find it so hard to comprehend that we can treat children and families so inhumanely today. We know that it is happening in our name, and yet, collectively, we stand by.