Simply Spirit - I was recently re-inspired by some young sisters, who place their confidence not in the human institutions that have served the church in the past but in the God who summons them to serve in new ways in the future.

In However Long the Night: Making Meaning in a Time of Crisis, sisters recount how they navigated their organization through the doctrinal assessment to an amicable resolution with the Vatican and share lessons for communal discernment and collective decision-making in times of conflict.

Direct action is just one part of any campaign. Legislative lobbying, op-ed columns and careful essays like Dr. King's "Letter from a Birmingham Jail" all work together to gain the prize.

"The hostel aims to give opportunities for ethnic students to study well at schools in the city," said Sr. Mary Nguyen Thi Thuan, head of the hostel, which is run by Mary Queen of Peace sisters in Buon Ma Thuot City. St. Teresa Hostel provides free accommodation, food, health care and education to first- through 12th-graders from remote villages in Vietnam's Central Highlands.

"Everyday experience and scientific research shows that the greatest effects of all attacks on the environment are suffered by the poorest."

Community is a gift that continues to amaze (and challenge) me. How is it, I sometimes wonder, that God managed to break through my self-imposed barriers and brought me to this particular group of women seeking God's gift of peace, the Sisters of St. Joseph of Peace? 

See for Yourself - Sure, you can get married in the middle of the night in Las Vegas, but there are things to watch out for. You can even plan a more conventional, less spontaneous one, if you want.

"I look into a sunflower and see earth, rows and rows of leaves, each one a person remembered, quivering, beautiful. The whole earth lies in a sunflower. A morning offering lifted like a host."

"It's really just listening to the Spirit's invitation. None of it was ever planned."

Speakers at the "Daughters of Wisdom: Women and Leadership in the Global Church" conference at DePaul University in Chicago are themselves evidence of women already exercising leadership in academia, religious life, and social and environmental justice organizations around the world. "We are very powerful," said Sr. Rosemary Nyirumbe. "The truth is that without women, the church cannot stand."