Sr. Rose Celeste O'Connell was once largely successful in hiding a secret: She liked to drink. A lot. "It was difficult to admit that you weren't the perfect religious, that you might have something wrong." Her recovery began in 1982 and has included ministry to other addicts.

Public accounts of mental illness and addictions among sisters have been rare, as have details of treatment and recovery. That may be because of the pervasive shame those illnesses can elicit, as well as a historical tendency for those who struggle with them to be directed only to spend more time in solitary prayer. But that is changing as knowledge and attitudes about mental illness evolve.

"Let us then pursue what leads to peace and to building up one another."

National Catholic Sisters Week and its sibling program, SisterStory, are now joined by an effort to engage young Latina women, a diocesan outreach program, and a curriculum-development project under one U.S. umbrella, the National Catholic Sisters Project.

"The most destructive cultural conditions for a woman to be born into and to live under are those that insist on obedience without consultation with one's soul."

Although she died 100 years ago, St. Frances Cabrini is a shining example of "love and intelligence" in ministering to the needs of immigrants and helping them become integral members of their new homelands, Pope Francis said.

GSR Today - A year after we launched Global Sisters Report, we conducted a survey of our readers to find out more about you and how we could improve. It's been two and a half years since then, and it's time we checked in with you again. What do you like about GSR? How can we continue to get better as we head toward our fourth anniversary? 

Eleven nuns take the stage wearing traditional black-and white habits but are anything but old school as they belt out songs to the ringing of electric guitar and a rock 'n' roll beat.

"I believe everyone has a unique vocation, and I enjoy helping people find what that is," says Sr. Sharon Dillon of the Sisters of St. Joseph of the Third Order of St. Francis. Dillon spoke with Global Sisters Report about her vision for the organization became executive director of in June, and how her past ministries inform her work.