"He has sent me to bring glad tidings to the lowly, to heal the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives and release to the prisoners. . . ."

I pulled into the empty church parking lot a few minutes early as the fresh daylight bathed the world anew. I stepped out of the car and stretched, grateful for the warmth after a long and fickle winter. Standing there, I wondered what the coming hours would bring. Today, I would drive a Guatemalan woman and her young daughter to immigration court in Cleveland, about four hours away. The social worker had told me that this would be the woman’s third trip to immigration court since arriving to the U.S. in November 2014.

The last nuns of Beuerberg Abbey have left. The monastery, founded in 1121, today stands empty in the snowy landscape of the Alpine foothills. "Oh, this is not the end! On the contrary," said Sr. Maria Lioba Zezulka, prioress of the Visitandine order, flashing a smile. "This is a new beginning on several wonderful levels! And not just for the refugees who may soon have a home within these walls." Zezulka and the Archdiocese of Munich and Freising have worked a deal to house refugees in the abbey. They hope that, within a few months, families from Syria, Iraq, Nigeria, Afghanistan and other conflict zones can find a home here.

See for Yourself - It’s health fair day at the mall and I quickly glance at the gentleman and his booth – a local funeral home. “Yes, I’m preplanned,” I reply.

Israel's Supreme Court blocked a plan to build a separation barrier through the Cremisan Valley in the West Bank that would have divided a Catholic monastery, a convent and adjacent olive vineyards. Church officials celebrated the April 2 court order, saying it was an early Easter gift as Christians prepared to celebrate the Passion and resurrection of Jesus. The decision ends a nine-year legal battle over a defense ministry plan for a wall that would have cut through Palestinian-owned land, separating families from their agricultural land as well as separating Salesian Sisters from the community they serve in their school.

"Each day my heart was broken and then lifted up by the ministry of the sisters."

Three Stats and a Map - Last week, the Public Religion Research Institute released a 60-page report on millennials and sex. The group polled a random sample of 2,314 adults in the U.S. between the ages of 18 and 35 – both in English and Spanish – about everything from their experiences with sex education to their thoughts on gender equality.

Nuns celebrate Passover Seder to connect to roots of Christianity and Easter story - As a Jewish reporter for Global Sisters Report, I am often touched and humbled by the ways our traditions intertwine. But I’ve never been as surprised as I was to learn that sisters have been celebrating a Passover Seder at the Kalundu center since 1974, longer than I’ve been alive.

GSR Today - On Friday, the Public Religion Research Institute released its much-anticipate report on millennials and sexual and reproductive health. If there was one thing that jumped out at me in the report, it was that this history of “racialized sexism and sexualized racism” is far from finished, even though most media reports focused on other issues.