Love returned two hundredfold - Contemporary conversations about how we approach dying are in part a reaction to 20th-century traditions like embalming, funeral homes and spending one’s last days in hospitals. In this midst of this lively and often graphic debate, some members of the Sisters of Mercy, one of the larger religious congregations in the Americas, are offering an alternate perspective, one that balances the certainty of human mortality with their strong faith.

Out of the last half of the 14th century comes an unknown writer giving us a spiritual treatise called, The Cloud of Unknowing. This it seems is the basic state of our relation with God – a state of unknowing, symbolized by a dense cloud between us. Sometimes, mercifully, the cloud is pierced by God’s “dart of longing love.” Most of the time we live with the cloud of unknowing above and the cloud of forgetting below.

GSR Today - Notre Dame Sr. Bui Thi Kim Ngoc is a cheerful soul. She has a buoyant personality and smiles a lot as she stumbles through her English, laughing at her own mistakes. You can’t spend more than a few minutes with her without feeling refreshed, uplifted. At age 38, Kim Ngoc is the principal of the Anh Linh Free School in bustling Ho Chi Minh City, which locals continue to call Saigon.

There is much talk these days about the upcoming encyclical of Pope Francis on the environment. Scholarly conferences, workshops, articles, talk shows and interviews are focused on what the pontiff might say on the environment and the looming consequences of global climate change. It is an extremely important area to engage, since polar ice caps are melting, sea levels are rising and the biological niches of fisheries and natural flora are radically changing. Ecology has become such a hot topic in the public sphere, especially among political and religious circles, that we have not paused sufficiently to ask, what exactly are talking about?

"I believe that the more clearly we can focus our attention on the wonders and realities of the universe about us, the less taste we shall have for destruction."

From A Nun's Life podcasts - What's it like to minister in Immaculate Conception Academy, a Cristo Rey school?

Three Stats and a Map - On Monday, the United Nations issued a new report on the human rights situation in Ukraine, which has been entrenched in bloody conflict since last year when crackdowns on anti-government protests turned deadly. Within months, Ukraine’s president had been run out of the country and Russia had invaded, all of which only sparked more violence.

Louise Simon, 66, knows each of us has the ability to make a contribution to whatever we believe in and to make a difference. "Being a Mercy Associate for nearly 20 years has led me on a faith journey that I would otherwise not have experienced. It has taught me much about myself and my faith and has brought wonderful people into my life."

GSR Today - I was so excited when Sr. Sidonie Oyembo, provincial of the Sisters of Mary Immaculate of Gabon, was elected the third president of the Confederation of Major Superiors of Africa and Madagascar (COMSAM). She never dreamed three years ago when she attended the second meeting of the organization in Kampala, Uganda, that she would become its leader.