by Caroline Mbonu

NCR Contributor

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Service marks the action of religious sisters in almost all part of the world. Service, especially to the “least of my people,” validates the sisters’ vocation and reinforces their relevance in a church that limits women’s participation in significant decision-making positions. Service given to residents of Compassion Center in Port Harcourt has greatly enriched the local community. A ministry of the Religious Sisters of Charity, the center aims to educate and rehabilitate each child according to his or her needs.

This story appears in the See for Yourself feature series. View the full series.

by Nancy Linenkugel

Contributor

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See for Yourself - At health fair day at the mall, I grab a seat on a bench and check emails on my phone. I rarely go to the mall and just happened to pick today – health fair day. That explains why it was tough finding a parking place. It wasn’t long before an older lady sat down next to me on the bench. Her health fair goodie bag was getting heavy and she needed a rest.

by Melanie Lidman

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Sr. Jane Wanjiru is the Kenya coordinator for a program that utilizes sisters working as early childhood educators to help the country’s 150 congregations reflect on their strengths and weaknesses to improve sisterhood there. "We learned that sisters do not learn from each other." Her work is changing that.

Catholic sisters have always gone to minister where the people are: they’ve crossed prairies and oceans, entered slums and prison cells, healed the sick and taught children, prayed with and counseled those discerning big decisions. In today’s global culture linked by digital media, the people instead can come to the sisters, especially Srs. Julie Vieira and Maxine Kollasch, whose brainchild, A Nun’s Life Ministry, is an online gathering place for thousands of users from all over the world.

 

GSR Today - Most people who know me would not consider “frivolous” an apt description. But that’s how I felt when visiting Peru, faced with the realities there and my life here in the United States. I was haunted by the Gospel story of Lazarus and the rich man and the chasm between them, between Celia and myself, the people of Peru and the people of the U.S.

Three Stats and a Map - If you’re like Global Sister Report’s U.S. sister liaison, Franciscan Sr. Jan Cebula, on Monday night, you were watching Independent Lens’ documentary about race on PBS. It’s a timely piece – it seems that we’re talking about race now more than we have in decades.

GSR Today - It’s a big thing to understand that you – just as you are – are beautifully and wonderfully created in the image of God. It makes me cherish the work of people like the Kenyan Elizabethan sisters profiled in Melanie Lidman’s latest piece for Global Sisters Report.