See for Yourself - “. . . she turned around and saw Jesus there, but did not know it was Jesus.” (Jn 20: 14)

Safe motherhood in Port Harcourt - Sr. Vivien Okereke is medical director of Our Lady Health of the Sick Hospital in Port Harcourt, Nigeria. In a country with one of the highest rates of maternal mortality in the world, health education for expectant and new mothers is important. Okereke, a member of the Congregation of the Handmaids of the Holy Child Jesus, urges women to bring their husbands to her “safe motherhood” classes and to find ways to set aside money that they can spend themselves on their own healthcare.

GSR Today - Sometimes we have to do what we’re called to do, even when it’s hard – especially when it’s hard, perhaps. When people are at their worst – when they’re racist, sexist, violent and mean – as Christians, we are still called to love them.

GSR Today - The Major League Baseball season in the United States ended this week with the San Francisco Giants beating my hometown the Kansas City Royals in the World Series. But the Royals had a particularly ardent group of supporters on their side. Read on.

It is my hope that the presence of so many religious sisters and other women at the transitional justice conference signals a new direction to peace-building initiatives. Society can no longer neglect the feminine principles in this all-important aspect of our lives on this planet: a peaceful coexistence. The way forward in peace-building in Africa rests on a change of mentality, a change of mentality seeded in the African system of values, particularly the traditional process for restorative justice.

Three Stats and a Map - Ebola is about more than just healthcare. As Melanie Lidman, Global Sisters Report’s Africa and Middle East correspondent, reported earlier this month, when an epidemic meets an already fragile social infrastructures, the reverberations are felt on multiple levels. One perhaps surprising example of this is the effect Ebola has had on the world’s chocolate industry.

GSR Today - We share the story of Sr. Ann Kelly and two other Missionary Sisters of the Holy Rosary who are using their education network in Liberia to educate people about how Ebola spreads. Where they are, the number of cases is currently dropping.

Financial education to help sisters “manage the little resources they have” on road to self-sufficiency - As American and European donations to Catholic organizations decline, congregations in Africa are trying to come up with creative ways to maintain the programs that provide essential services in rural areas, often beyond the reach of the government services. One innovative approach is securing education so that sisters can take charge of their finances, to help congregations become financially self-sufficient.

Sr. Judith Royer has had a 40-year career as a professor of theater and in February was honored with a Lifetime Achievement Award by the Kennedy Center American College Theatre Festival. She is also a St. Joseph sister and director of the CSJ Center for Reconciliation and Justice, established at Loyola Marymount University in 2012 to host forums on social justice topics and be a resource for education and reflective action.

Springbank Retreat Center for EcoSpirituality and the Arts in Kingstree, S.C., is part of religious communities’ mission in the U.S. and Ireland dedicated to teaching people about conservation, clean energy and respect for the natural world. In the Diocese of Charleston – the only diocese in the state, the center has had a presence by the Dominican Sisters of Adrian, Mich., since the 1980s, when Sr. Betty Condon became the center’s director. Its retreats and programs are run by a variety of women religious communities.