"O God of Unexpected Places, fill us with the strength and conviction to find you as we journey through this Advent season."

GSR Today - If you haven’t yet placed your holiday order for “Heavenly Trash,” mixed by the skilled hands of a group of women religious in upstate New York, read on.

Now that their sisters who need nursing care are well placed, the Sisters of St. Francis of the Providence of God in Pittsburgh, Penn., begin planning the best uses for their 33-acre campus.

See for Yourself - As congregational secretary, I eagerly embraced the assignment to shepherd our response to the Apostolic Visitation. It was up to me to work on the questionnaires, to research the facts, and to gather the supporting documents. I saw it as a unique opportunity to tell the Vatican directly what a faithful congregation we Sylvania Franciscans are. I went at that with fervor and a positive attitude.

Because they have sisters gifted at planning and assessment, the Sisters of St. Francis of Assisi were able to make informed decisions and make the best of use of the assets they had.

You don’t have to see a picture of Holy Cross Sr. Verónica Fajardo to know what she looks like – you can hear the wide smile in her voice and in her ever-present laughter. At age 39, she has already had what most would consider a full life: Natives of Nicaragua, her family fled the war there and came to the United States when she was 8 years old. She grew up in Los Angeles and studied education at Loyola Marymount University, getting a master’s degree in special education, which she used to teach in public schools for six years before getting involved with the Sisters of the Holy Cross and teaching in Catholic schools for five years.

The Sisters of Divine Providence not only used decades of projections, reflection and planning to maximum advantage, but met the right buyer at the right time – a turn of events that could be termed happy coincidence or divine providence.

The view of women religious toward the Apostolic Visitation changed dramatically in the six years of the Vatican’s investigation, a panel of authors said Monday, but that happened because of their own spirit, not because of anything that occurred in Rome. Ten of the 11 authors and editors of Power of Sisterhood: Women Religious Tell the Story of the Apostolic Visitation, as well members of a group formed to gather data on the Visitation, gathered at Loyola University in Chicago on Monday. Many spoke of how their attitudes changed over the six years of the probe into religious life.

Pope Francis on Wednesday made a forceful and personal plea for the end of modern-day slavery, calling on governments, communities and individuals globally "not to become accomplices" to human trafficking and exploitation in their myriad forms. Women religious, of course, have been involved a long time with this issue.

Located near other religious communities, the sisters of St. Joseph of Chambery could place their frail elderly sisters with these organizations.