I love Advent. It's such a hopeful and consoling season for those who long to see God's values fully realized "on Earth as in heaven," as Jesus prayed. This is the season of the prophet Isaiah, whose proclamations permeate our liturgies and whose writings inspired both Jesus and St. Paul. We renew our belief in a God who brings "glad tidings to the poor, liberty to captives and makes justice and praise spring up before all the nations" (Isaiah 61).

As well stirring body, mind and spirit, Advent invites the soul to a new awakening. It is a mystical moment in the annual cycle of liturgical time. An invitation is issued to wait again with hopeful anticipation for the ever new action of God in our world.

Sisters utilize agriculture to generate income to sustain their ministry projects - At a hospital in Luweero, Uganda, two hours outside the capital of Kampala, the children are sometimes discharged from the hospital with antibiotics and a female goat. Both the goat and the medicine come from an initiative created by Catholic sisters who noticed that many of the HIV-positive orphans they treated at the Bishop Caesar Asili Hospital were stunted and malnourished.

Before Brown v. Board of Education mandated the integration of America’s schools, Sinsinawa Dominican Sr. Patty Caraher taught at an all-black high school in the Mobile, Ala. As she puts it, she was naïve when she arrived, thinking she would sweep into the Deep South and teach her students how to survive in the “white world.”

"O Wisdom guiding creation with love, fill us with wonder."

GSR Today - Advent is a favorite liturgical season of mine. The Scripture readings, especially from Isaiah, give me hope for the world in the making. Isaiah also reminds us that we are a people, not just individuals. Particularly here in the U.S., too often we lose sight of that communal dimension of the summons, who we are and what we are to be about as a people.

Three Stats and a Map - This week, leaders from around the world are convening in Lima, Peru to work out a deal to address climate change. Up for discussion is a feasible plan to limit countries’ greenhouse emissions, and whatever the delegation comes up with is expected to be adopted next year.

"Underlying all religious traditions are two basic principles: The first is caring for others and the second is stewardship of nature."