The identity of women religious has changed dramatically in the last 50 years, the nation's largest group of sisters heard Thursday, but that change has occurred because they implemented the directives of the Second Vatican Council. Sr. Nancy Schreck, a Franciscan sister and a past president of the Leadership Conference of Women Religious, told LCWR members at their annual assembly that Perfectae Caritatis, the Vatican II document on the adaptation and renewal of religious life, has been one of the most implemented of the council documents because women religious have followed its teachings.

GSR Today - As a journalist writing primarily about Catholic sisters, spending all day, every day with 750-plus congregational leaders has certainly been fruitful. But I would have to say that I’ve actually been in a continuous crash course on all things women religious since May, when I first joined the Global Sisters Report. One thing I quickly learned was that women religious do leadership differently than the rest of the Catholic church. It was also driven home during yesterday’s panel discussion on how leaders can discern holy mystery.

GSR Today - Arriving in Nashville yesterday to cover the Leadership Conference of Women Religious annual assembly, I was struck with a deep sense of thankfulness. The theme this year is “Holy Mystery Revealed in Our Midst,” and from the press section in the back of the ballroom — being able to see not only the stage, but the entire audience — I was keenly aware of how holy mystery plays a part in each individual life. I’m in Nashville until Friday evening, and I’ll be blogging right here at the Global Sisters Report every day and tweeting from the sessions that are open to press (search the hashtag #LCWR2014).

Three stats and a map - The Ebola outbreak that began in March is the deadliest in recorded history. As of early August, more than 900 people had died in four countries – Sierra Leone, Guinea, Liberia and Nigeria – and on August 8, the World Health Organization declared the epidemic a global emergency and an “extraordinary event.”

The Leadership Conference of Women Religious, made up of Catholic sisters who are leaders of their orders in the United States, represents about 80 percent of the 51,600 women religious in the United States. Nearly 800 of the group's 1,400 members have gathered here for their four-day annual conference, which got underway Wednesday, August 13.

Sr. Irene Holland serves the slum community of 20,000 unemployed people who live on the outskirts of Harare, Zimbabwe, where they were displaced from by government efforts to clean up the city. Her Sisters of Nazareth community bought the land where a grandmother had started an orphanage and have expanded it to include schooling and meal programs.

Video interview - Social Service Sr. Simone Campbell said the Leadership Conference of Women Religious will be "another step in the dark, faithful to mission." In her August 7 trip to Kansas City, Mo., Campbell, executive director of the lobbying group NETWORK, visited NCR headquarters to talk about LCWR, health care, her book Nuns on the Bus and more.

The distance from Seoul to Nashville is 6,927 miles, but some “sister sisters” here feel close to Leadership Conference of Women Religious delegates now in the middle of the annual meeting. Yesterday I had an appointment to meet two women here in Seoul, members of the Little Servants of the Holy Family, a local congregation, that took the Vatican II call seriously and renewed their congregation’s charter and mission following the council.

GSR Today - Oblate Fr. Hank Lemoncelli, an undersecretary from the Congregation for Institutes of Consecrated Life and Societies of Apostolic Life, presented U.S. women religious with a series of questions the Vatican is asking all religious congregations, male and female, to reflect on over the next year.

The Leadership Conference of Women Religious, made up of Catholic women religious who are leaders of their orders in the United States, represents about 80 percent of the 51,600 women religious in the United States. Nearly 800 of the group's 1,400 members have gathered here for their four-day annual conference. There was no mention of troubles at Tuesday's welcoming ceremony, which opened with music, song and interpretive dance. Seattle Archbishop J. Peter Sartain thanked the LCWR members for "an extremely warm welcome."