Sheila Campbell is a Medical Missionary of Mary sister of Irish and Brazilian nationality. After an early nursing ministry in Ireland, she did nursing, health education, parish work, and pastoral health care work (specializing in HIV/AIDS) as a missionary in Brazil. She later served in congregational administration in Ireland, and in Brazil with families affected by urban violence and prostitution. Currently, she serves sick and elderly sisters at her congregation's home in Massachusetts.

Marie Vianney Bilgrien is a School Sister of Notre Dame living in El Paso, Texas. She taught grade school in Wisconsin and Mississippi and served in Bolivia as a catechist and in Guatemala as the director of an orphanage. She directed Hispanic ministry for the Diocese of Baker, Oregon, and worked in higher education in Shreveport, Louisiana, and El Paso. After she received a Doctor of Sacred Theology from the Angelicum in Rome, she began work with the Graduate Theological Foundation and the University of Texas at El Paso.

Lucy Bethel is a member of the Sisters of Providence of St. Vincent de Paul. An eighth-generation Bahamian, she held various positions in banking in the Bahamas before entering religious life. Later, she served as director of a center providing full-time care for mentally challenged adult women. Currently, as director of Providence Spirituality Centre, she is a full-time spiritual/retreat director in Kingston, Ontario.

Maria Magdalena Bennásar (Magda) of the Sisters for Christian Community is from Spain. Studies in theology gave her a foundation for the charism of prayer and ministry of the word with an emphasis on spirituality and Scripture: teaching, conducting retreats and workshops, creating community and training lay leaders in Australia, the U.S. and Spain. Currently, she is working on eco-spirituality and searching for a space to create a center or collaborate with others.

Sandra Wiafewa Agyeman (Ofia) is a Ghanaian member of the Missionary Sisters Servants of the Holy Spirit. She began her ministry in a school in Ghana as an account clerk, helping with registration and admission. Later ministries there included pastoral work with people living with HIV/AIDS; ensuring their children's education; and organizing prayer experiences and recollections. For the past year, she has been attending the Institute of Formation and Religious Studies in the Philippines.

Mary Elizabeth Looby has been a Grey Nun of the Sacred Heart for 52 years. With an academic background in pastoral care and counseling, and training in spiritual direction, she has been a spiritual director and retreat director for over 35 years. She served on her congregation's Leadership Council, and currently lives in Philadelphia, where she does spiritual direction and retreat ministry.

Carol Schuck Scheiber is an independent writer and editor in Ohio whose major focus for many years has been on Catholic vocations and related topics.

by Rekha Kerketta

Contributor

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My journey to religious life has had many unique hurdles. I am from an aboriginal tribe called Kurukh and only learned to read and write in sixth grade. We were fortunate to have a government school at the Catholic mission in Hazaribag, 40 kilometers away from our village, but instruction was in Hindi, which I did not speak.

by Joyce Meyer

International Liaison, Global Sisters Report

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At the Women of Wisdom and Action colloquium, I met Sr. Rashmi Kanta Kiro, who belongs to the Daughters of St. Anne, Ranchi, the first congregation in India founded by tribal women. One of the first two female tribal doctoral students in India, Rashmi is carrying on their revolutionary charism.