In topographically challenged New Orleans, where "running water" can be a pejorative depending on whether it is flowing inside or outside the house, a long-promised, 25-acre stormwater management and flood control project called the Mirabeau Water Garden will be a welcome sight.

Sr. Margaret O'Dwyer, who represents the Company of the Daughters of Charity at the U.N., said the survey "can help influence where NGOs, governments, the private sector, or the U.N. might focus efforts in the future.

From NCRonline.org: St Joseph Sr. Helen Prejean's memoir shows there is no singular point of decision in the Christian life. Rather, there is a constant need for ongoing conversion, growth, and change guided by the Holy Spirit.

The vote was the culmination of nearly a year of work drafting and shaping the statement and came at the end of a session during the group's annual assembly exploring the ways racism, migration and climate change are interconnected. 

Catholic Mobilizing Network Executive Director Krisanne Vaillancourt Murphy spoke to about 40 sisters and guests at the Leadership Conference of Women Religious' annual Assembly Aug. 15, in a session on why actively fighting capital punishment is so important.

Four Missionary Sisters of the Eucharist in the Nogales community run the Aid Center for Migrants, part of a congregation of about 60 sisters, living in 11 communities in Mexico. A 10-minute walk from the Mariposa Border Crossing, the center serves more than 100 people a day. Every day the sisters minister to people who have encountered stressful situations. To handle this, the sisters rely on prayer and their community life, as well as days off for personal chores, time and renewal.

Simply Spirit: I owe my learning to the women and men with whom I have walked and am walking. Their solidarity helps me to first accept and then join together to alleviate the wounds of our world.

Holy Cross Sr. Sharlet Wagner, the 2018-2019 president of the Leadership Conference of Women Religious, spoke on the issue of abuse in her Aug. 15 presidential address at the organization's annual assembly. "It is a source of deep pain for us that in some instances, our own sisters have been perpetrators of the abuse," she said. "This is a truth we must not attempt to avoid."

In her Aug. 15 presidential address to the Leadership Conference of Women Religious' annual assembly, Holy Cross Sr. Sharlet Wagner said Catholic sisters are called to stand together and be models of hope in world beset by hateful rhetoric and political division.

"The responses needed today are often not found in the big initiatives of the past but instead are like tiny mustard seeds: a word of hope, a listening heart, a compassionate presence, a healing glance. This mysticism of encounter happens everywhere," said Sr. Pat Murray, executive director of the International Union of Superiors General, during the opening day keynote address at the 2019 assembly for the Leadership Conference of Women Religious.

LCWR 2019 - As a Sister of St. Joseph of Orange, "I love to connect people to our mission," Sr. Jayne Helmlinger says. Colleagues say her experience leading a community of increasing diversity will serve her well in a national role with the Leadership Conference of Women Religious.

At our recent convocation, we Ursuline sisters, associates and friends heard from Sister of Charity of the Incarnate Word Teresa Maya, who gave us a new way of thinking about charism. For each congregation, she said, there is a founding call. Then, as need finds us, there is an apostolic response to that call. Charism happens in the present moment of the dialog between the two.