Dan Stockman

Network, the Catholic social justice lobby, is offering an online series that will address what it means to be a Catholic, multi-issue voter and how to engage people in challenging conversations about important issues. 

"We need to be touched, we need to be hugged and we need to be loved," says Sr. Rosalind Gefre, who from the mid-1990s to 2020 gave free massages at the St. Paul Saints minor league baseball games. 

In dozens of projects across the country, Catholic women religious are transitioning assets such as land and buildings into tools to meet other needs. 

The 11th Catholic Sisters Week features dozens of events that allow laypeople to connect with sisters and their ministries. Plans include a webinar on gun violence, a food drive, and spiritual exploration.

Sisters say the event was an opportunity for younger sisters to see each other, to know they are not alone and that they are part of something that goes beyond congregations and borders. 

Organizers say the conversation of what religious life should and will look like is vital for younger sisters because they are the ones who will be living it.

The Loretto Community is calling on the U.S. government to halt arms shipments to Israel, insist Hamas release all hostages and insist Israel stop military attacks on Gaza. 

In 1965, Kinsella was finishing a stint in the U.S. Army, and was trying to visit an order of Carmelites to see about joining. But the cab driver — unbeknownst to her — dropped her off with Visitation Sisters instead.

Mercy Srs. JoAnn Persch and Pat Murphy, along with Mercy Associate Carol Conway and dozens of volunteers and donors, have been hard at work delivering peace and mercy to asylum seekers in Chicago.

The sisters say corporate directors at Smith & Wesson Brands have exposed the company to massive liabilities by its manufacture, sale and marketing of AR-15 style rifles.

Sr. Patricia Murray said the Holy Spirit guided the journey through deep listening to one another, which connected participants as individuals and also as a global church.

Insurance expert Stephen Waldorf says that congregations are facing a triple whammy that will make insurance not only far more expensive, but in some cases unavailable. And all of it is driven by climate change.

For the Erie Sisters of St. Joseph, their annual Thanksgiving meal is one of their biggest undertakings of the year. Last year, their army of volunteers delivered 1,200 turkey dinners with all the trimmings.

"That's why we often say you can't be pro-life and ignore gun violence," said activist Shane Claiborne at a webinar hosted by Nuns Against Gun Violence.

Because consecrated men and women have already largely embraced synodality, their prophetic voices can teach the universal church to follow the path the Holy Spirit is leading us, Cardinal Robert McElroy said. 

The inaugural Sisters Anti-Trafficking Awards were held Oct. 31 in London, honoring Sr. Patricia Ebegbulem from Nigeria, Sr. Seli Thomas from India, and Sr. Francoise Jiranonda from Thailand.

"I won't use the term success, but it has been fruitful. It's a new state in the experience of synodality," says one sister who was a voting member at the first session of the Vatican's multiyear synod.

Monday Starter: Several women religious congregations and organizations released a statement on Oct. 20 urging the Biden administration to publicly call for a ceasefire in the Israel-Hamas conflict.

A consortium of four sites is working to collect and preserve religious archives and eventually be linked together to provide access to the holdings of all four facilities. At risk is the history of Catholic sisters.

Panelists at the National Catholic Conference on Restorative Justice say that great strides have been made in some areas by the church to ensure widespread abuse and cover-up do not happen again, but failures continue to arise.