Judith Best

The Trappist monk and writer Thomas Merton has challenged me to be my true self, encouraging me to go deep inside to find a deeper wisdom waiting to welcome and guide me. 

Living in "sundown towns," a visit to a cultish colony in Idaho, and an encounter with the Westboro Baptists in Kansas: These are places I've encountered examples of white Christian nationalism.

As a young sister, Judith Best spent two weeks in a detention center after a challenge from Cesar Chavez, founder of the United Farm Workers. 

Severe asthma, congestive heart failure, and atrial fibrillation sent me to the hospital. I knew the routine. But in desperation amid one more mandated test and more meds for an already overloaded digestive system, I had an idea.

I read former President Barack Obama's book A Promised Land. He has germinated hope in my heart; and when I feel discouraged, I promise to "try anyway."

On retreat in May 2020, our anxiety — COVID-19, unemployment, systemic racism — shifted as we listened to Mary Evelyn Tucker's Laudato Si' Week 2020 presentation hosted by the Global Catholic Climate Movement.

Sitting outside in masked, pandemic style, I recently asked some of my sisters involved in criminal justice ministry to share reflections on their experience. In our faith sharing, we focused on how this ministry called them to change.

Sr. Regina Kabayama, a School Sister of Notre Dame, was born in Osaka in 1931. I am filled with awe how her spirit was nurtured with a diversity of experiences and how her faithful Catholic family, strengthened through persecution, blessed her with resilience and commitment.

Recently one of our sisters who had served on the Standing Rock Sioux Reservation shared a photo of a monument called "Kindred Spirits." It reminds us of mutual compassion after bitter hardships.

I've been giving presentations on how musicals help us get through hard times. Today, "The King and I" offers wisdom as we deal with racial bias, bigotry, polarization and learning to live with different views.

As I reflect on living during the pandemic, mentors guide me: my mother and her Irish faith, wit and temper and humor; my father and his ability to let life happen around him; and Thomas Merton.

A new book about women who resisted Hitler in Nazi Germany has inspired me to choose how to respond to these troubled times.

The Indianapolis Carmelites co-authored, as a community, what eventually evolved into the 1997 People's Companion to the Breviary, which included women as members of the Catholic Church and beyond.

Remembering the Berlin Wall's fall stirred up vivid memories. I visited fellow sisters in East Berlin, back when the city was divided. The courage of the imprisoned to dream of a different future taught me the power of imagination, and the vitality of organizing for systemic change.

Some Americans who exemplify a possible way to take cutting criticism and angry feelings and turn these "swords" into "plowshares" call to me today.

As an alumna of the choir that accompanied the St. Louis Jesuits in the 1970s, I was honored to be among those invited to sing at their final concert. Memories triggered by songs brought to mind a lifetime of being loved by a God beyond all names.

I met some someone who helped me realize how much I judge others by appearances and not substance.