See for Yourself - There's that passage from John 15: 2 that explains a lot about the human condition and the reality of suffering around us: "He removes every branch in me that bears no fruit. Every branch that bears fruit he prunes to make it bear more fruit."

Nine years ago, a song in Spanish about asking the Lord to call us to service helped to give language to the love song that my heart had somehow already begun singing — but that still terrified me. Now, as a vowed Sister of Charity of Cincinnati, I am in awe about God's faithfulness.

"We live in a world filled with the action of God’s creating love and are partners of that divine activity in a time when major social and global change creates both enormous challenge and significant opportunity."

When no priests were available, the bishop of the Quebec Diocese of Rouyn-Noranda sought and received Vatican permission for a local nun to officiate at a recent wedding. Bishop Dorylas Moreau said the wedding was carried out according to a long-established provision of canon law.

Get beyond stories of slavery and crime: Watching the black women scientists of NASA in "Hidden Figures" and the achievements and disappointments of the family in "Fences" can open minds to some of the dilemmas facing North America today, politically, socially and racially.

Hospital Sisters of St. Francis Sr. Jomary Trstensky started her career in Catholic health care more than 50 years ago as a nurse. In June, she was a recipient of a Catholic Health Association Lifetime Achievement Award for inspiring her colleagues to live the values and mission of the Hospital Sisters and Catholic Church. She is an expert in leadership.

LCWR 2017 - A learner, a visionary, a strategic thinker, a source of energy — those close to St. Joseph Sr. Mary Pellegrino have no shortage of buoyant words to say about the outgoing president of the Leadership Conference of Women Religious, an organization facing the challenge of "reconfiguring ourselves to the future." Pellegrino will become LCWR's past president Aug. 11.

"To hear the call of the human heart in another person means hearing truth. It puts your hand on the doorway to peace, comfort and understanding in someone's life. In the presence of another's truth, one can feel its impact. But then, the choice: to let it draw out the best in you — or harden one's heart into judgment, criticism or ignoring the call for response."

GSR Today - A 20-something raging extrovert walks into a Benedictine monastery. Sounds like the start of a bad joke, doesn't it? It actually happened. I walked through the doors of Mount Saint Benedict Monastery in Erie and began a 10-week internship with Sr. Joan Chittister.

Processing my recent 29 years in the Mississippi Delta, I have come to believe that the truth found in the stories of people's lives here, now, today, made my years there some of the best in my life. People's stories invited me to the deep truth about the connection, understanding and bonding which is part of the human heart.