"This is ultimately a spiritual fight": Panama's political context weighs heavily on retreat-goers, including a biologist worried about habitat loss and an environmental director sanctioned for trying to enforce the law.

The response of young, newly educated women religious to the fast-paced changes taking place within Chinese society will play a determining role in the future of religious life in the nation.

GSR Today - Government in this country is not some "other." It is not a dark entity that is our enemy or something to be tolerated. It is us. Both government and the church, when they are at their best, are truly examples of how the whole can be so much more than the sum of its parts.

The Life - Since its start three years ago, Global Sisters Report has provided a forum to "give voice" to women religious from around the world. We're taking that part of our mission a step further in a new monthly feature called The Life, an international panel of 20 sisters who write short reflections on various topics. The second anniversary of Pope Francis' environmental encyclical Laudato Si' inspires the first question for women religious from around the world in GSR's new feature.

"Old gears move slowly with the wisdom of contemplation. Where are we going? Why rush there?"

Past the coconut palm and the greenhouse and the tree nursery, alongside the garden of medicinal plants like ginger and turmeric and aloe vera, following a busy procession of leaf-cutter ants, the Web of Life retreatants' happy chatter rang through the trees as they walked through the Maryknoll Pastoral Center's forest.

Panama's importance in the history of planet Earth is hard to exaggerate. Nearly 3 million years ago, the iconic land bridge emerged to join two continents and divide a vast ocean in two, opening a bridge to a massive migration of species and shifting of ocean currents. It triggered an ice age and may have helped create conditions that led to the evolution of humans.

The first in a 10-day series of eco-spiritual explorations began with a ritual and reflection on origins of the universe. Attendees introduced themselves and shared a bit of their collective sum of life experience. 

Home again, a humdrum of living now hovers. Has the wonder that was exponentially increased on the Camino been watered down? Has my heart become re-hardened to the wonders I encounter each day?