See for Yourself - For my few weekly groceries, I always use the YouScan checkout lanes. One early Saturday morning I was at YouScan when only one other customer was also doing a self-checkout.

"Raindrops magnify the smallest blessings within me. Magnify the blessings in your life!"

While racism seems to get little air time in most churches, church doctrine is crystal clear on the matter. God created human kind, female and male, in God's own image and likeness. We are all brothers and sisters, children of the same God. Each of us is granted human dignity and inalienable rights by our creator God.

Dr. Rachael Consoli spent three years working as an obstetrics and gynecology surgeon and clinical instructor for in Massachusetts, then felt God was calling her to "do something radical" with her life.

"The gift of charism allows us to pass on our mission to the world with passion and grace. We offer it to the world as a gift and trust that as it has gifted us, so it will give to many others."

The Catholic church places a high value on parenthood as a vocation. But the entrance of previously married women into religious communities also raises another possibility: more than one sacred calling. The diversities mothers bring to religious life impact community living, prayer life, decision-making, governance structures and ministries, and the stories of how these women were drawn to religious life are as diverse as the women themselves.

Three Stats and a Map - Much of the world is still primarily reliant on fossil fuels and nuclear power to meet its energy needs, but it's encouraging to read about efforts different countries are making to transition to renewable energy.

Blessed Sacrament Sr. Donna Breslin, the president of the congregation, said in a statement that a portion of the proceeds from the sales will support the care of retired sisters. Proceeds from the sale of the properties will be used "to challenge, in new ways, all forms of racism as well as the deeply rooted injustices in the world," she said. The decision, according to the statement, will make it possible for the congregation to carry forward the vision and spirit of St. Katharine Drexel.

"There is not a 'fragment' in all nature, for every relative fragment of one thing is a full harmonious unit in itself."

Notes from the Field - Last year, I walked into an apartment in an active construction zone in Boston, where I did not know anyone and where I would spend the next two years of my life. Going into it, I was terrified.