Archbishop Emeritus Joseph Fiorenza of Galveston-Houston, Texas, says that he hopes Pope Francis will meet with the U.S. women religious leaders and that the tension between the women and the hierarchy will be resolved quickly.

The Association of U.S. Catholic Priests in a letter to Pope Francis criticized the head of the Vatican Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith for his recent comments chastising the Leadership Conference of Women Religious.

The third in a series of reports for GSR about the war in South Sudan and its toll, this article looks at how women are striving for continuous development amid ongoing disruption. It falls to women to keep families together in the midst of chaos, insecurity and death. And the intangibles – the way things get lost in a country at war, like a commitment to education, to literacy, to health – are all of concern of women.
Also by Chris Herlinger - Easter hope for South Sudan  and,
on NCRonline.org, In South Sudan, 'everything they are doing, they are doing with tears'

". . . the water that I will give him will become in him a well of water springing up to eternal life."

From NCRonline.org - Although the Nuns on the Bus, films such as "Radical Grace" and books like Jesus Feminist have or are gaining some notoriety, in academia, the binary is so acute that little research exists on just how women manage to occupy both identities. One woman who could be considered a model for how faith informs one's feminism: Sr. Lucy Freibert.

I learn so much from my sister Carol. She teaches me about being in the moment and listening. Carol, who was born with Down’s Syndrome, has limited communication skills. If she is in a group and feels left out and “can’t get a word in edgeways” – as my mother used to say – she taps me on the shoulder and says, “Excuse me, excuse me. You are not listening to me.” In the last few weeks there were a number of times when people and events tapped me on the shoulder insistently with “Excuse me, excuse me. You are not listening to me.”

GSR Today - As a member of Maryknoll Sisters, the first U.S.-based congregation of women religious dedicated to world mission, Seattle native Sr. Jean Fallon has spent decades working on peace and justice issues around the world. Last week she received the Sister Christine Mulready Peacemaker Award from Pax Christi Metro New York for her work.

". . . Fill the hearts of mankind with the fire of your love and with the desire to ensure justice for all. . . ."

Following the takeover of the northern Iraqi city of Mosul by Islamic extremists this week, an estimated 500,000 civilians poured out of the city, fleeing bullets and burning wreckage. Yet, in all the chaos, one group remains resolute in its determination to stay in Mosul: the Dominican Sisters of St. Catherine of Siena, a congregation of Iraqi sisters that has witnessed generation upon generation of war and carnage.

We live a world that is widely divergent from the first-century world. It occurred to me to ask myself, “What image describes the core, the essence, the essential elements of the lived reality that is called ‘religious life’ from my own lived experience?” “What image do I carry around in my head, heart and gut?”