GSR Today - The month-long FIFA World Cup soccer championship is right around the corner. However, festive anticipation has been brought up short by protests by the poor who are witnessing massive government spending, and by sisters who are working to raise awareness about human trafficking that exploits people seeking employment.

“I find it interesting that the meanest life, the poorest existence, is attributed to God's will, but as human beings become more affluent . . ."

Mixed message on maternal mortality - A May report from the Institute for Health Metrics at the University of Washington shows that, globally, fewer women are dying from pregnancy-related causes, but some countries actually saw increases in their maternal death rates.

I remembered an ancient saying not long ago that smacked far too much of the present than it did of the past. "There are only two mistakes on the way to truth," Buddha taught. "One is not going far enough and the other is not starting." I knew right away that we're either on the verge of another mistake – or not. It all depends.

Have you ever said, “That word doesn’t work anymore,” when you were trying to explain something? You had to fish around for a word, a phrase that might capture what you wanted to say because you realized that the old way of talking about things didn’t quite match your experience. Such a moment brings home to me the power of words, of language.

Sr. Imelda Poole, IBVM, is president of Religious in Europe Networking Against Trafficking and Exploitation (RENATE), a group of religious congregations working against human trafficking in Europe. A native of Great Britain, Poole has worked in Albania for nine years, where she leads Mary Ward Loreto, a non-profit development organization serving vulnerable communities.

Franciscan Sr. Mary Lou Lafferty spent many years in education before realizing that her talents could also help inmates and their families. She assumed the rold of prison ministry coordinator for Catholic Charities in the Camden, N.J., diocese last September.

Can a devastating hurricane be a good thing? It is when it opens opportunity for improvement: Sr. Cathy Buster has administered, managed and developed housing projects for 57 years. Her Casa San Juan Bosco community in Arcadia, Fla., developed through Catholic Charities, is a model of state-of-the-art, energy-efficient housing for agricultural workers whose families used to live in trailer parks.

It is a time of great uncertainty and of great promise. We share a powerful moment! Even the phrase “Global Sisters” makes my heart skip a beat. “Global” evokes a sense of the expansive, the far-reaching, the diverse. And to be a “Sister” is something intimate, something characterized by love, care – and an organic bond. What a beautiful mystery that this time allows both to be true, in innovative ways, for religious life.