Michele Morek

Loretto Sr. Jeannine Gramick of New Ways Ministry recently spoke on a panel with Jesuit Fr. James Martin of the Jesuit ministry Outreach, and a gay Catholic theologian, Jason Steidl Jack, author of LGBTQ Catholic Ministries: Past and Present.

All of life is awe-full if we just pay attention.

At the motherhouse in Mount St. Joseph, Kentucky, the Ursulines have a shrine featuring Our Lady of Prompt Succor. When I mention this to the uninitiated, my listeners usually laugh: "What kind of 'sucker,' you say?"

GSR Today - I was bowled over by what I saw and felt and experienced April 21-23 at Network's big 50th anniversary celebration, which included training for advocates and a gala. 

Trickster-heroes usually have a lesson to teach, even if the lesson is nothing other than: "Lighten up, laugh at yourself." 

GSR Today - Being an editor of columns from sisters and associates from all over the world is the best job — I get to read stories all day! Here are 10 themes, reflecting both darkness and joy, that cropped up this year.

GSR Today - We sisters are basically all the same all over the world. Oh, sure, we are in different congregations and have different charisms. But I've come to the conviction that the real charism is religious life.

GSR Today - Writing this end-of-the-year blog is difficult, but delightful. How do I summarize a whole year of great columns?

GSR Today: When we're kids, we're scared by the monsters in our imagination. Today, we have a real monster: a tiny, invisible one, but very, very effective in filling us with fear.

GSR Today - On Juneteenth, I had envisioned us standing with hands outspread and eyes closed, meditating and praying for peace and unity. But our prayer took a different form: the color of rejoicing. 

GSR Today - I commemorated the 55th anniversary of the 1965 march from Selma to Montgomery, Alabama, early this year with two "Sisters of Selma."

GSR Today - I would love to tell you about every single column, but that would be cheating — and it would add up to about 225 columns! So I went looking for major themes and "surprises."

The sermon I have remembered the longest — for about 50 years — was one I heard on Christmas Day. And there was no sermon, as such. Just a story about a flock of birds.

GSR Today: We are grateful for our readers, our staff and our abundance of good columnists. As a Thanksgiving gift, we have gone to our treasury of good columns and selected a few to share with you.

GSR Today - I was expecting chants, picket signs and women with attitude at the "Women of the Church" conference. I couldn't have been more wrong.