* “Nun” in German
This page is dedicated to contemporary nuns who courageously speak “truth to power”
as well as to those sisters who quietly spread compassion, wisdom, joy and harmony.
Working on this page.
Please come back soon!
Joan Chittister, OSB is a Benedictine Sister of Erie, PA. She is the author of over 50 books – and over 700 articles in numerous journals and magazines including: America, US Catholic, Sojourners, Spirituality (Dublin) and The Tablet (London). She is a regular contributor to NCRonline.org and HuffingtonPost.com Her next book, Between the Dark and the Daylight, will be published by Random House in the spring of 2015. Her book, The Monastery of the Heart: an invitation to a meaningful life, is prelude to a movement for all seekers: Monasteries of the Heart, recently begun by her Benedictine community. She serves as Executive Director of Benetvision, a research and resource center for contemporary spirituality. She also is co-chair of the Global Peace Initiative of Women, a UN-sponsored organization creating a worldwide network of women peacemakers.
Read her description of Hildegard here...
Sr. Joan is a dozen years older than I am — what an inspiration!
I always look forward to finding her newsletter in my mailbox. ‑pb
Sister Margaret Farley, RSM, is a member of the Roman Catholic Sisters of Mercy, an ethicist and retired professor. She taught Christian ethics at Yale Divinity School from 1971 to 2007. The first woman appointed to serve full-time on the Yale School board, she is a past president of Catholic Theological Society of America.
Farley’s controversial book, Just Love (2006), brought criticism and censure from the Holy See, specifically the Congregation of the Doctrine of the Faith for moral views which oppose the teachings of the Roman Catholic Church, but her book and views has received both support and endorsement from the groups Leadership Conference of Women Religious and the Catholic Theological Society of America. (wikipedia)
Nuns on The Bus — 2016
In a spirited retort to the Vatican, a group of Roman Catholic nuns embarked on a bus trip across nine states in June, 2012, stopping at homeless shelters, food pantries, schools and health care facilities run by nuns to highlight their work with the nation’s poor and disenfranchised.
The bus tour was a response to a blistering critique of American nuns released in April of that year by the Vatican’s doctrinal office, which included the accusation that the nuns are outspoken on issues of social justice, but silent on other issues the church considers crucial: abortion and gay marriage.
Sister Simone Campbell
Sister Simone, a lawyer who ran a legal clinic for the poor in Oakland, Calif., for 18 years, is not completely on board with the bishops’ religious liberty campaign. She said that financing for Catholic social services had increased significantly in the three years since President Obama took office: “We’re celebrating the religious freedom we have.”
The Leadership Conference of Women Religious (LCWR ) is the association of the leaders of congregations of Catholic women religious in the United States . The conference has more than 1500 members, who represent more than 80 percent of the 57,000 women religious in the United States. Founded in 1956, the conference assists its members to collaboratively carry out their service of leadership to further the mission of the Gospel in today’s world.
LCWR president Theresa Kane, RSM addresses Pope John Paul II at the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception in Washington, DC on October 7, 1979.
The scope of the conference’s concerns is broad and includes collaborating in Catholic church and societal efforts that influence systemic change.
- LCWR produced a one-hour documentary entitled Women & Spirit: Catholic Sisters in America that also tells the story of the contributions of women religious to the nation.
Sister Maureen Fiedler, S.L., is a radio host and a member of the Sisters of Loretto. She is a progressive, controversial activist within the Roman Catholic Church. She has a long history working with interfaith coalitions on a variety of issues including: social justice, peace, the environment, gender equality, human rights and female ordination in the Catholic Church. She holds a doctorate in Government from Georgetown 
University.
In 1984 she was one of 97 theologians and religious persons who signed A Catholic Statement on Pluralism and Abortion, calling for religious pluralism and discussion within the Church regarding its position on abortion. The Vatican later reported that she had disavowed the statement, but she responded, “I have never retracted or recanted one syllable... I continue to stand behind every word of it without the slightest reservation.”
She has hosted the newsmagazine and talk radio program Interfaith Voices since it debuted in 2002. The program’s mission is the promotion of interfaith understanding and religious dialog in the public square.
The Loretto Community
From Faithful America:
“The fracking industry messed with the wrong nuns. After poisoning drinking water and increasing earthquake risk throughout Pennsylvania, Ohio and West Virginia, now they want to build a dangerous pipeline through the heart of Kentucky.
The original pipeline route would’ve gone through hundreds of acres of historic farmland that an order of nuns have lived on for nearly 200 years. But after the Sisters of Loretto refused to let surveyors on their land, the pipeline company had to change their plans.”
The Loretto Community, founded in 1812 as the Sisters of Loretto, is a congregation of Catholic vowed Sisters and lay Co-members. “Our members continue to live out the Community’s mission to “work for justice and act for peace because the Gospel urges us.” Traditionally a teaching order, the Loretto Community has expanded its work into many fields to promote justice, including education, healthcare, elder care, environmental stewardship and advocacy. Learn more.
At the Sisters’ Loretto Community website one can view a YouTube video of the singing, anti-fracking nuns and get a feel for their endless endeavors on behalf of those opposed to the invasive pipeline.