• Why did I go to the Missions? (Josephine Wright, RSCJ)

    Why did I go to the Missions? It was in response to a strong and clear call from God to bring the knowledge and love of Him to other lands. My family tells me in my years of growing up, I often spoke of going as a missionary to Africa. As an RSCJ, I don’t…

  • Be open to the surprises of God (Nancy Koke, rscj)

    In the Spring of 2008, Sr. Ursula Bugembe, the Provincial of the UGK Province, wrote to Kathy Conan, the US provincial, to ask if it would be possible to invite me to the Uganda/Kenya Province to be an elder sister in community and to offer spiritual accompaniment as well as to serve in one of…

  • The Heart of Christ as Home (Helen O’Regan, rscj)

    While I was still teaching (Buffalo 1970) – though not certifiable yet, I was asked by Ev Kane RSCJ, responsible for studies in the New York Province, if I would like to continue my education as a teacher or if I would like to become a nurse. I had started to do volunteer work at…

  • The Grace of a Lifetime Awaits You (Nance O’Neil, rscj)

    In 1987, Helen McLaughlin came to the US for an LCWR meeting in Niagra Falls. She invited me to lunch by the falls. It was time for me to think of a change of ministry. “I know you’ve always wanted to serve outside the country, Nance. How about Indonesia?” “We’re not in Indonesia. Where is…

  • Be Ready to Be Cracked Open (Gwendolyn Hoeffel, rscj)

    In 1964 as college graduation and the next step in my life approached, I made a weekend retreat to pray about what next. I wanted to enter but I knew in my gut that it was too soon. I was interested from an easy age in “missionary life” in another country. At that time there…

  • Say ‘yes’ to reality (Margaret Conroy, rscj)

    It is easy for me to write about what it means to be a missionary in the spirit of Philippine. I entered back in 1951 on November 17th for the feast of Blessed Philippine and felt a deep attraction to her spirit of prayer and austerity even then. Later in the 1950’s, after my vows,…

  • The mission is the sending (Carol Burk, rscj)

    The Missions were never a general calling for me, but when I was a first year novice I did receive a call from God to go to Sweden. Never mind that we had no house there or that I had never thought about Sweden at all and had no contact with that country. The call…

  • Why I went to the Missions (Judy Vollbrecht, rscj)

    My sense that God was calling me to the msns began when I was in 1st grade. We were reading a Holy Childhood magazine about the ‘pagan babies’ in China. When we finished, I knew that God was calling me to be a missionary in Africa. It was a conviction that never left me. When,…