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Detroit, July 16, 2025 – The election and early messages and actions of Pope Leo XIV brings a sense of hope to Adrian Dominican Sister Kathleen Nolan, OP, who recently retired as long-time Director of the Congregation’s Office of Peace, Justice and Integrity of Creation. Her reflection, “The Pope, Hope, and Environmental Leadership,” is published in The Detroit Catholic.

In the reflection, Sister Kathleen notes many troubling signs of our times, including “too many wounds caused by hatred, violence, prejudice, fear of difference, and an economic paradigm that exploits Earth’s resources and marginalizes the poorest.” 

But she also focuses on Pope Leo’s early advocacy for the environment – a stance that many people might have believed was uniquely of the late Pope Francis. “I’m hopeful that hearing the message from a new pope, and one from the U.S., will help Americans understand that care for God’s creation is fundamental to faith and morality,” Sister Kathleen writes.

Read her entire reflection here.

Caption for above feature photo: Adrian Dominican Sisters, in an informal watch party at the Dominican Life Center lobby in Adrian, await the announcement of the new pope, Leo XIV. —Adrian Dominican Sisters File Photo

July 11, 2025, Notre Dame, Indiana – History and congregational archives are important tools to keep the knowledge of the dedicated ministries of U.S. women religious alive well into the future – and even to bring a sense of healing from division.

Those were some of the lessons that archivists of congregations of U.S. Catholic Sisters heard about during a national conference, held June 22-25, 2025, in Notre Dame, Indiana.  

Among those featured in a recent Global Sisters Report article was Adrian Dominican Associate Arlene Bachanov, of the Congregation’s History Office. She and Grand Rapids Dominican Sister Mary Navarre, OP, Director of Archives, noted the healing effects of investigating the past. Their research helped members of the two congregations to understand the division experienced by the Grand Rapids and Adrian Dominicans, who were once separate provinces of the same Dominican congregation in New York. 

“There were all sorts of assumptions about what happened,” Arlene told the conference participants. But their research – collected into a 30-page publication, Golden Links – revealed that, in 1894, Bishop Henry Joseph Richter wanted the Sisters in Grand Rapids to be a diocesan congregation. Sisters could choose to become part of the new Grand Rapids congregation or remain in the New York congregation as part of the Adrian Province. The Adrian Province became an independent congregation in 1923.  

Both Arlene and Sister Mary had extensive help in their research from their respective archives: Arlene through Lisa Schell, Archivist, and Sister Joy Finfera, OP, Secretary of the Congregation and Director of the Office of Information, and Sister Mary through the Associate Director of Archives, Jennifer Morrison.

Read more about the importance of archives for congregations of Catholic Sisters in an article written by Dan Stockman for The National Catholic Reporter’s Global Sisters Reports.