How Sister Karina found home … and what home means to her

How we end up where we go is part planning, part luck, part mystery. For Catholic Sisters, mystery figures particularly large. God's call is, after all, inexplicable. And we don't always get it right. Sister Karina Conrad, CDP, didn't. Not at first.

The thing about God's call is that it nags you until you respond. Then, it nags you more until you get it right. Sr. Karina shares her story, in the hope that it will help you find - and know - your right path and true home.

In the crosshairs.

It was July 4, 2022. Sr. Karina was relaxing in the Chicago-area home she shares with another Catholic Sister. It had been a long week at the two behavioral health clinics where she served. No fireworks or parades were on her schedule. She planned to enjoy the quiet. At the moment, she was scrolling through Facebook posts on her phone.

Then she saw the breaking news: an active shooter was mowing people down at the nearby Highland Park parade. Videos from parade-goers showed families running, belongings scattered, as they tried to escape the attacker. Carnage and chaos were replacing what had been a happy celebration with floats, American flags, candy and patriotic music.

"I got an urgent email asking for Spanish-speaking therapists. I prayed, 'God, what do I do?' I felt God answer, Go. They need you. I'm with you. I had never helped someone through this kind of trauma before. I'd never thought I would need to. You never think a shooting is going to happen in your backyard."

Sr. Karina waded into the crosshairs of shock, grief, and a landscape of human lives lost, gouged, and forever changed. Although she's still processing the experience more than a year later, she's certain of two things: It affirmed she is on the right path, and it deepened her gratitude that the right path - and place - finally materialized.

It just took much longer than she had anticipated.

Read the whole story in Vision Vocation Guide, pages 67-72!

Vocation discernment: Knowing when it feels like home

This review is humbling. It’s posted on the School Sisters of Notre Dame’s website:

Feels Like Home is a quick and easy read, offering a brief encounter with women who have journeyed the path of discernment to religious life in the 21st century.

Using simple terms, it guides inquirers along this path of self-discovery and provides examples and advice from those who have already walked it.

Though small enough to fit into your purse or even a pocket, the book includes practical next steps, discernment resources such as a list of recommended books and videos/films, scriptural passages for reflection, and a glossary of terms.

Each chapter also ends with Questions for Reflection.

Read the whole review!

Some Reviews of “Feels Like Home: A Single Catholic Woman’s Guide to Religious Life in the U.S.”

“This book provided education into the lives of many different Catholic religious orders. It shared the differences of the orders as well as the common threads. This book provides the reader with questions they may want to ask themselves as they explore the options of religious life. Resources for further investigation and clarity along the path. It should be placed in all Catholic high schools and colleges as a resource for those inquiring, and for those of us who are curious.”

“A great resource for any woman who is discerning a call to religious life. The stories show that you don't have to be a certain "type" of woman to answer the call.”

“Identifies the unique missions of various orders and would benefit any woman trying to determine whether they are called to the pursue a religious life.”

Please see for yourself!

A review of Susan Flansburg's Feels Like Home: Finding Your Way to Catholic Sisterhood 

By Sister Beth Murphy, OP

Though I’ve been quite aware of the shortage of Catholic sisters in the United States for some time, an experience last year took me by surprise. Our vocation director Sister Denise Glazik and I were at my alma mater—Eastern Illinois University—for a Busy Persons Retreat at the Newman Center where my religious vocation was nurtured 40 years earlier. It was Catholic Sisters Week, and I had a brilliant idea: We’d invite the students to create selfies for social media with posters that included a shout-out to their favorite Catholic sisters. 

“I’m not sure that will work,” Sister Denise calmly remarked. “I don’t think the students have much contact with sisters.” She was correct. An informal poll that day uncovered two students among 30 or so who had a relationship with a Catholic sister. Two. 

THAT is why I’m so happy to see Susan Flansburg’s book, Feels Like Home: A Single Catholic Woman’s Guide to Religious Life in the U.S. The volume is slim enough to fit in a purse, and inexpensive enough that every parish, campus ministry center, convent, spiritual director, religious community and diocesan vocation office should have a dozen of them on the shelf, ready to share with women in the midst of discerning their life’s vocation.  

Dare I say, parents may want to have a copy on hand, too. It will help familiarize you with the process of discerning religious life, introduce you to apostolic, missionary, monastic, and cloistered communities, and prepare you for that golden moment when you talk with your own child about possibilities for a way of life the world may need now more than ever. Read Sister Beth’s whole review!

An Inspiring Woman: Sister Helen Carey, OSB

My long-time friend and mentor, Sister Helen Carey, died recently. She was one of the best people I ever met. She allowed me to tell her vocation story, which I am sharing here.

It doesn’t appear in my new book, Feels Like Home: A Single Catholic Woman’s Guide to Religious Life in the U.S. The stories in it feature young, newly professed nuns. But Sister Helen coulda’ knocked them all out of the ballpark with her wild - and shockingly honest - story. Hope you like it!

Writing Straight with Crooked Lines

The year was 1946, and Helen Carey had ordered matching bedspreads with her roommate-to-be. She couldn’t wait to go to college. She had wanted to be a nurse as long as she remembered.

As she made final plans for the move to Marycrest College in Davenport, Iowa, though, Helen received devastating news. Her mother had been diagnosed with terminal breast cancer that had already metastasized to the brain and bone. Instead of learning nursing in college, Helen went home to nurse her mom and care for her family.

“While other young women my age were attending classes, I was chauffeuring neighborhood kids around,” Sr. Helen remembers. “I was a Cub Scout den mother and a member of the Junior Women’s Club. I was dating a very nice young man who I thought I might marry.”

When Helen’s mother died in 1949, though, she decided not to remain in Streator. Instead, she moved to Joliet, Ill., to take a job with Caterpillar as a keypunch operator and enjoy the life of a young carefree adult.

A Wild Year

“My dad had remarried, and had encouraged me to go to college,” Sr. Helen says. “But I had gone through so much, caring for my mom, that I decided I couldn’t be a nurse. Working at Caterpillar was great fun. My friends and I used to go to Chicago to see plays all the time. We’d go to jazz clubs, and get a sandwich and a pitcher of beer. We’d catch the last bus back to Joliet.

“One night we caught the train to LaSalle/Peru to see a band we really liked. We missed the last train back, so we rented a hotel room for the night. Trouble was, we were supposed to report for work at nine the next morning. We had already been late enough that we worried we’d lose our jobs if we came in late again.

“So we pooled our money and called the airport to see if a private plane would fly us back early the next morning. A guy there said he would do it so we got to work on time, although we were wearing the same clothes we had on yesterday. But I was thrilled. It was my first time in an airplane.”

The Fork in the Road

Attending night school classes to learn more computer skills, Helen advanced in the company. Soon she was wiring the boards to keep factory inventory and do payroll accounting. But Helen’s “wild year” was winding down. She was starting to want something more.

“My family had always been quite religious, so it was natural for me to choose to go on a retreat during the annual company summer shutdown,” Sr. Helen says. “I went to the Benedictines and had a very peaceful time. I wondered what it would be like to be a nun. They all looked so happy.”

Despite her religious upbringing, Helen had never thought of becoming a Sister before.

“After that retreat, though, I couldn’t get the idea out of my mind. I wrote to several communities for information and even visited another group. But the Benedictines were for me. I valued their quiet happiness.”

Sr. Helen left her job and entered the community – to the surprise of many – in 1952. She chose a different trailblazing path … one that included marching in Selma, teaching all over the country, and, finally, living a happy monastic life.

“I had all kinds of friends say, You’ll never last,’” she chuckles. “I guess they were wrong.”

Sr. Helen did end up attending college. She earned her BA in English, and her MA and PhD in philosophy. After a career in teaching, campus ministry and hospital chaplaincy – where Sr. Helen got as near to nursing as she ever again wished to be - she retired to the monastery to lead retreats and write.

I will miss her lovely voice, her wisdom, and her generous and loving spirit.

You can find many contemporary vocation stories in my new book, Feels Like Home: A Single Catholic Woman’s Guide to Religious Life in the U.S.!

Feels Like Home: A Single Catholic Woman’s Guide to Religious Life in the U.S.

I’ve been absent from the blog for a long time, but busy working for our clients as always.

I’ve also been writing a book. Now that it’s been published, I’m thrilled to tell you about it!

"Feels Like Home" is a narrative-based guidebook for women discerning their vocation. It was written with and for vocation directors from across the country.

I wrote it because, after 20 years of serving in communications ministry for Catholic Sisters (much of it supporting vocations), it was clear to me how desperately needed a guide like this was.

"Feels Like Home," which I have made available in paperback on Amazon, functions as a kind of “one-stop shop” of critical but hard-to-find insights.

It explores - through heartfelt vocation stories of newly professed Sisters from a general range of institutes including monastic, apostolic, missionary, habited and cloistered - the sometimes-circuitous paths that lead to the convent, and shares information about the institutes the women eventually call "home."

Vocation Director Sister Stefanie MacDonald, OSB, writes in the Preface, "If this book had been available to me, it would have saved me years of searching. ... Feels Like Home spells out your options for you. From vocation stories to discernment tips, it offers insight into the lifestyles of different kinds of institutes. … You’ll find a clearer picture of where God is calling you. And you’ll discover you are not alone in the process."

My faith-based work has been published by Vision Vocation Guide as well as in congregational publications. I also am a contributor to Duke Divinity Faith & Leadership, St. Ambrose University Scene, Horizon, and other publications. Catholic Media Association awarded a story from the book - published by Vision - an award for Best Magazine Feature in 2022.  

It’s been my privilege to write a book that will help inquirers find their home among today’s women religious. They are the prophet-warriors of the Church, still serving all God’s creation, still standing strong.

I hope you’ll take a look!

“The Voice”

By Alan Sivell

When I was entering the 10th grade, the first year of high school in my hometown, my mother signed me up for a speech class. She wanted me to get over shyness.

She was the type of person who made conversation with everyone - trips to the grocery store or the fabric shop were never quick - and my father was a gregarious salesman.

When not with my friends, I looked at my shoes and mumbled. 

Not for the first time or the last, my mother knew what she was doing. The class did wonders for me. Well before the end of the semester, I couldn’t wait to get up in front of the class and speak. Oh, I got nervous, but the end result was usually so satisfying, I couldn’t wait for my chance.

The class didn’t start with much promise. It was filled with seniors who, to me, looked like fully functioning adults outside of class. But in class, they did not do well. They were no better than I, the lowly sophomore, at the start of the semester. And they didn’t really seem to care. Speech was just a class to get through.

However, I listened to what the teacher had to say and put it into practice. I’d like to say that was because I was a serious and obedient student. But, no, initially it was to gain status with some of the seniors in the class.

And with each speaking opportunity, I got better. And better. I could tell the other kids wanted to hear what I had to say.

And the teacher noticed.

Mr. Reimer began calling me “the voice” and challenging the seniors to do as well or better than “this sophomore.” He selected me to narrate the Christmas play that year. And predicted that I would make a career in broadcasting.

And for 10 years I did, at WQAD-TV in Moline, IL. While fun, it was not – in my opinion or the opinion of my spouse – a job for an adult, let alone a parent. The hours were crazy.

So I moved into a faculty position at St. Ambrose University, where I’ve spent my career teaching broadcasting and speech.

I still write speeches for others and write and deliver my own. And I still use my voice for radio and narration work, always thinking about Mr. Reimer just before I throw open the microphone and click on the record button. 

Here’s a recent voice-over piece I did for John Deere. I wish my mom could see and hear it. It would be one more validation of her own parenting skills.

Christmas 2020: In the Nick of Time

By Susan Flansburg

This is the year I had to search my soul for Christmas spirit. It was nearly lost to me as I plodded through a season now defined by absence rather than abundance. People, plans, places and traditions were off my calendar. The traditional frenzy of gift-buying, albeit online, and wrapping diverted me for a while. But in the end, with no guestroom to prepare, I was left alone with my thoughts.

Which strayed, as I considered the appearance of the Christmas star, to the urgent question: What does Christmas mean to me, anyway?

The answer came to me, yes, in the Nick of time.

I awakened thinking of how my parents had prepared a Christmas welcome for me and my family every year. They had made the beds, filled the fridge, stacked gifts beneath the Christmas tree. They had decorated every corner of their home. They had greeted us at the door as we pulled up.

They weren’t just playing Santa. They were being Santa, embodying the place where giving and receiving become the same.

They had filled my stocking – my hope and my anticipation – to the brim, with their full-hearted graciousness, attention and welcome. I thought about my own preparations. Had I offered that same full-hearted graciousness, attention and welcome to my own loved ones this year? The answer is no.

Yes, I bought and wrapped and delivered gifts. I agreed to Zooms over meals and gift exchanges. I decorated my own home (although not as fully as if we were hosting guests). I played Santa.

But I discovered my weak spot, courtesy my parents. It was the spot where I had let anger grow and bloom. It was where I not only robbed my loved ones, I robbed myself.

That spot was in the stockings. I had pronounced against them. There would be no stockings hung by the fireplace this year. Why should there be? If Page’s family couldn’t join us, by God, we wouldn’t act as if everything was normal. We wouldn’t hang the things. No one would be here to enjoy them.

“No one” was a proxy, I now realize, for the traditions that had been upended by the coronavirus.

It was a teeny tiny place to express my rage. An undetected, safe place.

But then I told Jamie. His face changed to one of disbelief and grief. I said, you have plenty of gifts under the tree. He said, that’s not the point.

When I told Alan later of Jamie’s reaction, Alan immediately said he would ensure Jamie had a stocking. Alan would be Santa.

I had to take it into the quiet of my dreams to understand what happened. I had not prepared a place for Jamie, or for Alan, or for myself. I had not been the full-hearted, gracious, welcoming soul I know I am called to be. I had not been Santa, but only played the role.

It turns out that this is what Christmas means to me.

Merry Christmas. May love fill your heart and hope fill your stocking for all time.

When Your Caregiver Can’t Afford to Visit a Doctor

By Susan Flansburg

When Cheryl got Covid, her face itched, her muscles ached and her body burned at 102 degrees. She tested positive after work one day while caring for Covid-positive residents at a long-term care facility in Iowa.

Cheryl drove home and closed the door to her bedroom to keep her toddlers out. Going to the doctor was out of the question. She didn’t have the money.

“Cheryl” is a pseudonym for a caregiver I had the great privilege to interview this summer.

She couldn’t reveal her identity and hope to keep her job, of course. But she was willing to tell the world about the dangerous conditions under which she and her colleagues must work.

We call our caregivers “Health Care Heroes,” but do we really mean it? What’s the evidence?

Cheryl’s story may upset you, but it’s the reality of our low-paid, under-respected and under-represented caregiving population. They need our help as much as we need theirs.

I’m thankful that the appeal letter I wrote is helping raise the funds needed to support the real-life heroes we depend on every day. Let me know what you think!

How Catholic Sisters Treated Their Own Essential Workers

By Susan Flansburg

I love my clients. To a person, they are passionate about what they do in healthcare, education, the arts and more. But no one is more passionate than the Catholic Sisters I get to work with.

I didn’t write this story, but it features one of my favorite clients. I’ve had the pleasure of working with the Sisters of St. Joseph of Orange on several stories, and can attest that they really are who the writer says they are: compassionate, caring and committed to doing the right thing. They are true Christians.

I wrote this story on spiritual direction for a recent issue of their magazine (pp 8-9), and have also written about their spirituality and social justice ministries.

For those who think nuns are a “dying breed,” here’s a head’s up: they are alive and making a difference.

You Have to Do Something

By Susan Flansburg

Two elderly Catholic Sisters were handcuffed and dragged off to jail last summer for standing still and praying. Sisters of Mercy JoAnn Persch and Pat Murphy - ages 85 and 90, respectively - were participating in the Catholic Day of Action for Immigrant Children on July 18, 2019, in Washington, D.C. Afterwards, they were sanguine about it.

“You have to do something,” Sr. JoAnn said after their release. “The little bit of discomfort we felt that day is so minimal to what the immigrants go through.”

I heard this sentiment again and again as I interviewed Sisters, Brothers and priests for a story that appears in the new Vision Vocation magazine. They want to do something to help “the human family,” as Sr. Pat said. Their example is inspiring.

Some work directly with migrants in or near detention camps, helping provide food and supplies. Others provide assistance to migrants many miles from the border, helping with housing, legal issues, social services. Viatorian Father Corey Brost takes a different approach, working to educate young Americans who might someday make a difference.

“We leave our comfort zones to search for God in the desert,” he says of the pilgrimage he takes them on. “We walk into the experiences of people who live through this human-rights tragedy of migration. We ask: How does our faith intersect with it? The young people say the pilgrimage humanizes the complex issue of immigration. It connects human suffering with our Catholic teaching.”

The cultural anthropologist Margaret Mead once said, “Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has.” The Sisters, Brothers and priests I met for this story are thoughtful, committed citizens. Shining lights. Enjoy!

Getting Students to the Finish Line

By Susan Flansburg

“Dad, I’m not sure what to do.” Olivia Chiodo remembers the conversation perfectly. She had called her father – a police officer in Des Moines – to let him know she needed help paying her outstanding tuition bill.

He paused before he answered. “I’m not sure either.”

Olivia was stunned. Scheduled to graduate from Iowa State in three months, she knew if she couldn’t pay her tuition, she wouldn’t be allowed to graduate. Her younger brother and ISU sophomore, Xavier, wouldn’t be allowed to register for classes.

It was a one-two punch for them. Their mother had just died, leaving her family to grieve even as they struggled to pay the medical bills that had piled up. Funeral expenses had added to the burden.

Now, money for school was simply gone.

Although Olivia’s story resonates for many, each story is unique. Families that are displaced by hurricanes, wildfires, flooding and other natural disasters can lose their livelihoods. Parents who die without life insurance can leave students to help pay for funerals.

I loved writing this article for Iowa State University. Olivia’s vulnerability and determination were - and still are - inspiring. Every student and staff member I interviewed helped make me believe the world is still in good hands. I’m grateful to have met them all.