On April 4th, Sister Simone Campbell, SSS invited members of the the New York Archdiocesan Council of Women Religious (ACWR) to a history lesson and a call to action. The group was gathered at The Center at Mariandale to discuss leadership, and the challenges facing it, today.
“Waking up the mystical body of Christ is critically important in this time to fight fascism,” Sister Simone told the group. “We [as Catholic Sisters] can stand up. We have a greater freedom than most to speak, to act.”
Sisters, she said, have the benefit of being in community, the benefit of intimately knowing those with and for whom they serve, and the benefit of age, along with which comes knowledge. These gifts can allow Catholic Sisters to make a bridge to those who aren’t being heard, particularly in fights of immigration, racism, and economic struggle.
“We need to be prepared to speak out the Truth of what our people need,” she told the group.
Sister Simone Campbell served as Executive Director of NETWORK, A National Catholic Social Lobby, from 2004-2021. She is a religious leader, attorney and poet with extensive experience in public policy and advocacy for systemic change. Among her accomplishments while at NETWORK was the writing of the famous “Nuns’ Letter,” considered by many as critically important in convincing Congress to support the Affordable Care Act, and organizing and leading NETWORK’s “Nuns on the Bus” trips across the country to support economic justice and immigration reform.
At the ACWR gathering, she detailed the history of her community, the Sisters of Social Service. The community was in Hungary during its slide from democracy into fascism during World War II. She shared parallels between that historical moment and the United States today.
While Sister Simone is not aligned with a political party, she urged sisters to bring the public’s attention to Pope Francis’ February 2025 letter to U.S. Bishops.
In the letter, Pope Francis extorts “all the faithful of the Catholic Church, and all men and women of good will, not to give in to narratives that discriminate against and cause unnecessary suffering to our migrant and refugee brothers and sisters. Let us ask Our Lady of Guadalupe to protect individuals and families who live in fear or pain due to migration and/or deportation… May the ‘Virgen morena‘, who knew how to reconcile peoples when they were at enmity, grant us all to meet again as brothers and sisters, within her embrace, and thus take a step forward in the construction of a society that is more fraternal, inclusive and respectful of the dignity of all.”
Sister Simone sees herself as promoting this message, in sync with The Vatican. One of her calls to action was encouraging sisters to brainstorm how to circulate the Pope’s letter more widely in parishes.
“Our people need to hear this,” she said. “We are called to be much more bold in speaking for the people. We could lose our souls if we don’t.”
According to Dominican Sister of Hope Judy Brunell, OP, who attended the gathering, “Sister Simone’s relating the apostles waking Jesus up to calm the storm at sea to our call to wake up the ‘Body of Christ’ at this stormy time we are encountering really captured my imagination.”
“I feel it stirred energy and a desire to act communally within the group to use the many gifts and freedoms we have as religious women and as Church to exert influence on behalf of caring for the most vulnerable in our society,” Sister Judy wrote. “There was a real surge of power among us as well as an honest expression of the fear and risk that is related to using that power. Simone’s often repeated question, ‘What do we have to lose?’…lingers within me. I am encouraged by her reminder that we can act because we are a community. We do not stand alone.”