The Mercy Day Greetings already received have now been posted online and are linked to this item.

All members and friends of the Mercy network are welcome to publish Mercy Day greetings on the mercyworld.org website. Greetings - text only- should be sent to mercyenews@mercyinternational.ie by September 21st to make sure they are published in time for Mercy Day.

Se invita a todos los miembros y amigos de la red de la Misericordia a publicar saludos del Dia De La Misericordia en la pagina Web. Saludos - en formato de texto solamente - deben ser enviados a mercyenews@mercyinternational.ie de aqui al de septiembre para cerciorarse de que sean publicados a tiempo para el Dia De La Misericordia.

Messages to: the Editor

We invite all our readers and website visitors to join us in prayer that all people of faith will be respectful of others' religious traditions, and to proclaim with us that violence in the name of religion is wrong.

Messages to: Mary Reynolds rsm - Executive Director MIA

A special E-news bulletin will be sent out on Mercy Day (Monday, 24 September) with the regular Mercy E-newsletter being distributed on Wednesday 26, September.

We welcome stories and images from your Mercy Day celebrations to include in the Wednesday 26 September Mercy E-news (Issue 484) or in the following week's edition on Wednesday, 3 October (Issue 485).

We particularly look forward to receiving reports of any Good Cup of Tea events celebrated on Mercy Day.

Messages to: the Editor

Editor: Reports from a number of universities and colleges sharing their plans for and reports from their Mercy Day celebrations are linked to this item. We look forward to including yours!

Mercy International Association is offering a month-long renewal programme for a third consecutive year, (Sunday, 2 June – Saturday, 29 June, 2013). This residential programme is designed for vowed Mercy women who are seeking refreshment and renewal. It offers participants the opportunity to take time out in an atmosphere of warmth, hospitality, and internationality in order to discern more clearly the invitation of the Spirit in how to live out the mission of Mercy in our church and world.

Details of Cost, Presenters and Facilitator and the programme outline, are linked to this item.

Messages to: Mary Kay Dobrovolny rsm - Assistant Director Heritage & Spirituality

This week's reflections have been prepared for us by Anne Reid, (Associate of the Sisters of Mercy of the Americas) and Joan Breen rsm (member of the Institute of Our Lady of Mercy Great Britain.

As you read each of their reflections, you are invited to consider and to share:

How has your own Mercy story expanded and changed over time?
Who is Catherine for you, today?

Messages to: Mary Reynolds rsm - Executive Director MIA

A recent landmark decision granting the Whanganui River, the third largest river in New Zealand, the status of legal ‘personhood’ poses deep problems for individuals /companies who think of the earth and its resources in terms of ownership. The decision follows a long court struggle for the river’s personhood initiated by the Whanganui River iwi, an indigenous community with strong cultural ties to the water...

Read the report attached to this item and consider signing the petition.

Messages to: Kathleen Glennon rsm - Member MIA Working Group Cosmology and Eco-Justice

Editor: In the September issue of Australian Catholics online, Jesuit theologian Andrew Hamilton SJ addresses the question "How does Christian faith lead us to see the environment?" To read the article, click here

The Church has great need of saints. The real innovators in the Church are the saints, holy people whose lives are dramatic with a humble and homely heroism. To read the complete article, click here.

Prayers through the intercession of Venerable Catherine are requested for the intentions of: Mary De Pinto, Maria and all those who have asked us for prayers.

Messages to:
Anne Hannon rsm - Vice postulator Europe and Africa
Sheila Carney rsm - Vice postulator Americas
Mary Duffy rsm - Vice postulator Australia, New Zealand, Philippines

Fifty years ago four Sisters of Mercy set out from Dublin, Ireland, to establish a foundation in Nairobi, Kenya. Archbishop JJ McCarthy had invited them to Nairobi.

The Foundation stone for the Hospital was laid on March 19,1961 and the Mater Misericordiae Hospital (Mater) opened on May 5, 1962.

Over the years the hospital has grown to become a general tertiary institution that offers a wide variety of health care services. The Sisters of Mercy remain the Trustees of the hospital.

Celebrations for the jubilee are being held on Saturday, 22 September.

We wish to thank all who have contributed so much to bringing the hospital to what it is today...

Messages to: Liz Fletcher rsm - Provincial Superior of the Sisters of Mercy, Kenya

Editor: Further detail of the history of the Mater with contemporary photos is linked to this item.

On a splendid spring morning in September, as the last drops of dew fell from the Catherine McAuley roses, and the sunlight streamed through the windows of the McAuley Room at Mercy Place, members of the Congregation Leadership Team joined around 50 Board members and Executive staff from across all of the Brisbane Mercy Sponsored Ministries and colleagues from Mercy Partners, to welcome  Áine Barrins rsm to Brisbane and to hear from her about the Life and Letters of Catherine McAuley...

Messages to: Mary Lawson rsm - Communications Contact, Brisbane Leadership Team

Carlow University is celebrating the 40th anniversary of the Women's Studies Program by screening the film Miss Representation, a documentary that explores how mainstream media contributes to the under-representation of women in positions of power and influence in America.

 In 1972 Ellie Wymard, PhD, the current director of Carlow's Master of Fine Arts program, founded Carlow's women's studies program and created a place for the study of women's experiences, histories and creativity. Carlow offers an array of women's studies courses and is the only institution in Pennsylvania that requires all its students to take a women's studies course as an undergraduate core requirement.

Messages to: Katie Hogan - Chair: Women's Studies Program

Editor: Regular readers of Mercy e-News might recall that in Issue 463 ( 23 May 2012) we reported on the story published in the Chicago Reporter of how every Friday morning around 4 a.m. JoAnn Persch rsm and Pat Murphy rsm go to the Broadview immigration processing center to help and comfort dozens of undocumented immigrants about to be deported later that morning.

And now, Sisters JoAnn Persch and Pat Murphy can be seen on the big screen.

“Band of Sisters” premiered Friday at the Gene Siskel Film Center in Chicago...The documentary focuses on the lives of nuns post-Vatican II, a 1960s meeting in Rome of all the world’s Catholic bishops with the goal of bringing the church into the modern world...

Director and producer Mary Fishman met Persch and Murphy through a church peace and social justice committee. The women were willing to be filmed and have Fishman follow them as they fought for immigrants’ rights.

Source:Northwest Herald Illinois

Messages to:JoAnn Persch rsm and Pat Murphy rsm c/- Pat Kenny rsm - Institute Communications Office

As a Catholic and Mercy school Mercy College seeks to provide opportunities for our students and staff to live out our mission to be witnesses of Christ's message to love one another. By acting to bring social justice to life in the world,  we can enhance awareness of the needs of others whilst also offering practical assistance to those in need. As part of the Asia Pacific area we, as Australians, are well placed to make a difference to the lives of some of our closest international neighbours.

Last Friday, Debbie O'Hara from St Brigid's, a Mercy Girls College in Perth, spoke to the year 8,9 and 10 students about an amazing opportunity that is available to them in 2013. Our students have been invited to participate in an Outreach Immersion to Cambodia which will be undertaken jointly with St Brigid's in early October...

Messages to: Michelle Kotter - Principal

The Misericordia University community officially dedicated Michael and Tina MacDowell Hall, the newest building on campus, on Thursday, Aug. 23 to acknowledge the significant leadership and accomplishments of the president and the first lady...

President MacDowell became the 12th president of Misericordia in 1998 after serving Hartwick College in Oneonta, N.Y. He has led the Religious Sisters of Mercy-sponsored University into the top tier of the Best Regional Universities North category of U.S. News and World’s Report’s annual edition of Best Colleges, and successfully managed its evolution from a college to a university on Aug. 24, 2007 featuring master’s and clinical doctorate degree programs...

Messages to:Jim Roberts - Director of Communications

An increasing number of hospitals in Southeast Michigan are growing their own produce for patients and selling healthy food through farmer’s markets on their campuses.

Experts say that 80 percent of chronic disease, including cardiovascular disease, diabetes and cancer, can be prevented, or conditions can be improved, through better diet and exercise...

St. Joseph Mercy Hospital in Ann Arbor has been growing produce on its own farm the past two years .. " We have enough yield now that we are including the vegetables and herbs in some cafeteria offerings and on patient menus ...We also host a weekly farmers’ market and donate excess food to local food pantries..."

Source: Modern Health Care

Messages to: Carol Tingwall - Director, Corporate Communications and Public Relations

JOPLIN, Mo. -- Emergency department nurses at Mercy Hospital in Joplin got a big national honor.

Nurse Terri Edens wrote an essay for a contest in January detailing the efforts of ER nurses after the deadly tornado last year.

Mercy's ER nurses received the Best Nursing Staff of 2012 award from the Advance for Nurses magazine.

Messages to:Nancy Corbett - Director of Media Relations, Mercy Healthcare St Louis

Source: OzarksFirst.com

Editor: As we approach Mercy day, the story "Cross Within a Cross Cut from Joplin Hospital's Steel Beams" has heightened meaning and significance. To read that story, click here

...One initiative of MIA Global Action is to internationalise a campaign to keep trafficking out of hotels in countries where Sisters of Mercy have a presence. The immediate goal is to have hotels sign up to a Code of Conduct which has been developed by ECPAT (End Child Prostitution / Child Pornography and Trafficking).

The Code has been adopted in many countries. Unfortunately Ireland is not one of these. It is time to act!

The steps in the strategy are outlined in the report linked to this item.

Messages to: Sheila O'Gorman rsm

MONTE Sant' Angelo Mercy College's Wind Ensemble has blown away the competition at the NSW State Band Championships.

Directed by Catherine Walmsley, the 30-member band huffed and puffed their way to first place in the open division.

They performed Bolero, Linden Lea and Relativo.

Messages to: Catherine Alcock - Principal

Source: The Mosman Daily

No particular events are recorded in the "Mercy through the Years" calendar as having taken place on September 19. Tomorrow, September 20, we remember that on this date in 1841, Catherine left Birmingham on her last journey back to Baggot Street .

Editor: The "Mercy Facts" section of the mercyworld.org section of the website is intended to be a repository of important dates in the global story of Mercy. We welcome contributions to this living record. These can be submitted online here.

The materials in the Spirituality section of the Mercyworld.org website provide 31 video, text and audio options, some with multiple elements, that could be considered for use for Mercy Day or throughout this coming Season of Mercy.

The tv symbol indicates that the resource is a video file. Clicking on the 'More' button below the title gives access to a page containing text, a pdf (where included) and the video clip eg "A Conversation with Mary C Sullivan rsm". Clicking on the arrow in the centre of the video screen will start the video playing. As soon as the video commences playing, the time code for both the length of the piece and the length of what has been played is visible. Clicking on the arrow again will stop the track playing. At the far right end of the control bar ( just past the volume control) there is a symbol in the shape of a white square. Clicking on this square will make the video play full screen, intended not only for individual viewing but to be used with a group presentation when projecting on a screen.

The microphone symbol indicates that the resource is an audio file. Clicking on the 'More' button under the title of the resource eg 'Composing Music for the Suscipe' gives access to a page containing text and the audio player. Clicking on the arrow at the beginning of the audio bar will start the audio track playing. As soon as the audio commences playing, the time code for both the length of the piece and the length of what has been played is visible. Clicking on the arrow again will stop the track playing.

The lined paper symbol indicates a text document.

In 1865 the North Sydney Mercies established a presence in Sydney under the leadership of Elizabeth McQuoin, who was called Mother Mary Ignatius...

Today the Sisters, although fewer in number, continue to spread the charism of Catherine McAuley by ministering in various fields - some in the ministry of prayer and others in executive positions, areas of leadership, administration, consultation and supervision, education, formation and retreat work, social welfare, pastoral care, health and aged care, liturgy and other church related services, information technology, areas of social justice, as volunteers and on various Committees and Boards. They are ably assisted by their Mercy co-workers.

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