Sister Susan Shares How Ordinary Catholics Can Spread God’s Love
In a recent episode of the Archdiocese of Louisville’s “What’s New in ArchLou” podcast, Sister Susan Gatz of the Sisters of Charity of Nazareth described how missionary work today is less about distance and more about presence, justice and everyday discipleship.
Raised in Holy Family Parish and educated at Presentation Academy, Sister Susan first met the Sisters of Charity of Nazareth at age six. “When I was little, they fascinated me. When I got a little older, I admired them, and eventually they inspired me to join the community,” she recalled.
Her ministry has taken her from Presentation Academy to a Mexican American parish in Texas, a parish in Florida serving Hispanic and Haitian migrants, and rural Mississippi. Leadership roles as provincial, vice president and president allowed her to visit every country where the Congregation serves and to see “the beauty and the interculturality of the church and the complexity of the church.”
The Sisters of Charity of Nazareth now minister in the United States, Belize, India, Nepal, Botswana and Kenya through education, health care, parish work and social services. In Belize, Sister Carlette’s LIFE program, Living in Full Existence, supports about 100 neglected elderly residents through home visits, practical help and communal meals, while also raising national awareness of their needs. In India, Sister Lena’s afternoon school for “rag picker” children offers basic education and confidence to young people who would otherwise never attend school.
A chalk message in an alley in Bardstown, Kentucky
“In mission work, you are going to be the presence of Christ there,” Sister Susan said. In India, where proselytizing is illegal, that means forming mostly Hindu students in values of compassion, justice and care for the earth rather than seeking conversions.
Missionary experience, she said, has “opened my heart and my mind,” deepened her compassion and “hardened my resolve” to challenge systems that keep people on the margins. For her, mission begins when people “realize and pay attention to the fact that God loves you,” then recognize that “God loves everybody else too” and ask, “How then do you spread that love?”