photo from Vatican news

May 8, 2025

Dear Sisters and Associates,

I greet you from Rome, where I have been blessed to be at the time of an election of a new Pope!  We had just finished the Liturgy at the end of the UISG Conference when news came that there was white smoke from the Vatican!

I was supposed to meet Sisters Yessica Amaro Cáceres, Cecilia Sungjoo Hong, and Maria Youngmi Kim to go to dinner.  We all went instead to the Vatican.  Because Sister Yessica knew some people and because I was walking with my cane after my foot troubles earlier this year, we were able to get into the front of St. Peter’s Square and they even gave me a chair!  I literally had a “front row seat.”

When the balcony doors opened for our new Pope, I was so shocked, surprised, and very happy that for the first time in Catholic history we have an American Pope.  It was so moving to see him standing there and all the people cheering.  He seemed to be very moved himself.

When I heard the name he chose, Leo XIV, I was again moved to tears.  The legacy of Leo XIII, as we know, is such a part of our dear founder’s life and times.  So significant that he chose this name!  He too sees the importance of reading the “signs of the times.”  To be focused on the social issues of the day and to be justice minded, as were his predecessors, Leo XIII and Francis, speaks to us, as daughters of Ketteler.  The new Pope calls us to be bridges of love and encounter, to be open to receive everyone, and to be a synodal church.

We, Sisters of Divine Providence and our Associates around the globe, congratulate Pope Leo XIV and promise our prayers for him.  As Bishop Ketteler’s daughters we resonate with his values and continue to look for ways to be a moral voice for justice wherever we are, wherever we serve.  May we all, Sisters and Associates of Divine Providence, be joined as one in this historic moment in our church. 

I send these greetings with love, Sister Barbara