The newly elected Leadership Team of the Sisters of Notre Dame de Namur (SNDdeN) met with members of the outgoing team to complete the transition of all responsibilities for the religious congregation. Sisters from five continents joined through Zoom in a Prayer Ritual of Handing over Canonical Authority. This was the first opportunity for the sisters of the congregation to witness this transfer process of congregational leadership teams.

Sisters Evalyne Aseyo (Kenya), Lorraine Connell (USA), Amarachi Grace Ezeonu (Nigeria), Miriam Montero Bereche (Peru) and Mary Johnson (USA), elected as the Congregational Leadership Team by delegates at a virtual General Chapter on Dec. 8, 2021, spent three months in transition with the outgoing Leadership Team. New Congregational Leader Sister Mary Johnson worked in close collaboration with Congregational Leader Sister Teresita Weind (2008-2021) to coordinate the leadership transition meetings during these months.

Two members of the leadership team, Sister Mary Johnson and Sister Lorraine Connell, have significant ties to Massachusetts and the Archdiocese of Boston.

Sister Mary was born in Springfield and raised in Sacred Heart Parish, where she was taught by the Sisters of Notre Dame in both elementary and high school. She graduated from Emmanuel College and entered the Sisters of Notre Dame. Following graduate studies in sociology, she returned to teach at Emmanuel and then at Trinity University, Washington, D.C., another educational apostolate of the Sisters of Notre Dame. Sister Mary is widely known and respected for her sociological research on developments in the life of women religious.

Sister Lorraine is a native of Boston and grew up in another parish with a school staffed by Sisters of Notre Dame, St. Mark. She is also an alumna of Emmanuel College. She taught in several schools here in the archdiocese before becoming a professor of economics at Emmanuel. She served in the leadership team of the Boston Province of the Sisters of Notre Dame, and in 2002, she became the general treasurer of the congregation with offices in Ipswich.

In a prayer ritual, sisters from many countries joined in rejoicing in the discernment and acceptance by the new Leadership Team, according to the Constitutions. In a sacred and symbolic gesture of the transfer of authority to the congregational leader, Sister Teresita conferred on Sister Mary the medal of Our Lady of Guadalupe, worn previously by the foundresses of the congregation.

The General Chapter delegates listened to the cries of people living in poverty and the cries of our globe and they declared: "In our virtual Chapter Room, attentive to the Spirit, we heard in this extraordinary way, the cries of people living in poverty as well as the cries of Earth. We see God's Creation scarred by systematic destruction, motivated by greed and hate, thus threatening the planet and life itself."

"We are called to care for those to whom and with whom we minister across five continents, as we are sustained by sisters whose prayer, wisdom, and experience of the cross is at the heart of our ministries."

"We are called to tend the gardens of diverse ministries and inter-cultural communities, and nurture an ecclesial life that holds the hope of producing a harvest of communion and synodality." (CALLS, General Chapter 2021)

The Sisters of Notre Dame de Namur are an international Congregation of Women Religious, founded by St. Julie Billiart (1751-1816) in Amiens, France, in 1804. Committed to making known God's goodness through education in a variety of ministries, Sisters serve in 15 countries on five continents: Africa, Asia, Europe, Latin America, and North America. The sisters staff offices or centers in Rome, Italy, Namur, Belgium, and Ipswich, and they maintain an international website at: sndden.org and an educational website at: notredameonline.org.