In a generation known to shun commitments, these women are embracing lifelong vows.

“Please have no leniency on me,” Sister Rice once said at trial. ”To remain in prison for the rest of my life would be the greatest honor you could give me.”

In a region of vast distances, weak infrastructure and a relatively small number of priests, religious and laywomen like Sister Laura are the mainstay of Catholic spirituality.

Sister Megan Rice, whose yearslong crusade against nuclear weapons included serving two years behind bars for a felony, died Oct. 10 at the Rosemont residence of her religious order.

It was 100 years ago—on Sept. 12, 1921—when the Maryknoll Sisters assigned its first group of sisters to China, the order’s first mission.

My vocation is about a far deeper encounter than a TV show about food can offer, and years later I discovered one of the most profound manifestations of this among children before the Bread of Life himself.