Susanna Bertelsen

On this March 19 first-day-spring, I too am secluded at home with my husband, “social distancing” ourselves from others by avoiding all sorts of venues where people gather. Inconvenient? Yes. Annoying? Often. Frustrating? Most of the time. Fearful? No doubt. Stressed?...

While busy with fall closet cleaning at Loyola, I came across three beautifully knit prayer shawls!  What a pleasant surprise!  Those three shawls immediately raised up in me powerful memories of my own experiences with prayer shawls…warm reminders of how God loves us...

by Susanna Bertelsen In July, my daughter and I visited Ellis Island’s Immigration Museum and viewed Liberty Island from the ferry.  The Museum Research room offered clues and discoveries to the immigration experiences just about 100 years ago, of both my Italian...

by Susanna Bertelsen  Decades ago, in the 1980’s, I received a frantic call from my mother in Ohio, who announced over the phone, “Your brother has Schizophrenia. And they put him on Stelazine.”  To say the least, at that time, this family news was both...

by Susanna Bertelsen “What the world needs now is love, sweet love It’s the only thing that there’s just too little of What the world needs now is love, sweet love No, not just for some, but for everyone.” Where is that “sweet love” today? How might I find it? This...

by Susanna Bertelsen Five years ago, I visited the 9/11 Memorial pools at the sight of reconstruction of the tower and memorial park and museum in lower Manhattan, 13 years after the devastating attack on the twin towers of the World Trade center. Amid construction...

by Susanna Bertelsen Like many people, I enjoy sending and receiving Christmas letters. Unfortunately, I am usually late with the mailings.  This year, however, I started the process early… the first week of Advent! It had been my 2018 New Year’s resolution…to send...