For cloistered communities like the Sisters Adorers of the Precious Blood, interaction with the outside world can be very limited. Yet, vocations in Canada are growing for the order. 

Many of us have visions of retiring to a warm spot and taking it easy, but not Sr. Fay Trombley. The 77-year-old former professor at Newman Theological College in Edmonton is spending her “retirement” in Tuktoyaktuk, N.W.T., tirelessly working to ease the hunger, unemployment and spiritual needs of people in the Arctic. 

Mission work is not just about humanitarian aid in developing countries. There are missions that exist in our own backyard. 

Erik Sorensen got his first job at 12, shovelling snow for an apartment building in his hometown of Red Deer, Alta. In high school he worked in a grocery store stacking cans and filling up the bins of potatoes.

Of course Mario Biscardi was given prior notice that he was to receive the highest honour the Vatican bestows on any layperson. 

Hippocrates, the father of medicine, described a physician’s career this way: “Life is short, the art long, opportunity fleeting, experiment dangerous and judgment difficult.” So, who in their right mind would want to be a doctor?