Sister Maria Salerno
University Professor
Washington, DC

For more than 20 years, Sister Maria Salerno has worked as a volunteer nurse practitioner in an inner city, non-profit clinic for the indigent and underinsured.  Their population is primarily Afro-American, Latino, and East African inner city residents.  In addition to her volunteer work at the clinic, once a week she works with one of the Missionaries of the Holy Apostles.  They pick up food from one of the high-end markets and distribute it to several religious communities in the area including among others, the Poor Clare’s, Mother Theresa’s Sisters of Charity, and Brothers of a Belgium group educating men from the Congo for work with the mentally ill.

For the last 8 years she has gone to Peru for varying lengths of time to assist our Sisters of St Francis.  With her very meager Spanish, she has been able to help educating rural lay health care workers (work that was started by our Sisters over 30 years ago.

As a Professor teaching at The Catholic University of America and living in Washington, DC she finds life invigorating, challenging, and never boring.  The opportunity to worship and interact with a variety of religious groups from around the world is continuous nourishment for the spirit and reaffirmation of the viability of religious life in the world today.