Marilyn Lacey, RSM, has worked with migrants and refugees since 1980. The Dalai Lama honored her in person as "an unsung hero of compassion"; she also received a global award for outstanding faith-based leadership. Her spiritual memoir, This Flowing Toward Me: A Story of God Arriving in Strangers, recounts the blessings she has experienced by standing with those whom the world calls "other".  Despite having a graduate degree from UC Berkeley and a handful of honorary doctorates, she insists that refugees and displaced persons have always been her best teachers. 

Sister Marilyn directs Mercy Beyond Borders, a nonprofit which forges ways for women and girls to learn, connect and lead in places of extreme poverty: in rural villages of South Sudan, Haiti, and Malawi, and in the refugee camps of Uganda and Kenya. She welcomes opportunities to speak at congregations and schools. Learn more at https://www.mercybeyondborders.org.

Photograph by Noella Nakabuye, East Africa Director, Mercy Beyond Borders.