She looks at each piece with great care and tells Father Rod to take photos of all of them. “Incredible paintings,” she says. “No duds here.” Bill has a series of three grape paintings that he has just completed. After careful study, she describes the mood of each: “Serene, passionate and dreamy.” She asks which one is my favorite and I point to the “dreamy” one.

A friend had just told me that our new digital camera, recently purchased and never used, takes short movie segments. So I try my hand and manage to get a few short clips of Sister Wendy and Bill. My favorite part of the video is when she faces the camera head-on and says, “It’s so wonderful to have Susan so completely entered into your vision, because when you have to drag along a reluctant partner, it makes all the difference. You need her.”

“You see, Susan,” she says over a cup of tea later that day, “my life is very simple. I wear the same thing and I eat the same food [leftover vegetables] every day. This frees all my time for prayer and creativity.” She explains that she owns two habits, and she is wearing the “good one,” which has many patches. Her pockets are like two saddlebags; she removes the contents and carefully arranges them on our kitchen table to show us: a tiny wooden icon that opens to reveal three portraits of the Madonna, a larger holy painting on wood, a tiny Buddha in a case from Tibet. “I can get through security without a problem because my pockets are deep,” she says.

“She doesn’t miss a trick,” Father Steve says. “Oh, yes, and she has very definite opinions and does not back down. She knows who she is and what she wants.”

The following morning at the Duomo, she says to Father Rod, “I want you to tip the wheelchair so I can see the frescoes on the ceiling.”

“Yes, dear,” he responds, and she laughs.

To see movie clips of Sister Wendy at the Kelleys’ and more examples of Bill Kelley’s work, go to www.williamjkelley.com.