- July 1, 2026 Sister Stories
Sister Ann Landers offers a calming presence to visitors at Kansas City Hospice House in Kansas City, Missouri, at a time that can be one of life’s most vulnerable.
The moment you step through the doors of Kansas City Hospice House, something shifts. There’s a peaceful stillness to this place. Many other visitors have paused, reflecting that same, “I feel peace here.”
And then, at the center of the entryway, behind the front desk, you see Sister Ann Landers.
Sister Ann volunteers at Kansas City Hospice House every other Wednesday afternoon and every Saturday morning. Her role, in official terms, is front desk greeter. But that title barely begins to describe all that she offers. She is, in her own words, “a presence” — and for visitors arriving at one of the most vulnerable moments of their lives, that presence is its own form of ministry.
Sister Ann came to Kansas City Hospice House in an almost unplanned way. A fellow parishioner of hers had a sister named Sue, who was a patient there. One Tuesday in September 2022, Sister Ann came to visit Sue, sat with her quietly, and felt something stir. “I thought, I could do that,” she recalls, referring to the greeter welcoming her and guiding her to Sue’s room. “I had never thought about it before.” She spoke to the volunteer coordinator, took a card and said she would pray about it. When she came back to visit Sue that Friday, the decision was made. She officially began her new role a few months later in December.
Before Sister Ann ever sat down at the front desk, she carefully thought about what to say to the visitors. “I thought, the typical response is ‘How are you?’ and it’s fine,” she says. “But the people coming in to visit their family and friends are not fine.”
So, she settled on “Hello,” “May I help you find someone?” or “Do you know the room they are in?” “I think that’s the most appropriate welcome here. I never say, ‘How are you?’”
This deliberate choice of words may seem like a small thing, but it reflects a deeper attentiveness that runs through everything Sister Ann does. She reads people. She knows when someone needs to get to the room immediately and when they need someone to talk to, even if they don’t quite know it themselves.
One afternoon, a man came to the desk to sign out. He was sighing heavily. Sister Ann asked if he’d like to sit down. He took a chair nearby and talked for a long time. Another day, a woman arrived in a navy sweatshirt dotted with sparkly flowers. Sister Ann mentioned it. The woman said her mother had loved flowers, and that’s why she always wore that shirt when she came. “I asked if she’d like to talk about her mom,” says Sister Ann. “And she did.”
Nancy, an administrative assistant who works at the front desk for staff, has watched Sister Ann in action for years. “She has a good feel,” Nancy shares, “for whether someone is on a mission to get to the room or whether they might have a moment to look around. She’s very good about showing people the features of the house where they can get soup or a snack. She has good instincts for meeting people where they are.”
Sister Ann brings more than warmth to those she greets. She brings 25 years of experience in end-of-life care, including many years as a caregiver with CSJ Care, a former home care ministry of the Sisters of St. Joseph. In that time, she learned what most of us never know: how to read the final signs, what families most need to hear and how to offer comfort without overstepping.
One of the most important things she shares with families is that hearing is the last sense to go. Even when a loved one appears completely unresponsive, they can still hear. Sister Ann tells them gently, “This is the time to say, ‘We’ll be okay. We love you. It’s okay to go.’ Those words give people permission to let go.”
For Sister Ann, the hospice house is a holy place. “It’s holy ground for me because I see the care that people get here.” Early in her time there, a gap in cleaning services led the volunteer coordinator to ask for help with basic upkeep. On her Saturday morning shift, Sister Ann dusted the blinds, the living room and the common areas. Something shifted in her during those quiet hours. “I was taking care of this place as if it were my own,” she says. “I think that’s part of why I feel the way I do about it.”
She speaks of the staff with deep respect — the nurses she's seen at bedsides, the chef who makes soup each day for families who can't bring themselves to leave. She shares about the labyrinth in the garden, which she has walked herself and recommends to visitors. She also makes sure visitors know about the special amenities available, including the interfaith chapel, the family dining room and the cot that can be rolled into a patient's room so a spouse or child can sleep nearby.
“Hospice ministry is a calling,” she says. And she would say the same to anyone considering volunteering at a hospice house: this work finds the people it needs. What it asks of you is not toughness, but steadiness. Not answers, but presence. The willingness to sit beside someone in their grief and not try to fix it — just to be there, to offer a kind word, to show them where the soup is, to walk them gently down the hall.
That is what Sister Ann Landers does each week, at the center of the entryway of the Kansas City Hospice House. It is not a small thing. For the people who walk through those doors, it may be the first moment of peace they have felt all day.