The Franciscan Handmaids of the Most Pure Heart of Mary are a predominantly African-American religious congregation of Roman Catholic women founded by Elizabeth Williams in 1916. They follow the Rule of the Third Order of St. Francis.
Their primary mission has always been education, primarily of children of the African-American community.
Elizabeth Williams was born February 11, 1868, in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. She received her education from the "Ladies of the Sacred Heart" and from the Sisters of the Holy Family, second oldest society of African-American religious in the United States.
At 19, Williams entered the Sisters of Saint Francis Convent in Louisiana. When that order disbanded in 1912, she entered the novitiate of the Oblate Sisters of Providence in Baltimore where she was received as a novice and given the name, Sister Mary Theodore.
In 1915, while working at Trinity College in Washington, she learned that Father Ignatius Lissner, provincial of the Fathers of the Society of African Missions, needed a religious to found a congregation of black sisters in Savannah. [1]
A bill in the Georgia Legislature proposed to forbid white teachers from instructing black children. It threatened the closure of joint schools founded by Father Lissner in Georgia and staffed by Franciscan Sisters of the Immaculate Conception. When two African-American congregations, the Oblate Sisters of Providence and the Holy Family Sisters, could supply no help, Lissner decided to form a new one. On October 15, 1916, Elizabeth Williams received the habit of the new order and took the name of Mother Mary Theodore.
The bill never passed, but the Sisters found little support in Georgia. They taught by day and, to supplement their meagre earnings, ran a laundry business at night and begged along the waterfront on weekends. [2] Thus the sisters decided in 1924 to move the motherhouse of the congregation to the Harlem in northern Manhattan, where it remains. [3]
By 1925, there were sixteen members, eventually including women from the West Indies. In 1930, Mother Theodore had the congregation enrolled in the Franciscan family as members of the Third Order Regular, thus becoming the Franciscan Handmaids of the Most Pure Heart of Mary. During the Depression, the Sisters established a soup kitchen.
Mother Theodore died in New York in August 1931.
From 1952 to 2003 the sisters ran a summer camp on Staten Island, providing summer getaways for thousands of youth from New York City and North and South Carolina. [2]
At its height in the 1960s, the congregation counted 80 Sisters. As of 2010, there were 18 Sisters, mostly age sixty or older. [4] In 2014, the order's closing was anticipated, but encouraged by Pope Francis, the sisters extended their outreach to other parts of the United States, the Caribbean, and Africa. In 2016, there were nine sisters in formation. [5]
The sisters continue to operate St. Benedict’s Day Nursery. Founded in 1923, at the request of Patrick Cardinal Hayes, it celebrated its 85th anniversary in 2008. Initially providing custodial care, it became one of the first pre-school educational programs in the United States.
The St. Edward Food Pantry is one of the ministries of The Franciscan Handmaids of Mary. The order has operated a food pantry on Staten Island since 1928. The Food Pantry collects food, clothing, gifts and toys for distribution during the Christmas season. In recognition of its outstanding accomplishments in the fight against hunger, the St. Edward Food Pantry was awarded the Kathy Goldman Beyond Food Award at the 15th Annual Food Bank of New York Conference in 2006.[ citation needed ]
Théodore Guérin, designated by the Vatican as Saint Theodora, and born Anne-Thérèse Guérin, was a French-American saint and the foundress of the Sisters of Providence of Saint Mary-of-the-Woods, a congregation of Catholic sisters at Saint Mary-of-the-Woods, Indiana. Pope John Paul II beatified Guérin on 25 October 1998, and Pope Benedict XVI canonized her a Saint of the Roman Catholic Church on 15 October 2006. Guérin's feast day is 3 October, although some calendars list it in the Roman Martyrology as 14 May, her day of death.
The Sisters, Servants of the Immaculate Heart of Mary (I.H.M.) is a Catholic religious institute of sisters, founded by Fr Louis Florent Gillet, CSsR, and a co-founder of the Oblate Sister of Providence, Mother Theresa Maxis Duchemin, in 1845.
The Franciscan Missionaries of Mary are a Roman Catholic religious institute founded by Mother Mary of the Passion at Ootacamund, then British India, in 1877. The Missionaries form an international religious congregation of women representing 79 nationalities spread over 74 countries on five continents.
Sisters of St. Francis may refer to:
The Third Order of Saint Francis, is a third order in the Franciscan order. The preaching of Francis of Assisi, as well as his example, exercised such an attraction on people that many married men and women wanted to join the First Order (friars) or the Second Order (nuns), but this being incompatible with their state of life, Francis found a middle way and in 1221 gave them a rule according to the Franciscan charism. Those following this rule became members of the Franciscan Third Order, sometimes called tertiaries. It includes religious congregations of men and women, known as Third Order Regulars; and fraternities of men and women, Third Order Seculars. The latter do not wear a religious habit, take vows, or live in community. However, they do gather together in community on a regular basis. "They make profession to live out the Gospel life and commit themselves to that living out the Gospel according to the example of Francis."
The Oblate Sisters of Providence is a Roman Catholic women's religious institute, founded by Mother Mary Elizabeth Lange, OSP, and Rev. James Nicholas Joubert, SS in 1828 in Baltimore, Maryland for the education of girls of African descent. It was the first permanent community of Roman Catholic sisters of African descent in the United States. The Oblate Sisters were free women of color who sought to provide Baltimore's African American population with education and "a corps of teachers from its own ranks." The congregation is also a member of the Women of Providence in Collaboration.
Mary Lange, O.S.P. (1784-1882), born Elizabeth Clarisse Lange, was an Black Catholic religious sister who founded the Oblate Sisters of Providence, the first African-American religious congregation. She was also, via the Oblates, the first-ever African-American Mother Superior.
Reverend James Mary Hector Nicholas Joubert de la Muraille, of the Society of Saint-Sulpice, was born in France, on September 6, 1777. A teacher at St. Mary's Seminary in Baltimore, he co-founded the Oblate Sisters of Providence along with Mother Mary Lange. He died in 1843.
The Sisters of St. Francis of Penance and Christian Charity is a Roman Catholic religious congregation for women. A third order secular group, the sisters are not cloistered nuns but active in the world, having historically been primarily involved in teaching, although they have participated in the care of the sick and poor, hospital work, mission work, and other activities.
The Reverend Ignatius F. Lissner, S.M.A. (1867–1948) was a French-born Catholic priest who was instrumental in developing the ministry of the Catholic Church in the United States to the African American population. He established there the missionary society to which he belonged, the Society of African Missions. He was called the "Apostle of the Negro" at the time of his death.
St. Francis Xavier Church is a Black Catholic parish in Baltimore, Maryland.
The Sisters of Mary Reparatrix are a religious institute of women in the Catholic Church which was founded in France in 1857. Their way of life has been to combine adoration of God with the evangelization of society, especially for women.
Mary Ignatius Hayes, O.S.F., also known as Mother Mary Ignatius of Jesus, was an Anglican religious sister who was later received into the Catholic Church and became a Franciscan sister. Her lifetime of religious service, in the course of which she traveled widely, led to the establishment of three separate religious congregations of Franciscan sisters and the establishment of the Poor Clare nuns in the United States.
Franciscan Sisters of Baltimore were the American members of a Roman Catholic religious congregation of women founded in the London suburb of Mill Hill, England, in 1868. Connected to the Society of Mill Hill Missionaries from the time of their founding, they were committed to serving the needy of the world. Members of the congregation came to the United States in 1881, where they were the first white religious order dedicated to serve the African-American population of Baltimore. The United States Province merged with an American congregation of Franciscan Sisters in 2001.
Honorat Koźmiński, born Florentyn Wacław Koźmiński, was a Polish priest and professed member from the Order of Friars Minor Capuchin who went on to establish sixteen religious congregations. He was a teacher before reinvigorating clandestine religious orders that the Russian Empire had suppressed during their occupation of Poland. He collaborated with a number of individuals in this venture and he publicised the Third Order of Saint Francis to people.
Mother Mary Elizabeth Williams, F.H.M. was an American Black Catholic nun who founded the Franciscan Handmaids of Mary in 1916.