Marianne Cope, TOSF, also known as Saint Marianne of Molokaʻi, was a German-born American religious sister who was a member of the Sisters of St Francis of Syracuse, New York, and founding leader of its St. Joseph's Hospital in the city, among the first of 50 general hospitals in the country. Known also for her charitable works, in 1883 she relocated with six other sisters to Hawaiʻi to care for persons suffering leprosy on the island of Molokaʻi and aid in developing the medical infrastructure in Hawaiʻi. Despite direct contact with the patients over many years, Cope did not contract the disease.
Giustino Russolillo, SDV - in religious Giustino Maria della SS. Trinità - was an Italian Catholic priest and the founder of the Vocationist Fathers, the Vocationist Sisters and of the Secular Institute of the Apostles of Universal Sanctification.
Maria Elizabeth Hesselblad, OSsS, was a Swedish religious sister who founded a new, active, branch of the Bridgettine order in the Roman Catholic Church, known as the "Bridgettine Sisters". Hesselblad is recognised as a Righteous Among the Nations due to her efforts in World War II saving the lives of Jews during the genocide of the Holocaust.
Pauline of the Agonizing Heart of Jesus, C.I.I.C., was an immigrant from Austria-Hungary to Brazil, who became the foundress of the Congregation of the Little Sisters of the Immaculate Conception, religious sisters who serve the poor. She became the first female Brazilian to be proclaimed a saint by the Catholic Church, when she was canonized on 19 May 2002 by Pope John Paul II. Pauline suffered from diabetes for much of her life and is considered an "unofficial" patron saint of diabetics.
Mary Frances Schervier, TOSF was the founder of two religious congregations of religious sisters of the Third Order Regular of St. Francis, both committed to serving the neediest of the poor. One, the Poor Sisters of St. Francis, is based in her native Germany, and the other, the Franciscan Sisters of the Poor, was later formed from its province in the United States. She was beatified by the Catholic Church in 1974.
The Sisters of Christian Charity (S.C.C.), officially called Sisters of Christian Charity, Daughters of the Blessed Virgin Mary of the Immaculate Conception, is a Roman Catholic women's congregation of pontifical right founded in Paderborn, Germany, on 21 August 1849 by Blessed Pauline von Mallinckrodt. Their original mission was caring for impoverished and abandoned children, with a special emphasis on the blind. Today, they work in a variety of ministries.
Maria Luise Merkert was a German Roman Catholic professed religious and the co-foundress of the Sisters of Saint Elizabeth. Merkert worked to help those in need including the poor and ill and tended to them with her older sister until her sudden death and the death of her other companions - this left Merkert alone to found and maintain her order as its first Superior General from 1859 until her death.
Teresa Jornet Ibars, also known as Saint Teresa of Jesus, was a Spanish Catholic professed religious and the founder of the Little Sisters of the Abandoned Elderly. Ibars was the great-niece of Francisco Palau and a friend and confidante of Saturnino López Novoa. Her dedication to the old and ill was noted, and her sisters' work in Spain and later abroad.
Francis Mary of the Cross Jordan, SDS, was a German Catholic priest and the founder of the Society of the Divine Savior, commonly called the Salvatorians. He was beatified by Pope Francis on May 15, 2021.
Giulia Salzano was an Italian Roman Catholic professed religious and the founder of the Catechetical Sisters of the Sacred Heart of Jesus (1905). Salzano served as a teacher prior to becoming a religious and since 1865 worked in Casoria as a teacher for children where she demonstrated herself as an apt catechist and instructor.
Rafaela Ybarra Arambarri de Vilallonga is a Spanish Roman Catholic widow and the founder of the Sisters of the Holy Guardian Angels. Vilallonga was part of Bilbao's upper-class and she mothered seven children with her husband José Vilallonga.
Małgorzata Szewczyk, also known by her religious name Łucja, was a Polish religious sister and the foundress of the Daughters of the Sorrowful Mother of God – or "Seraphic Sisters"; she was also a member of the Third Order of Saint Francis. Her life was dedicated to the care of ill people and she even spent a long period to that end in Israel and Palestine before returning to her native Poland where she became a close collaborator of Honorat Kozminski. Her initiatives to aid the poor and those in need included tending to elder women in her apartments or in going to hospitals and in the streets to help those that needed her charitable assistance.
Maria Theresia Bonzel, born Regina Christine Wilhelmine Bonzel, was a German religious sister. She was the founder of the Sisters of Saint Francis of Perpetual Adoration. By the time of her death, the congregation had sisters all over the world, and had established schools, hospitals, and orphanages.
Maria Giuseppa Rossello was an Italian religious sister who founded the Daughters of Our Lady of Mercy. She has been declared a saint by the Catholic Church.
Maria Katharina Kasper – born Katharina but in religion known as Schwester / sister Maria – was a German Roman Catholic religious sister and the founder of the Poor Handmaids of Jesus Christ. Kasper entered the religious life later in her life despite having harbored a desire to become a religious sister for a very long time. It did not materialize earlier due to aggravating circumstances such as the Kaspers' poor economic status and the deaths of both a brother and her father. Her dedication to the poor and the will was noted during the course of her life and she dedicated herself to this work with great zeal.
Alodie-Virginie Paradis, PSSF, also known as Élodie Paradis, was a Canadian Roman Catholic nun who established the Little Sisters of the Holy Family in 1880. It was dedicated to the domestic needs in the field of education across Canada while members embarked on the process of sanctifying themselves by private vows. She took the name of Marie-Léonie after she became a nun.
María Dolores Rodríguez Sopeña was a Spanish Roman Catholic nun and the founder of the Sisters of the Catechetical Institute. Her religious activism came about from her earliest experiences in Almería where she tended to the poor including a leper though she later moved to Madrid and Puerto Rico where she continued her care for the poor and the sick. Her return to her native land saw her continue her work and her commitment to establishing religious and secular movements for others all directed towards active participation and care for poor people.
Giuditta Vannini – also known as Giuseppina – was an Italian Roman Catholic nun who became a Camillian. Together with Luigi Tezza she established the religious congregation known as the Daughters of Saint Camillus. She and her two siblings were orphaned as children and were placed in different homes; she was raised and educated in Rome under nuns where her vocation to the religious life was strengthened. Vannini later tried joining a religious order but was forced to leave during her novitiate period after suffering from ill health. She and Tezza met in 1891 and founded a religious congregation of which Vannini served as Superior General until her death while Tezza was exiled to Peru around 1900.
Clelia Merloni was an Italian Roman Catholic nun and the founder of the Apostles of the Sacred Heart of Jesus. Merloni was destined to follow her father into the business world but renounced his anti-religious sentiment and instead went down the religious path. Internal complications led to Merloni's fall from grace and she went into self-imposed exile where she received a dispensation to break from her religious vows. She later rejoined the congregation as a nun not long before her death.
Emma Üffing - in religion Maria Euthymia - was a German Roman Catholic professed religious from the Clemens Sisters. Üffing was born to humble farmers and worked as an apprentice in home management until she decided to enter the religious life in the interwar period - she assumed her religious name in honor of a nun she once knew.
