History
The Sisters of Charity of Nazareth was founded in 1812. Mother Catherine Spalding, along with Bishop John Baptist Mary David, are honored together and remembered as co-founders of the Sisters of Charity of Nazareth. [1]
In 1812, in the newly formed diocese of Bardstown, Kentucky, Bishop Benedict Flaget was overwhelmed by the responsibility of providing religious education for the children of Catholic families who had migrated to Kentucky from Maryland after the Revolutionary War. In response to this need, Father John Baptist David, who had recently established St. Thomas Seminary, called for young women willing to devote their lives to the service of the Church. [2] From among a group of six women that responded to the call, nineteen-year-old Catherine Spalding, originally from Maryland, was elected first superior of the Congregation. Mother Catherine guided the young Congregation for forty-five years. [1]
The new community followed the rule of St. Vincent de Paul and their dwelling was named Nazareth. [3] The symbol of the congregation is the pelican feeding its young from its own body. The Sisters' spiritual formation and service to their neighbors steadily expanded on the Kentucky frontier and beyond.
Ministry
Their education ministry began in 1814 when the first school, Nazareth Academy, was opened at the motherhouse near Bardstown. Spalding founded Presentation Academy in Louisville, Kentucky, in 1831. The academy began to grant degrees in 1829.
Since the beginning years of the congregation, SCNs have been involved in a variety of ministries, responding to the needs of the times. In 1832, when Catherine Spalding brought home two orphans left on the wharf in Louisville, their social work ministry began. Pastoral ministry later emerged within the congregation as a distinct form of ministry after Vatican II as they followed the call of the Church to respond to the signs of the times.
In 1833, when cholera struck, SCNs nursed victims of the disease. So began their health care ministry, which continued as the sisters served in military hospitals during the Civil War. [4]
In 1920, the Sisters opened Nazareth College in Louisville, Kentucky's first, four-year, Catholic college for women. The Louisville and Nazareth campuses merged. and in 1969, the school was renamed Spalding College. Two years later, all instructional activity was moved to the Louisville campus. Former dorms on SCN's campus now function as affordable housing for the elderly and disabled. [4] In 1984, Spalding College became Spalding University.
Modern times
In 2000, the sisters apologized for the slaveholding past and erected a monument in memory of those who had suffered in their bondage. [5]
Founded as a diocesan community, they are now an international congregation, both in ministry and membership. As of 2018, 550 sisters were serving in 20 states in the U.S., in India, Nepal, Botswana, and Belize. [4]
They are committed to six priorities in ministry: promoting peace, promoting humanization of values, opposing racism, alleviating poverty, supporting women's issues and supporting environmental issues. Through their daily lives and ministries, in collaboration with their Associates and others, they are living out these priorities to meet the changing needs of today's world in their spirit of pioneering.
The Sisters of Mercy is a religious institute for women in the Roman Catholic Church. It was founded in 1831 in Dublin, Ireland, by Catherine McAuley. As of 2019, the institute has about 6200 sisters worldwide, organized into a number of independent congregations. They also started many education and health care facilities around the world.
Benjamin Joseph Webb was a Catholic editor, state senator for Kentucky, and historian.
The Sisters of Charity of Leavenworth is a Catholic religious institute based in Leavenworth, Kansas who follow in the tradition of Saints Vincent de Paul and Louise de Marillac. A member of the Sisters of Charity Federation in the Vincentian-Setonian Tradition, the order operates schools and hospitals in the United States and Peru. Members are denominated with the post-nominal letters SCL.
The Archdiocese of Louisville is a Latin Church ecclesiastical territory, or archdiocese, of the Catholic Church in central Kentucky in the United States. The cathedral church of the archdiocese is the Cathedral of the Assumption in Louisville, Kentucky. The archdiocese is the seat of the metropolitan see of the Province of Louisville, which encompasses the states of Kentucky and Tennessee. The archdiocese is the second-oldest diocese west of the Appalachian Mountains, after the Archdiocese of New Orleans. As of 2023, the archbishop of Louisville is Shelton Fabre.
The Diocese of Bardstown was a Latin Church Catholic diocese in the United States established in Bardstown, Kentucky on April 8, 1808, along with the Diocese of Boston, Diocese of New York, and Diocese of Philadelphia, comprising the former territory of the Diocese of Baltimore west of the Appalachian Mountains. The Diocese of Baltimore simultaneously became a metropolitan archdiocese with the four new sees as its suffragans. The title of the former Diocese of Bardstown changed to Diocese of Louisville with the transfer of its see from Bardstown to Louisville in 1841.
Spalding University is a private Catholic university in Louisville, Kentucky. It is affiliated with the Sisters of Charity of Nazareth.
Catherine Spalding, known as Mother Spalding, was an American educator who was a co-founder and longtime mother superior of the Sisters of Charity of Nazareth. She pioneered education, health services and social services for girls and orphans in Louisville and other Kentucky cities. On January 6, 2003, the Louisville Courier-Journal named Spalding as the only woman among sixteen "most influential people in Louisville/Jefferson County history."
The Sisters of Providence are a religious institute of Roman Catholic sisters founded in 1843 by Émilie Gamelin. They are headquartered in Montreal, Quebec with five provinces: Mother Joseph Province, Holy Angels Province, Philippines Vice-Province, Émilie-Gamelin Province and Bernard Morin Province.
Benedict Joseph Flaget was a French-born Catholic prelate who served as Bishop of Bardstown from 1808 to 1839. When the see was transferred to Louisville in 1839, he became Bishop of Louisville, remaining in the post from 1839 to 1850. He was a member of the Sulpicians.
The Sisters of Charity Federation in the Vincentian-Setonian Tradition is an organization of fourteen congregations of religious women in the Catholic Church who trace their lineage to Saint Elizabeth Seton, Saint Vincent de Paul, and Saint Louise de Marillac.
Bethlehem High School is a coeducational, Roman Catholic high school in Bardstown, Kentucky, United States. It is part of the Archdiocese of Louisville, and is one of only two coeducational high schools among the nine overseen by the archdiocese.
The Vincentian Sisters of Charity were an American religious congregation of Religious Sisters founded in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, in 1902 to serve the Slovak American immigrant population in Pennsylvania.
The Sisters of Charity of Cincinnati were founded in 1852 by Mother Margaret Farrell George, by the separation of the community from the Sisters of Charity in Emmitsburg, Maryland. the motherhouse of the community is at Mount Saint Joseph, Ohio.
Martin John Spalding was an American Catholic prelate who served as Archbishop of Baltimore from 1864 to 1872. He previously served as Bishop of Louisville from 1850 to 1864. He advocated aid for freed slaves following the American Civil War. Spalding attended the First Vatican Council, where he first opposed, and then supported, a dogmatic proclamation of papal infallibility.
John Lancaster Spalding was an American Catholic author, poet, advocate for higher education, the first Bishop of Peoria from 1877 to 1908. He was also a co-founder of The Catholic University of America.
John Baptist Mary David, S.S., was a French-born prelate of the Roman Catholic Church in the United States. He served as bishop of the Diocese of Bardstown in Kentucky from 1832-33.
The Sisters of Charity of St. Augustine, a Roman Catholic religious congregation of women, have served health, education and social service needs in the Diocese of Cleveland, Ohio, since 1851.
Nazareth is an unincorporated community and a historic site in Nelson County, Kentucky, United States, located about three miles north of Bardstown. The zipcode is: 40048.
St. Thomas–St. Vincent Orphanage was an orphanage located in Anchorage, Kentucky, best known for allegations of child sexual and physical abuse by one priest, seven nuns, and five laymen, between the 1930s and 1970s. It opened with the merger of St. Thomas Orphanage and St. Vincent Orphanage in 1955 and closed in 1983 as a result of rising costs and increased government services for orphans.
Barbara "Mary Lucy" Dosh was a Catholic sister in the order of the Sisters of Nazareth. She was a volunteer nurse in Western Kentucky during the American Civil War, caring for both Union troops and Confederate prisoners of war, and died in the course of duty from typhoid fever. In 2012, the United States Congress passed a resolution honoring Dosh's nursing care given to both Union and Confederate soldiers.
