Sisters of Selma

The Franciscan Sisters of Mary

The Sisters of St. Joseph  of  Carondelet

The Sisters of Loretto

The Sisters of St. Joseph of Rochester

The Sisters of Charity of the Blessed Virgin Mary


1812

Founded in Loretto, Kentucky, the Sisters of Loretto at the Foot of the Cross, was the first wholly American sisterhood.  In covered wagon and stagecoach, the sisters joined with the pioneers to bring Christian education to the children of the rugged frontier towns, coming as far west as Denver.  They derived their strength from prayer and from living "in community." 

Through the teachings of Vatican II, they gained a new understanding of their vocation.  Mary Luke Tobin, head of the Sisters of Loretto was one of a handful of women, and the only one from America, present as auditors.  She was at the 3rd and 4th sessions of the Council (1964 & 1965) and was assigned to the commission in charge of drafting the Gaudium et Spes (The Church in the Modern World). To all men and women religious in America, particularly the sisters of Loretto, it was "a clear call for the vigorous engagement of the church with and inside of history."  


March 9, 1965:

When Father Francis Doyle, executive secretary of the St. Louis Archdiocesan Commission on Human Rights, proposed the trip to Selma, one of the first to join him was Father John Shocklee of a St. Louis parish.  He offered to bring with him the two Sisters of Loretto who lived in an inner city apartment with some of their students.

Sister Ann Christopher (Therese Stawowy) was teaching undergraduate sociology at a Loretto College in Webster Groves, Missouri, and Sister Christine Mary (Christine Nava) was the librarian. 

Sister Ann Christopher's students were studying how children "in a disadvantaged area live and learn."  They supervised homework assigned to the children by the Jesuit school.   These children were mostly African American.  Their families knew and believed in Rev. Martin Luther King's work.  Since they didn't have the means to go to Selma, the sisters went as their representatives.
In Selma, they marched with many young African Americans like those they knew in St. Louis.  They feared for the young people because both their own leader and the SCLC leadership made it very clear that "an element of physical danger exists."  After all, Jimmie Lee Jackson had died after being beaten by a state trooper, and Reverend James Reeb, attacked by segregationists, was fighting for his life.  

The sisters would get a crash course in the methods of non-violent protest.  From the young Blacks, they learned not to talk back, just listen.


photo: Pictures Staff Photographer
It was dark by the time they returned to St. Louis that Wednesday, but they were still singing.  

The freedom songs they had learned in Selma continued to bind the people of different faiths and Christian denominations.

In the following weeks, the sisters received letters of congratulation and criticism.  The latter kind, though racist and virulent, had a certain sadness.  They accused the sisters of not understanding either the South or "the needs of the Negro."  One correspondent suggested that the "Southern Negro needed an education, not the vote."  Another bemoaned the loss of her own daughter to "negro men, midgets, drunkards, hoboes, Italians, Jews, and  illegitimates."  Another asked about their appearance in a political demonstration, "Does the Vatican approve?"  All but one were anonymous.  Clearly these were people whose world was changing around them--and they were being left behind.

Among those who wrote in support of the sisters were white professionals and black Catholics.  One of several nuns who wrote, was from Colorado.  She said to Sister Christine Mary:

I have the privilege of working with the Spanish-Americans in Pueblo Catechetical Center...I 'd love to see you and discuss many things with you.
A young woman from the Philippines wrote that she had been particularly struck by a phrase Sister Ann Christopher had used to explain to a reporter why she was there: 
We must help all to recognize the Christlikeness in each person...the best way to demonstrate this belief was by my bodily presence which is a language which speaks to all men.

40 Years Later... 

In the end, both Therese Stawowy and Christine Nava left the religious life to marry and Christine raised a family of her own.  Perhaps this was possible because they could remain co-members of the "Loretto Community."  The name Loretto Community incorporates the two types of membership in Loretto: sisters who make public profession of vows and co-members who affiliate with the spirit and mission of the community. 
Therese believes that it was the quality of education offered by the Loretto Academy in Kansas City that attracted young women to the order.  In the 1940s, taking vows seemed just a step in a rewarding career.  In the Loretto nuns she saw role models, and an extension of the values she was taught at home.  Her father had customers of every race and creed in his Kansas City butcher shop.  Her mother's factory co-workers also came from many ethnic backgrounds.  Loretto Academy was the first school to integrate in Kansas City, and did so voluntarily.
When Therese left the order in 1968, it was to enter a life which didn't seem very different.  She married a teacher who had left his Jesuit order and had the same interests and values as herself.  Together they remained committed to social justice and service.  Christine left before she did and many others left around that time.  In Therese's opinion, the decrees of Vatican II had validated their urge to fulfill their mission outside the structure of the religious life.

My trip to Selma has had a lifetime effect.
It has made me a lot stronger in my faith-- 
and in my faith in people.

Therese Stawowy

 

sources: The Transformation of American Catholic Sisters by Lora Quinonez & Mary Turner (1992)
Sisters in Crisis by Ann Carey (1997)

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