Catholic Sisters Week is an annual celebration of the ways that women who have devoted their lives to God show that devotion in the world. This year’s celebration took place during March 8-14. Since CLINIC’s RIS section assists many sisters with obtaining visas to the U.S., it’s important for us to reflect on the roles that sisters play in American society.

A sister is a woman who has made vows to God – of poverty, chastity, and obedience – and helps society in realms like education, medical work, or activism. A nun, in contrast, takes vows and lives a more private life within a cloister, serving society through her life of prayer.

Sisters have been active in what is now the United States since 1727, when the Ursulines, an order of sisters from France, opened a girls’ school in New Orleans that is still operating. In 1867, a French-Canadian religious order, the Sisters of St. Anne, opened their first school in New York state. Soon, the Sisters of St. Anne had schools throughout the northeast.

During the Civil War, many orders of sisters provided nursing care on both sides of the battle lines. There is even a monument to “The Nuns of the Battlefield” in front of Washington, D.C.’s St. Matthew’s Cathedral. In the early 20th century, a daughter of renowned American writer, Nathaniel Hawthorne, became a sister and founded a religious order to care for cancer patients. The Dominican Sisters of Hawthorne care for “Christ’s sick poor,” in the words of their website, to this day.

While many Americans have encountered sisters in medical fields, others have encountered them in educational institutions. I personally was blessed as a student at the University of Notre Dame to know sisters who worked in administration or lived with female students in our dorms. They were like our dorm mothers – we could turn to them with any challenges we faced in navigating young adult life. My own children have been blessed by the influence of sisters on their lives as they have attended schools in California and Virginia administered by Dominican orders.

In the past 60 years, some orders of sisters have served society through their activism against social ills like racism, poverty, and abuse of the environment. Many of these sisters also have sought to protect the dignity of immigrants in the United States, while others have given their lives to assist oppressed people outside the United States, such as the Maryknoll Sisters who were killed during the Salvadoran Civil War in 1980.

Whatever their role and purpose in the world – what sisters call their “charism” – sisters see themselves and their ministries as embodiments of the values and ethics preached by Jesus.

More information about Catholic Sisters Week can be found here.

Excellent articles about the impact of religious sisters on women’s history and American history can be found at National Catholic Reporter and America Magazine.