Mary MacKillop 1842 - 1909

Mary MacKillop, the eldest of eight children, was born in Melbourne in 1842 to recently arrived migrants, Alexander and Flora MacKillop, nee MacDonald. Her family was poor and as a child she endured much hardship.  She wanted to be a nun, but, while still very young, had to go to work to help support her family. At eighteen, when she had a position as a governess at Penola in South Australia, she met Father Julian Woods. At his bishop’s request, he was trying to establish Catholic schools in his very large parish, but with little success.  She offered to assist him once she was free from family commitments and so in 1866 at twenty four, she became co-founder with him of the Sisters of St Joseph, a religious order of women whose mission was to teach poor children and educate and care for needy people of all ages.

She was professed as a Sister of St Joseph on August 15th, 1867.  In 1867, she moved to Adelaide where Father Woods was now Director of Catholic Education.  She and her companions began wearing the Josephite religious habit and teaching the children of poor families.  The work spread rapidly. Priests from city and country areas asked Mary to send sisters to open schools for them. In 1868, she and the sisters opened a Refuge for young women recently released from prison, an orphanage and a House of Providence as a home for older women, especially the frail aged. Within four years there were 130 sisters working in more than forty schools and charitable institutions in South Australia and Queensland.

Some Bishops and priests could not understand the Sisters’ way of life and tried to have them change it. Mary believed that God was calling her to live according to the rule of life she had adopted when she made her vows and felt she could not change. Consequently Bishop Sheil excommunicated her in 1871 from the Church and tried to disband the sisters. He soon regretted his action, removed the sentence after five months and allowed the sisters to reassemble and resume their good work. 
 
At thirty-one Mary travelled to Rome to present the Rule for papal approval. Roman authorities made major changes regarding the way the sisters should live poverty. Father Woods could not accept these changes and he and Mary became estranged.

During this time the Order expanded to the dioceses of Bathurst and Queensland. The local bishops refused to accept that Mary governed the Order from Adelaide. With deep regret shewithdrew the sisters from these places. As a result, the Order expanded into New South Wales and New Zealand. 

In 1883 the Bishop of Adelaide ordered Mary to go to Sydney because he did not wish to lose control of the sisters in his diocese. This move pained her deeply but she never lost her faithand trust that she and the Order were in God’s hands. 

In 1885 the Archbishop of Sydney declared that she could no longer be superior general of the Order and appointed another sister to that position. Fourteen years later, in 1899, she was re-elected Superior General. She suffered a stroke in 1902 and died in North Sydney on 8 August 1909, aged 67 years. She was beatified by Pope John Paul II on 19 January 1995.

God’s Will was her guiding light and she believed that the Sisters of St Joseph should never see an evil without trying to do something about it.