The Daily Missoulian. [volume] (Missoula, Mont.) 1904-1961, 1913-04-27
Modern Women
xxxIIi.-WOMEN AND RELIGION.
BY Frederic J. Haskin.

III ~ 10 T10SNIUs |
have been active in many beneficent
works from colonial days. The
founder of the order of the Sisters of
Charity and it's first superioress was
Elizabeth A. Seton, a convert to Ca
tholicism. In 1911 her little band to-
Gated in st. Joseph's Valley, Maryland,
n a copy Of the regulations used
for the Daughters of Charity, founded
by st. Vincent de Paul, was procured
from France for their guidance. At
the time she established this institu-
ton, Mrs. Seton was a young widow
with children. She did not in any
way neglect her duties as a mother
to her w family, even when engag-
ing in a broader work and
ments were always made in full recog-
milton of the obligations she bore to
them. The founder of Georgetown
Convent in Georgetown, D. c., which
was the first Visitation house in
America, vas Miss Alice Labor, after
ward known as Mother Teresa. She
was born in Ireland but came to Amer
lea in 1874 with her sister, who had
married an American merchant. On
the vessel she became acquainted with
Mrs. McDermott and Mrs. Sharpe and
the three decided that they were called
upon to go into clustered life. They
landed in Philadelphia and chose. as
their spiritual director, Father Neale,
who long had dreamed of establishing
a community. When Father Neale
became president of Georgetown COL
lege, he established these three women
temporarily with the Poor Clares,''
some religious women driven by per-
%secution from France, who were vainly
trying to establish a school, as a means
of support. Their rules We're so rig
orous and their poverty so extreme
that few scholars applied. At first
Alice Labor and her friends boarded
in this conven and taught, but soon
it was apparent hat the rule of s..
Glare requiring the. women to go bare.
footed was so austere as to be un-
suited to the needs of the community,
so Father Neale established them in a
house. This was the. beginning Of
the Convent School of the Visitation
in which so many of the most dis.
tinguished women of the country have
been educated during the past century.
There was considerable difficulty
about placing the institution Under
visitation rules because the founders
had not been members Of a religious
order, but after Father Neale became
c%oadjutor to Archbishop Carroll he re-
solved to admit the sisters to simple
vows. When he bee anne archbishop
himself, in 1915, he admitted the old
est sisters to solemn ows, and the es-
Establishment Of the institution was
complete.
Mother Hardey is another Catholic
woman whose work had a great in
%fluence upon the educational develop
ment of the country. She was born in
Louisiana and took her first vows in
the Order of the Sacred Heart in 1925,
when only 16 years old, and at hat
early age she assisted in the estab-
lishment of a convent in an adjoining
parish which, by 1882, contained over
200 inmates. During his year the
Asiatic cholera ragged in Louisiana and
the convent was destroyed as a part
of it's ravages, although Mother Har-
dey stood at her post until the place
was closed by orders of the. church.
She was then ordered to go north as
superior of the convent of New York.
She assisted in the founding of the
orders in Halifax, Nova Scotia, Buff
falo and New York, n in 1846 es-
tablished a convent in Philadelphia. "A
year later she established a school in
that city known as Eden Hall, which
she entrusted to Mother Tucker. In
1852, Mother Hardey opened a free
Catholic school in New York for the
instruction of poo children. In 1863
she went to Cuba and established a
school for girls. During all of these
activities she was still superior of the
convent of New York, located at Nam
h%attanville. In 1855, there was some
, talk of replacing her with another SUI
perior but Archbishop McCloskey of
New York disapproved so strongly of
this that a promise was secured from
Mother Barat, the head of the order
in France, that she would never with
draw Mother Harley from connection
with Manhattanville.
At the time of the Chicago fire,
Mother Hardey organized bazaars in
each of the 25 institutions under her
direction, and sent the proceeds.
amounting to thousands of dollars, to
be distributed among the sufferers.
After this she was sent to Paris to
give Mother Goetz the benefit of her
business judgment. Upon Mother
Goetz' death she was sent back to
| America to attend to business matters
connected with the Manhattanville
! property. At this time she estab-
lished the Tabernacle society in con-
nection with the Sodality Of the Chill
dren of Mary. In 1876, she was sent
to visit the converts of Spain. After