This article first appeared in the St. Louis Beacon, Oct. 13, 2011 - Enthusiastic party hosts sometimes claim that they've invited "everyone they know."
The Sisters of St. Joseph of Carondelet have gone beyond that. They are inviting what they term the "dear neighbors" whom they've never met.
Two interstate billboards invite the public to a reception Oct. 15 from 1 to 4 p.m. at 6400 Minnesota Ave. in south city's Carondelet neighborhood.
The party celebrates the 175th anniversary of arrival of six sisters from Lyon, France. Three of the sisters were the first in the region qualified to teach the deaf.
Over the past dozen years, the nuns have rehabbed and polished the more than 100 rooms in the historic, red brick motherhouse on a Mississippi River bluff. A motherhouse is the provincial headquarters of a Catholic religious female order.
Saturday's reception includes tours of the first floor of the 130,000-square-foot building's seven wings completed by 1891 and of its nearby 1899 chapel. Both have been completely restored, often with environmentally sensitive materials. The entire campus with its brick pathways and gardens is listed as a National Historic Landmark. Scenes in the 1993 "King of the Hill" were shot there.
The sisters mailed printed invitations to people on their partnership, donors, family and Christmas cards lists. For weeks, many have carried around post card-size invitations to hand to former students, fellow volunteers and board members at a host of St. Louis places where they now serve.
Sisters of St. Joseph teach at the three area schools that their community began at the Carondelet building; they continue to sponsor Fontbonne University, now in Clayton, St. Joseph Academy, now in Frontenac and St. Joseph School for the Deaf, now in Chesterfield. The sisters also co-sponsor the Nazareth Living Center in South County.
At one time Sisters of St. Joseph taught at and were principals of 58 parish schools in the St. Louis Archdiocese. Today Rosati-Kain is the only archdiocese school they serve full time, said Sister Pat Giljum of the Sisters of St. Joseph leadership group. Some sisters are volunteer tutors at parish schools.
Today semi-retired sisters (nuns rarely retire fully, except for illness, before they are in their late 90s) serve the elderly as regular companions, organize food pantries, tutor children and adults, run neighborhood associations, programs for abused women and many other services.
'Dear Neighbors' Since 1836
Those billboard "invitations" are not just about inviting former students. The sisters are welcoming the stranger or what their congregations call their "dear neighbor."
"Maybe someone has just passed the motherhouse for years and wondered what it is; well, now they can come and see. They don't have to know us," said Sister Helen Oates, who has worked at the motherhouse for two decades. Years ago it was painted a dour gray and some thought it looked like a prison.
In the motherhouse's Heritage Hall, Oates showed a reporter exhibition banners telling the story of the early sisters who brought their congregation's goal of serving their "dear neighbors" to St. Louis.
In 1836, Sister St. Protais Deboille and five other sisters of St. Joseph left their native Lyon, France, for the region at the invitation of St. Louis Bishop Joseph Rosati. He had what today we'd call a head hunter/recruiter in France who personally recruited the nuns from their superior Mother St. John Fontbonne. The seven-week voyage to America and 10-day trip from New Orleans up the Mississippi River to St. Louis was encouraged and partly financed by their own "dear neighbor" Felicie de Duras, the Countess of Rochejaquelein of Lyon.
Sisters Arrive As St. Louis Booms
Three of the sisters settled in Cahokia. Those sisters worshipped among an established community at Holy Family parish church, which had been founded in 1699. The French rivers network from Quebec to New Orleans was still very strong. French-Americans still dominated regional leadership.
St. Louis was changing, however.
English-speaking Americans were streaming into St. Louis. Between 1830 and 1840 the city more than doubled in size going to 35,979 from 14,125.
Three of the Sisters of St. Joseph from Lyon settled in a log cabin on the west side of the Mississippi in still rural Carondelet. The following year, 1837, they began a school for the deaf. There were no public schools in St. Louis. The first would not open for two more years. Three Catholic orders -- the Vincentians, the Religious of the Sacred Heart (both from France) and the Jesuits from Belgium -- and a few secular teachers had founded schools a couple of decades before, but none of those had experienced teachers of the deaf.
In 1840 Mother Celestine, a Sister of St. Joseph, began teaching young girls at Carondelet who had no hearing challenges. That school in the motherhouse evolved into St. Joseph's Academy.
In 1860, the nuns separated with church approval, from their Lyon, France superior to become an independent American congregation.
"France was just too far away" to provide leadership, Giljum said. The Americans named their newly constituted congregation the Sisters of St. Joseph of Carondelet.
In 1923, Fontbonne College began at the Carondelet motherhouse. The school was named for the French superior who had dispatched the six nuns. Later, the college moved to its current campus at Wydown and Big Bend boulevards.
Today the large motherhouse is often rented out for retreats - religious and business - and for receptions. Parishes, interfaith groups, nonprofit and for-profit groups hold events there.
Saturday guests who take the motherhouse tour can see banners about the sisters' story in Heritage Hall, where they will also find an image of the Countess de Rochejaquelein.
Guest should not miss St. Louis sculptor Rudolph Torrini's silvery bas relief that depicts the nuns' story. It's on the side of a staircase. The wooden floors set in patterns with in black walnut and blond maple were installed by St. Louis Aloysius F. Glick and his brothers in 1905.
Favorite Students Favorite Teachers
St. Louis Archbishop Robert Carlson will be among the guests Saturday. He's one of more than 550 who had replied yes by Monday. Sister Pat Giljum's voice warmed when she said his name. Partly because she likes the archbishop but, also, because he's one of their "boys." When he was in grade school, the Sisters of St. Joseph of Carondelet taught at the Minnesota parish school where he and his sisters were students.
Guests will no doubt seek out old friends among the nuns. Sister Agnes Marie Baer, who ran the New Life Style program to help women prostitutes learn ethical work skills so they could support their children, will be among the "stars." So will Sister Marie Charles Buford who ran the Carondelet Community Betterment Federation for years and successfully persuaded developers to build more housing in their neighborhood. Sister Marion Renkens, who last week won the Carondelet Community Betterment Federation award for her countless hours of recent volunteer work, will no doubt have a cluster of friends.
Others might inquire about favorite teachers, like Sister Roseanne Cook a former Fontbonne science professors now a medical doctor who runs the Grace Busse Rural Clinic in Pine Apple, Ala., and has been cited in Congress as an American Mother Teresa.
Each Sister of St. Joseph is required to write her autobiography for the congregation's archives. In recent decades, many sisters have also taped oral histories about their childhoods, families, education and their many assignments and social justice volunteer work. Saturday visitors can listen to some of those oral histories over headphones.
Going Green
There will also be talk about the future. Any guests interested in going green, especially those who live in 19th century buildings, may hear advice about how to convert their homes. Going green has been a major mission.
Renkens stopped ordering paper napkins for her community and returned to fabric napkins, something the sisters think those emigrating French nuns would applaud. They've replaced several concrete walkways with spaced-out brick paver to eliminate puddles for safety and to cut down on rain run-off. Recent landscaping feature plants that survive St. Louis summers without extra watering. The campus grounds' automatic water system does not turn on by a pre-set timer but only when sensors indicate the ground is dry.
The maintenance staff avoids chemical cleaners, switching to eco-friendly laundry and other cleaning products. They polish dining tables with mayonnaise with expired freshness dates, clean windows with vinegar and water, then, use newspapers to dry the panes. The sisters have bins to recycle most everything. They've bought only hybrid cars.
"I drive one. I love it. It has over 100,000 miles on it." Renkens said.
Lay Associates Boost Sisters Mission
Guests will also be welcomed by lay Catholic men and women who are Associates of the Sisters of St. Joseph of Carondelet. The 37-year-old lay associates' organization aims to take the sisters' religious spirit of serving the "dear neighbor" into the broader community. Members meet monthly in small groups in one another's homes for prayer and discussion groups. The whole group gathers at an annual retreat. Many, but not all, were educated by the Sisters of St. Joseph.
Longtime associate Tom Clifford, after retiring from Arch Coal, worked in the business office at Nazareth retirement center. His wife, Anne, is also an associate. The couple considered it a family membership since their children attended gatherings and were influenced by the volunteer work, he said. Most able associates do social justice volunteer work. The Cliffords have volunteered at the Old Cass House, a shelter for homeless women; and over the years, he and his wife have become good friends of other associates.
"We try to carry on the sisters' charism of helping the dear neighbor," Clifford said. "Not in my lifetime, but in another 50 years, you can only wonder what will happen. How can the Sisters of St. Joseph survive, with just one or two novices (nuns in preparation) a year? Actually one or two new ones each year would be a lot for today."
"This seems to be happening in many orders of nuns. I'd like to be around to see what happens in 50 years but meanwhile the associates are a way to continue their spirit."
Clifford thinks many St. Louisans would enjoy a visit the handsome historic campus Saturday.
"I find it significant that in 1836, three faithful and courageous sisters in a humble log cabin began the ministry of teaching the deaf and today, 175 years later, we have three faithful and courageous women in the formation process to become Sisters of St. Joseph of Carondelet," said Jenny Beatrice, the sisters' spokeswoman. "The Spirit has brought us full circle!"
Patricia Rice is a freelance writer who has long covered religion.