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photo
by Greg Campisi
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"As we leave the old world for the new, we will still have
the same responsibilities, the same struggles, the same people,
the same God. On the shores of the Mississippi as on the banks
of the Jordan, the world has need of being renewed." So wrote
Father Ernest Lelievre, a priest who dedicated his life to our
young Congregation, as he sailed to America in May, 1868. He arrived
in New York on June 10, 1868, an ambassador for the Little Sisters
of the Poor to the bishops of the New World.
Father Lelievre quickly set off for New Orleans, a week’s
journey by train and barge, where he made arrangements for the
arrival of the Little Sisters in that city later that year. He
also met with the Bishops of St. Louis, Chicago, Detroit and Baltimore
before returning to New York, where the first American foundation
was established on DeKalb Avenue in September1868. By October a
second group of Sisters had arrived from France, this time destined
for Cincinnati. A third group arrived in New Orleans December 11,
1868.
Four more foundations were made by Father Lelievre in 1869: Baltimore,
St. Louis, Philadelphia and Louisville. Boston and Washington,
D.C. followed. Within four years Father Lelievre oversaw the establishment
of thirteen homes for the aged in the United States. He returned
to Europe in the summer of 1872, happy that the elderly poor of
America could now find a home with daughters of Jeanne Jugan.
Since the beginning of our American Adventure, the Little Sisters
have been generously supported by bishops, religious communities
and countless generous citizens. According to an unconfirmed tradition
in our Congregation, President Abraham Lincoln also supported the
work of the first Little Sisters in America. He saw their presence
as a response to the needs of the elderly who found themselves
alone in their old age after their sons had given their lives in
the Civil War. An Act of Congress in 1874 allowed the Little Sisters
to care for the aged of all religious denominations.
American vocations arrived at the doorsteps of the Little Sisters
just as surely as the elderly themselves. The first three American
postulants left our shores to make their novitiate at our mother
house in France on September 4, 1869.
Before leaving America to return to France, Father Lelievre wrote, "The
work of the Little Sisters here has succeeded far beyond what I
ever expected." Today as we serve the elderly poor in 32 Homes
in North America, we share in the conviction of Father Lelievre,
and of Blessed Jeanne Jugan, that of all the calculations we could
ever make, the wisest is to abandon ourselves into the hands of
God’s loving Providence.
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Welcome | Mission & History | Introduction | Our
Logo | Art of Accompaniment | Jeanne
Jugan |
Sayings of Jeanne Jugan | Our
Spirituality | Vow
of Hospitality | Expansion
of the Congregation | Little Sisters
in the USA
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