The Sisters of St. Joseph, also known as the Congregation of the Sisters of St. Joseph, abbreviated CSJ or SSJ, is a Catholic religious congregation of women founded in Le Puy-en-Velay, France, in 1650 by Jean-Pierre Médaille. This congregation, named for Saint Joseph, has approximately 9,500 members worldwide: 2,584 in the United States; 2,000 in France; and are active in 50 other countries.
Composition The Sisters of Saint Joseph comprise three international congregations (Lyon, Chambéry, and Annecy) and four federations (French, Italian, US, and Canadian), representing more than 9,500 Sisters worldwide.
Congregation of the Sisters of St. Joseph of Lyon The Congregation of the Sisters of St Joseph of Lyon number nearly 1,000, serving in four provinces (Maine, Mexico, India and Europe) in fifteen countries. The Sisters operate many Catholic schools and hospitals in France, the United States, Canada, Japan and England. In India, they operate hospitals, homes, and orphanages.
Foundation The Congregation of the Sisters of St. Joseph was founded by Jean-Pierre Médaille (although older accounts attribute this to his brother, Jean Paul). Medaille sought to establish an ecclesiastically approved congregation of women who would profess simple vows, live in a small group, with no specific apostolates and would dress in a common garb of the women of their day. The original six sisters were Anna Brun, an orphan; Marguerite Burdier; war widow, Claudia Chastel; Anna Chaleyer; Anna Vey, age 15; and Françoise Eyraud, a hospital administrator, served as superior of the new community for 30 years. The Bishop of LePuy, France, Henri de Maupas gave the foundation canonical status. Although the Congregation celebrates October 15, 1650 as its beginning, there is evidence that points to an earlier founding, more likely between 1646 and 1650. All the women made ribbon and lace that gave them some income to support themselves. In turn they taught others to make lace and ribbon.
The new Congregation enjoyed rapid growth, expanding into eighteen houses during the first decade. By the time of the French Revolution, almost 150 years later, the Sisters had spread to twelve dioceses in the southeast corner of France. The Congregation of Saint Joseph was disbanded during the French Revolution."Our Heritage", U.S.Federation Sisters of Saint Joseph The convents and chapels of the community were confiscated in 1793. The Sisters were forced to choose between returning to their families or leaving France to join communities in other countries. Some Sisters who remained became martyrs. Three in Dauphiné and two in Haute-Loire were sent to the guillotine because they refused to take the Civil Oath. Others were imprisoned at St-Didier, Feurs and Clermont.
Post-Revolutionary France The congregation was re-established in 1807 by Jeanne Fontbonne in Lyon, France."History", Sisters of Saint Joseph Philadelphia As word of the Sisters' services and good deeds grew, dioceses throughout France requested the services of the restored Congregation. Houses were established in the dioceses of Lyon, Chambéry, Annecy, Gap, Bourg, and Bordeaux.
In 1902 many French houses of the congregation were closed by the Government, in consequence of which a large number of Sisters left for Denmark, Russia and the United States. In 1996 the Congregation of the Sisters of St. Joseph of Bourg re-joined the Sisters of St. Joseph of Lyon as part of the latter's European Province.
Sisters of Saint Joseph of Chambery The center of the Congregation is in Rome. Other Provinces and Regions are located in Belgium, Bolivia, Brazil, Czech Republic, Denmark, France, Germany, Ireland, India, Italy, Mozambique, Norway, Pakistan, Sweden and Tanzania. The order has approximately 1,800 sisters in 18 countries.
In 1812 a colony of Sisters of St. Joseph was sent from Lyon to Chambéry, in Savoy, France under Mother St. John Marcoux. She in turn sent sisters to Turin and to Pignerole in the Piedmont, thus giving rise to new branches of Saint Joseph sisters. In 1843 Mother Félicité became Mother Superior. More than eighty houses rose under her direction, and when, in 1861, a state normal school was opened at Rumilly, Savoy, France. it was placed in charge of the sisters. Meanwhile, the Chambéry sisters had been constituted a diocesan congregation, but as years went on a stronger administration became necessary.
The rule was therefore revised to meet the requirements of a generalate, and papal approbation was granted in 1874 by rescript of Pius IX. Under the new form of government the congregation is subject to a Superior General, whose term of office is six years and is divided into provinces, each possessing a novitiate. The novices, after two years probation, make annual vows for two years, after which they bind themselves by perpetual vows. The rule is based on that of St. Augustine.
Congregation of the Sisters of St. Joseph of Bourg
In 1819 a foundation from the motherhouse in Lyon was established in the Diocese of Belley under the leadership of Mother Saint Joseph Chaney. In 1823 the Sisters of that diocese formally separated from community in Lyon. They became a new and independent diocesan congregation under the leadership of Reverend Mother Saint Benoit Cornillon and the authority of Bishop Alexander Devie. Several other foundations spread from France throughout the world. In 1996 the Bourg congregation merged with the founding congregation of Lyon, as part of the latter's European Province.
Congregation of the Sisters of St. Joseph of Annecy The Congregation of the Sisters of St. Joseph of Annecy is an international congregation of about 500 sisters serving in the Congo, England, France, Gambia, India, Ireland, Senegal, Switzerland, Tanzania and Wales.
After the French Revolution, the Congregation was revived by Mother St.John Fontbonne, on 14 July 1808. As Superior General, she undertook the consolidation and expansion of the Congregation to other parts of France. In response to a request from Bishop Rey who had previously worked with them in Pignerol, five Sisters arrived in Annecy on 7 May 1833.Sisters of St. Joseph of Annecy The new Congregation grew and developed, and their first mission in India was established in 1849. A provincial house and novitiate are located in Visakhapatnam (once known as Waltair), Andhra Pradesh. In 1891, a school was established to help educate the children of the Roman Catholic families based in Visakhapatnam. The school which was named, St Joseph's Girls High School continues to operate to this day, and is the second oldest school in Visakhapatnam. It is one of the oldest institutions set up exclusively for girls in India.
In the summer of 1864, two Sisters of St Joseph of Annecy set out on a voyage from India to the UK to open a community in the small town of Devizes, Wiltshire, England. In 1946, Llantarnam Abbey in Wales was bought by the Sisters of St. Joseph and is home to a large community of Sisters. The Sisters farm the adjoining land. Llantarnam Abbey in Cwmbran, South Wales stands on the site of a medieval Cistercian monastery. The Tŷ Croeso ecumenical retreat center adjoins the Abbey. There are eight houses in the United Kingdom, under the provincial house and novitiate at Llantarnam Abbey. The congregation now numbers 60, in charge of 10 elementary day and boarding-schools, with an attendance of about 2000. In Scotland at St Mary's College, Blairs, 15 sisters have charge of the household arrangements and work of the college.
In 1950, the congregation bought Tredegar House, Newport, from the Hon. John Morgan, who was disposing of his family seat in lieu of death-duties. The sisters ran the house as a convent and latterly comprehensive school until 1974, when it was sold to Newport County Council.
On March 19, 2015, the Bhubaneswar Province of the Sisters of St. Joseph of Annecy opened St. Joseph's Hospital in the city of Agartala, Tripura, India.
US Federation of the Sisters of Saint Joseph In 1966 the Federation of the Sisters of Saint Joseph was created as a union of all the Sisters of Saint Joseph of the United States who claim a common origin in the foundation at LePuy, France in 1650. It includes approximately 2,584 members of 16 Congregations throughout the United States. In addition there are 2,797 associates.
Member congregations are:
Sisters of St. Joseph of Carondelet
Sisters of St. Joseph of Philadelphia In 1847 the Sisters of St. Joseph of Carondelet, in response to an appeal of Bishop Francis Kenrick, sent four members of the community to Philadelphia to take charge of St. John's Orphan Asylum, until that time under the Sisters of Charity. The Know-Nothing spirit, which had but a short time previously led to the Philadelphia riots was still rampant, and the sisters had much to suffer from bigotry and difficulties of many kinds. Shortly afterwards they were given charge of several parochial schools, and thus entered on what was to be their chief work in the coming years.
In October 1858, under the patronage of St. John Neumann, the congregation in Philadelphia began to take a more definite development by the establishment of a mother-house at Mount St. Joseph, Chestnut Hill. When the Sisters of St. Joseph of St. Louis formed a generalate in 1863 (approved later by the Holy See), the congregation of Philadelphia preserved its autonomy, by the wish of the bishop. When the number of religious members increased to between three and four hundred, and the works entrusted to them became so numerous and varied as to necessitate an organization more detailed and definite, steps were undertaken to obtain the papal approbation, which was received in 1895.
During the Civil War, detachments of sisters nursed the sick soldiers in Camp Curtin and the Church Hospital, Harrisburg. Despite anti-Catholic sentiments from doctors and soldier-nurses who did not appreciate the sisters' presence, the sisters worked at the camp until its closure in April 1864. Shortly after, under Surgeon General Smith, they undertook more active duty on the floating hospital, Whilldin, which received the wounded from both sides at the battle of Yorktown, and other southern battle-fields.
For two thirds of the 1900s, the group supplied teachers to hundreds of elementary and secondary schools in the Philadelphia area, educating generations of children and young adults. The trademark white triangle that was worn as part of the sisters' veil was present until 1974. The changes in lifestyle and ministry that were common in Catholic religious institutes of women in the late 1960s took a little longer to catch up with this group who held on to convent living in traditional parish settings as well as a modified habit and veil up to the mid-1980s.
From a membership high of close to 2,500 in the mid-sixties, the current 2022 membership is approximately 500"About Us: Our History". Sisters of St. Joseph of Philadelphia. with most of the membership in full or partial retirement.
Sisters of St. Joseph of Philadelphia sponsored institutions: Saint Joseph Academy McSherrystown, Pennsylvania; Mount Saint Joseph Academy (Flourtown, Pennsylvania); Saint Joseph Villa; Saint Mary By-The-Sea Retreat House in Cape May Point, New Jersey; Norwood-Fontbonne Academy;Welcome to the SSJ center for spirituality Holy Family Academy (Bayonne, New Jersey);Welcome to the SSJ center for spirituality SSJ Center for Spirituality Chestnut Hill, Philadelphia; Bethlehem Retirement Village, Flourtown, Pennsylvania; Sisters of Saint Joseph Welcome Center, Philadelphia (Kensington), PA; and Chestnut Hill College, in Chestnut Hill, Pennsylvania
Sisters of St. Joseph, Brentwood, New York
The Sisters of St. Joseph, Brentwood is an independent diocesan congregation.