The New Orleans Sisters of the Holy Family

Edward T. Brett

Description

The Sisters of the Holy Family, founded in New Orleans in 1842, were the first African American Catholics to serve as missionaries. This story of their little-known missionary efforts in Belize from 1898 to 2008 builds upon their already distinguished work, through the Archdiocese of New Orleans, of teaching slaves and free people of color, caring for orphans and the elderly, and tending to the poor and needy.

Utilizing previously unpublished archival documents along with extensive personal correspondence and interviews, Edward T. Brett has produced a fascinating account of the 110-year mission of the Sisters of the Holy Family to the Garifuna people of Belize. Brett discusses the foundation and growth of the struggling order in New Orleans up to the sisters' decision in 1898 to accept a teaching commitment in the Stann Creek District of what was then British Honduras. The early history of the British Honduras mission concentrates especially on Mother Austin Jones, the superior responsible for expanding the order's work into the mission field. In examining the Belizean mission from the eve of the Second Vatican Council through the post–Vatican II years, Brett sensitively chronicles the sisters' efforts to conform to the spirit of the council and describes the creative innovations that the Holy Family community introduced into the Belizean educational system. In the final chapter he looks at the congregation's efforts to sustain its missionary work in the face of the shortage of new religious vocations.

Brett’s study is more than just a chronicle of the Holy Family Sisters' accomplishments in Belize. He treats the issues of racism and gender discrimination that the African American congregation encountered both within the church and in society, demonstrating how the sisters survived and even thrived by learning how to skillfully negotiate with the white, dominant power structure.

Sujets

• Ethnic Studies
• Black Studies
• Social Science
• HISTORY
• Sociologie, société et politique
• Nueva Orleans
• América
• Roman Catholic Archdiocese of New Orleans
• African American studies
• Stann Creek District
• British Honduras
• New Orleans
• Latin America
• Catholic
• Central America
• Christianity
• African American
• SS Central America
• American
• La Nouvelle-Orléans

Informations

• Publié par: University of Notre Dame Press
• Date de parution: 15 avril 2012
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9780268075880
• Langue: English

Extrait

THE NEW ORLEANS SISTERS OF THE HOLY FAMILY
African American Missionaries to the Garifuna of Belize
EDWARD T. BRETT
University of Notre Dame Press
Notre Dame, Indiana
Copyright © 2012 by the University of Notre Dame Press
Notre Dame, Indiana 46556
www.undpress.nd.edu
All Rights Reserved
The author and publisher express their gratitude to the Sisters of the Holy Family and to Sister Mary Carolyn Leslie, Archivist, for permission to reproduce the photographs in the gallery.
Matt Whetsell, La Roche College, provided the maps in chapter 1 .
E-ISBN: 978-0-268-07588-0
This e-Book was converted from the original source file by a third-party vendor. Readers who notice any formatting, textual, or readability issues are encouraged to contact the publisher at [e-mail]
To the Sisters of the Holy Family and all other religious sisters who have served in Central America and who have made a difference in the lives of many;
and to Father Edward L. Cleary, O.P. (1929–2011) colleague, mentor, and dear friend
Contents
Acknowledgments
Introduction
PART I
THE PRE–VATICAN II PERIOD
Chapter 1
Foundation and Growth in New Orleans
Chapter 2
Mother Austin Jones and the Early Mission
Chapter 3
Trouble with the Bishop
Chapter 4
The 1920s to the Second Vatican Council
PART II
THE POST–VATICAN II YEARS
Chapter 5
Changes in the 1950s through the Early 1970s
Chapter 6
Problems over Language and Inculturation
Chapter 7
Mission Experiences of Three Holy Family Sisters
Chapter 8
Withdrawal from Belize
Conclusion
Appendix A
Holy Family Sisters Who Have Worked in Belize
Appendix B
Holy Family Sisters from Belize
Appendix C
Reflections of Three Lay People Who Were Taught by the Holy Family Sisters in Belize
Notes
Bibliography
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Many people have generously given their time and expertise so that the story of the Sisters of the Holy Family and their 110-year mission in Belize could come to light in this book. I thank all of those listed in the bibliography whom I corresponded with or interviewed. A special thanks, however, goes to Sister Carolyn Leslie, S.S.F., the archivist for the Holy Family Sisters, who through my eight years of research on this book provided me with hundreds of documents—many of which I would never have found on my own—and set up countless interviews for me with members of her congregation who, she realized, had valuable information to share. Of this latter group I am especially grateful to Sisters Sylvia Thibodeaux, Clare of Assisi Pierre, Judith Therese Barial, and Jean Martínez, and to the former mayor of Dangriga, the Honorable Sylvia Flores, who is an associate member of the Holy Family Congregation. Indeed, when I first interviewed Sisters Judith and Clare in 2003 and saw their eyes sparkle as they reminisced about their years in Belize, I knew that this was a research project worth undertaking.
Special thanks goes to Sister Angelyn Dries, O.S.F., Diane Batts Morrow, Father Cyprian Davis, O.S.B., Sister Patricia Byrne, C.S.J., Sister Sally Witt, C.S.J., and Father Robert Carbonneau, C.P., for reading all or parts of my manuscript. These fine historians pointed out mistakes and misconceptions in my work and also, along with David Miros of the Jesuit Midwest Province Archives, brought to my attention important books and articles of which I had been unaware. I am also grateful to Charles Nolan, who played a crucial role in helping me gain admittance to the Holy Family Archives, and to my brother-in-law Kurt Whitson, who, without being asked to do so, saved every article for me that appeared in the New Orleans newspapers over the last decade that treated the Holy Family Sisters.
My appreciation also goes out to my colleagues at La Roche College, especially Paul Le Blanc, Joshua Forrest, Sister Michele Bisbey, C.D.P., Sister Mary Christine Morkovsky, C.D.P., Sister Rita Yeasted, S.F.C.C., Edward Bobinchock, and Anna Marie Neutrelle, and to Father Edward L. Cleary, O.P., of Providence College, for the many discussions I had with them concerning my research and writing. These discussions and my colleagues’ input certainly made this a better book. I am likewise grateful to the staff of the La Roche College Library—LaVerne Collins, Darlene Veghts, Jacqueline Bolte, Marilyn McHugh, and Caroline Horgan—who obtained for me countless books and articles and always did so with good cheer. I am also grateful to Elizabeth Williams, my former student, for helping me track down several hard-to-find books and articles. My thanks also go out to Sister Barbara Flores, S.C.N., and Sister Ellen Doyle, S.C.N., for their help concerning the apostolate of the Sisters of Charity of Nazareth in Belize.
I would be remiss if I did not acknowledge my daughters, Erin Brett and Tracy Brett Dunlap, and my son-in-law, David Dunlap, for their ongoing support when it comes to my research projects and for almost always listening politely when I would get carried away on the topic of the Holy Family Sisters. Thanks also should go to my two young grandsons, Scott and Samuel Dunlap, for at least trying to be quiet when their grandfather was working on the computer or reading something about the Holy Family Sisters.
The person who is most deserving of my appreciation, however, is my wife, Donna. She has read every word of every draft of this book (and everything else I have written), checking my grammar and style and making insightful suggestions to clarify or expand on the text. Before I began my work on the Holy Family Sisters, she had coauthored a book and several articles with me on the Catholic Church in Central America. My collaboration with her on these projects has certainly made me a better historian.
INTRODUCTION
I n the mid-1980s, my wife and I decided to write a book on U.S. missionaries who had been murdered in the 1970s and 1980s in Central America. Aside from a few short magazine and newspaper articles, we had never before written about modern-day missionaries, so, like any reputable historian would do, we began a search to uncover and read everything we could find that dealt with the history of U.S. Catholic missions and missionaries in Latin America. The one work that proved to be of immense value to us was Gerald Costello’s Mission to Latin America: The Successes and Failures of a Twentieth-Century Crusade . 1 It greatly influenced our approach in composing our book and has influenced my scholarship ever since. Aside from Costello’s study, however, there were not many other books that we found on U.S. Catholic missions that could be termed serious, professional history. Granted, there were some histories of specific religious congregations’ mission enterprises, but they were usually in-house productions printed by small publishers who charge a fee for their services. They were often hagiographical in tone and usually devoid of meaningful analysis. To put it bluntly, they were amateurish, usually replete with historical misconceptions and of little worth to a serious historian.
When my wife and I consulted the standard books on U.S. Catholic history, we were again disappointed. Although they included some information on European missionaries who came to work in what would become the United States, they contained almost nothing on U.S. Catholic foreign mission enterprises. 2 To make matters worse, the archives of religious congregations were often poorly organized. They contained valuable information on Catholic mission history, but the researcher had to have patience and plenty of time to track down what he or she needed. 3 Nevertheless, despite these problems we were eventually able to complete our book. 4 From our research efforts, however, I had come to believe that American missionaries had played a significant role, especially in the twentieth century, in shaping U.S. Catholic perceptions of other cultures. Furthermore, I came to realize that American missionaries had influenced how their fellow U.S. Catholics—both clergy and laity—viewed the foreign policy of their own government. 5 Even more important, I was convinced that the American Catholic missionary movement had had an important role in the overall history of the U.S. Catholic Church, yet historians had given little attention to this field of study.
The National Conference of Catholic Bishops’ Committee on the Church in Latin America took a step in remedying this situation when it commissioned Sister Mary McGlone to draw up a study of the relationship between the North American and Latin American Catholic churches, with special emphasis on how that relationship has impacted the United States. The book that resulted from her efforts, Sharing Faith across the Hemisphere, 6 which appeared in 1997, also includes valuable appendices on the involvement in Latin America of U.S. dioceses, parishes, religious orders, and congregations as well as Catholic colleges and universities.
The year 1997 also saw the publication of American Women in Mission: A Social History of Their Thought and Practice, by historian Dana Robert. This innovative work not only highlighted the contributions made by female missionaries, both Catholic and Protestant, to U.S. mission history, but it also showed convincingly that women missionaries were far more than mere auxiliaries to their male counterparts. They provided services to indigenous people that could not be offered by men due to cultural mores and other reasons, and, in so doing, they often developed a closer relationship with the common people, especially with women, than did the male missionaries. 7
The publication in 1998 of Sister Angelyn Dries’s The Missionary Movement in American Catholic History represented a major advance in U.S. Catholic mission studies. 8 In this important work, Dries lists virtually every American mission enterprise—those conducted by male and female religious congregations, those directed by dioceses, and those that were lay-or