Category Archives: Sisters of Charity Federation

Attendees at the first Conference of Mother Seton’s Daughters in 1947 included:
Mother Mary Josephine and Sister Mary, Mount Saint Vincent-on-the-Hudson, New York
Mother Mary Evaristus and Sister Maurita, Mount St. Vincent, Halifax, Nova Scotia
Mother Maria Benedict and Sister Miriam Fidelis, Seton Hill, Greensburg, Pennsulvania
Sister Estelle and Sister Henrietta, Marillac Seminary, Missouri, Western Province of the Daughters of Charity
Sister Isabel, Visitatrix, Saint Joseph’s, Emmitsburg, Maryland
Sister Marie Helen and Sister Helen Cecilia, St. Elizabeth’s, New Jersey
(In the published agenda and proceedings, the Sisters are identified only by first names)
Moderator of the Conference was Most Reverend John McNamara, then Administrator of the Archdiocese of Baltimore and Washington.

The theme of the 1947 conference was how to further interest in the cause of Mother Seton. Sessions focused on three means of doing so: prayer in each community, propagation of knowledge of Mother Seton, and community works. The meeting also included visits to Shrines of Mother Seton and a Mother Seton Pageant presented by students of St. Joseph’s College.

One of the actions taken during this initial meeting was the adoption of an approved likeness of Mother Seton for uses connected with her cause. The image chosen by the participants was the well-known Filicchi portrait, a version of which can be seen in our August 26 blog post.

(Image from the St. Joseph’s College Valley Echo, October 22, 1947, used with permission of the Daughters of Charity Provincial Archives)

On October 24-26, 2013 the Provincial Archives will host a meeting of archivists from Sisters of Charity Federation member communities. As we prepare to welcome our colleagues from the Federation, it is appropriate to look back at the Federation’s origins. The photo above shows the October 22, 1947 issue of the St. Joseph’s College newspaper, the Valley Echo, which includes a banner headline announcing the First Conference of Mother Seton’s Daughters. “Conference of Mother Seton’s Daughters” is the original name of what is now known as the Sisters of Charity Federation. The first meeting, held in Emmitsburg on October 28 and 29, 1947, arose out a suggestion by the Most Reverend Amleto Giovanni Cicognani, Apostolic Delegate to the United States, that the American communities which traced their roots to Elizabeth Ann Seton should unite in their efforts to promote Mother Seton’s cause for canonization.

In 1947 the property just to the south of our current building, now occupied by FEMA, housed both the Central House for the Daughters of Charity Emmitsburg Province and the campus of St. Joseph’s College, a liberal arts college for women operated by the Daughters of Charity until the early 1970s.

Elizabeth Ann Seton was beatified in 1963 and canonized in 1975.