Monday, 1/4/16
Today is the feast day of St. Elizabeth Anne Seton, the
founder of the Daughters of Charity. It was she who established this St.
Vincent’s Hospital. Elizabeth was a wealthy Protestant New Yorker, and when her
husband failed with tuberculosis, she brought him to the warm climate of
southern Italy.
As her husband was dying there, she and her children
received much kindness from Italian Catholics. Back in America, Elizabeth
became a Catholic, and took over a school in Emmetsburg Maryland.
Her Daughters of Charity flourished for two centuries; and
Jacksonville, as well as all of this the country, benefitted from their great
kindness. People walking the hallways here at St. Vincent’s love to stare at
the many Sisters in their wild headgear. We miss them very much.
However, we should think of them as passing the torch on to
us. Without wearing any hats at all, our nurses, our teachers, our Vincent
DePaul ladies are caring on the same Lord’s work here now.
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