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  • "To the Ends of the Earth":Catholic Women Religious in Nineteenth-Century San Francisco
  • Jamila Jamison Sinlao

Introduction

In the last thirty years, the study of Catholic women religious and their impact on the United States has grown dramatically. Scholars have expanded the shared understanding of the historical record, striving "to build bridges, make connections, and integrate the history of women religious into the larger contexts of Catholic history, religious history, women's history, and American social history."1 These studies reveal that in addition to braving the dangers of urban streets, sisters helped to settle the frontier and held positions of authority and leadership, becoming some of the earliest female founders and chief executives of institutions including schools, hospitals, and orphanages. They grappled with poverty; combated religious, ethnic, racial, and gender discrimination; and navigated a rocky political terrain, caught between civil government, anti-Catholic and Nativist movements, and the patriarchal Church's structure.

Women religious became co-creators of the Church in the United States. They served essential roles in its founding and expansion, providing much-needed labor and funding, and spearheading the creation of social-service institutions serving both Catholics and non-Catholics in need. As historian James Kenneally writes the sisters were,

the force holding the Church together. By the last half of the century they outnumbered male church workers in every diocese, were four [End Page 25] times as numerous as priests, exercised the major influence on the growing immigrant population, and bore the economic brunt of selfless service—'Catholic serfs,' according to one historian.2

As women working beyond the accepted boundaries of marriage and motherhood, sisters faced gender discrimination both within and without the Church. The lack of canon law governing sisters in the United States led to authority clashes between bishops and women religious. Despite these issues, evidence suggests that the relationships between women religious and priests included elements of partnership and collaboration. Sisters became, as Janet Ruffing writes, "active agents in both the mission of the church and the advancement of women."3 As such, the relationship of sisters and clergy has been described as "institutional partnerships" often more "liberating rather than oppressive."4 Experiences of U.S. women religious, then, developed in the context of coalition-building with clergy, civic officials, lay people, and the broader community. This network of supporters became a crucial resource upon which sisters drew in order to carry out their manifold apostolic activities.

The Catholic Church's history in the San Francisco Bay area illustrates the ways women religious forged institutional partnerships with clerics at all levels. In many ways, San Francisco may be regarded as a microcosm of the larger U.S. context; like sisters throughout the country, congregations in San Francisco braved primitive living conditions, struggles with debt, illness, and discrimination. Unlike other parts of the country, the 1848 Gold Rush touched off a population explosion. Rapid urbanization, coupled with an inefficient, corrupt, and ill-prepared city government, presented a unique set of problems. Within fifty years, San Francisco was transformed from a rough and tumble frontier town to the West Coast's most cosmopolitan urban center. As the region's institutional life evolved, so did that of women religious. Together with clergy and ecclesiastical authorities, they adapted to the changing times, drawing upon their spirituality, ingenuity, and creativity to tackle social problems and tend to the needs of a growing Catholic population.

This essay draws from the archival records of the Sisters of Mercy, Sisters of the Presentation of the Blessed Virgin Mary, and Sisters of Notre Dame de Namur, with supplemental material from secondary literature, providing an overview of the ministries of San Francisco's women religious. As governed [End Page 26] by their Rules and constitutions, sisters' worked as educators, health care providers, and champions of the most vulnerable members of society. Their efforts helped to nourish and shape Catholicism in one of the most important regions of the West.

Beginnings

As soon as women religious arrived in San Francisco, beginning in 1850, they worked with clergy in a symbiotic relationship, motivated by a vision of building and sustaining the growing Catholic community in the archdiocese. Overall, religious women's conceptions...

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