Bl. Maria Franciszka Siedliska

Bl. Maria Franciszka Siedliska (1842-1902) was born to a noble and wealthy family in Warsaw, Poland. When a Capuchin friar prepared her for her First Holy Communion, she began to desire the religious life and made a private act of consecration to God. Her father was greatly opposed and said he would rather see her dead then lost to the cloister. Her vocation was not deterred, and she went to Rome to obtain the Pope's blessing for founding an active apostolic Order modeled on the hidden virtues of the Holy Family. The Congregation of Sisters of the Holy Family of Nazareth was formed in 1875, and she took the name Mary of Jesus the Good Shepherd. In 1885 the Nazareth Sisters arrived in New York, eventually settling near Chicago where they made their first foundation in the U.S.A. She was beatified by Pope St. John Paul II in 1989. Her feast day is November 21.