S. Bernard Louise Carroll

S. Bernard Louise’s first mission in 1916 was to St. Mary, Jackson, Mich. She was still there during the depression years, and thus became intimately involved with the problems of the poor. With the blessing of the pastor and her superior, Sister set up a distribution center. Every day after school, and all day Saturday, she was there to supply bedding, clothes and food to the long line of needy, or she was out soliciting from generous friends, wholesale dealers, Church societies, and the Sisters’ own kitchen. The cooperative convent cook, Fanny, had to keep a watchful eye on choice morsels “so that S. Bernard wouldn’t carry everything off to her poor children.”

This story of one Sister is illustrative of the efforts made by many Sisters of Charity to minister to the poor in the situation in which they found themselves. Whether quietly helping needy students locate resources to continue in school, reaching out to needy families in the parish, or distributing sandwiches out the kitchen door to “knights of the road,” Sisters were ever alert to serving Christ in the person of the poor.