Note: For the next several weeks, I’m featuring women with a connection to the Americas.
The Basics: Born February 19, 1800, in Canada; died September 23, 1851, in Canada; beatified October 7, 2001, by John Paul II; feast day, September 24; wife, mother, and nurse.
The Story: It was a busy life, a very busy life, spent in service. Emilie’s mother died when the child was just four years old, and her father passed away just ten years later. She spent much of her childhood with relatives, except for the 1814-1815 school year, when she boarded at a school run by the Sisters of the Congregation of Notre Dame.
Emilie spent some time in the Montreal social scene as she cared for an ailing aunt, and when she was twenty-three, married a fifty-year-old bachelor who was an apple grower. It was a happy marriage with a shared vision of service, but it ended after just four years when he died. (Two children had died shortly after birth, and the third within a year of Emilie’s husband’s passing.) Emilie busied herself with service groups, then began bringing sick elderly women into her home. When that ministry expanded, she opened a shelter. Then, in March 1844, she was one of six women who professed vows in what is now the Sisters of Providence, with Emilie being elected superior general. She died seven years later in a cholera epidemic.
Emilie’s Wisdom: “Life is so short… and we are so afraid of self-sacrifice.”
What We Can Learn from Emilie: Sacrifice comes in all forms… in having the faith not to be bitter when we lose loved ones… in having the faith to be kind to those in need. Is there a place where you are saying no and the Lord desires you to say yes?
To Learn More About Emilie: Visit the site for the Sisters of Providence’s Emilie-Gamelin Centre.
To Learn More About Other Women Saints and Blesseds: Come back next week, or consider buying my books, Blessed Are You: Finding Inspiration from Our Sisters in Faith or Sisterhood of Saints: Daily Guidance and Inspiration.
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