Élisabeth Bergeron, in religion Sister Saint-Joseph, (May 25, 1851 – April 29, 1936) was a Canadian religious servant who was a founder of the

Sisters of Saint Joseph of Saint-Hyacinthe The Sisters of Saint Joseph of Saint-Hyacinthe (Soeurs de Saint-Joseph de Saint-Hyacinthe) are a female religious congregation teaching institute established under Pontifical right. Historical background The congregation was founded on September 1 ...

in 1877. She was its Mother Superior for the first two years before giving the role to another sister and was either the Assistant Superior or General Councillor until 1925. Before that, Bergeron worked in a cotton mill in the New England region of the United States and taught catechism in evening school to local impoverished children with no religious education. She was beatified in Rome in 1976 and she was declared venerable by

Pope John Paul II Pope John Paul II ( la, Ioannes Paulus II; it, Giovanni Paolo II; pl, Jan Paweł II; born Karol Józef Wojtyła ; 18 May 19202 April 2005) was the head of the Catholic Church and sovereign of the Vatican City State from 1978 until his ...

in 1996 after the Congregation for the Causes of Saints recognised her work.

Biography

Bergeron was born on May 25, 1851, in the small village of

La Présentation, Quebec La Présentation is a municipality in southern Quebec, Canada on the Salvail River in Les Maskoutains Regional County Municipality. The population as of the Canada 2011 Census was 2,466. Demographics Population Language Communities * La Pr ...

Lower Canada The Province of Lower Canada (french: province du Bas-Canada) was a British colony on the lower Saint Lawrence River and the shores of the Gulf of Saint Lawrence (1791–1841). It covered the southern portion of the current Province of Quebec an ...

, close to Saint-Hyacinthe. She was the fourth of eleven children of the farmer Théophile Bergeron and Basiliste Petit. After briefly going to the local rural area school located in La Présentation where she learned to read since her parents were poor, Bergeron became interested in religion from an early age, and did her first Communion in mid-1859 at the age of eight. She asked her parents if she could do her

First Communion First Communion is a ceremony in some Christian traditions during which a person of the church first receives the Eucharist. It is most common in many parts of the Latin Church tradition of the Catholic Church, Lutheran Church and Anglican Communi ...

but they refused and barred her from attending catechism classes. At age 14, Bergeron unsuccessfully wanted to join the

since the Superior General thought her to be too young. She and her family later relocated to the

New England New England is a region comprising six states in the Northeastern United States: Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, and Vermont. It is bordered by the state of New York to the west and by the Canadian provinces ...

region of the United States due to the economic crisis where they worked in from 1865 to 1870. Bergereon initially resided in Brunswick, Maine and then in

Salem, Massachusetts Salem ( ) is a historic coastal city in Essex County, Massachusetts, located on the North Shore of Greater Boston. Continuous settlement by Europeans began in 1626 with English colonists. Salem would become one of the most significant seaports tr ...

, working in a cotton mill and teaching catechism at evening school in her home to local children who had no religious education since they were poor. She returned to Quebec with extra savings in March 1870, and was part of the admitted to the Sisters Adorers of the Precious Blood in March 1871 but left in July that year since the Superior General advised her that she did not think her of having the vocation of a worshipper because of its strict rules. Bergeron briefly spent time with Montreal's Sisters of Miséricorde but she decided to leave it following a few days of being a postulate due to dissatisfaction. In 1875, she applied to join the

Sisters of the Presentation of Mary The Sisters of the Presentation of Mary are a religious congregation in the Latin Rite branch of the Catholic Church. It was founded in 1796 at Thueyts in the Ardèche department of south-central France, by Saint Anne-Marie Rivier (1768–1838); ...

but was rejected due to her lack of education. Bergeron became a member of the

Third Order of Saint Dominic The Third Order of Saint Dominic ( la, Tertius Ordo Praedicatorum; abbreviated TOP), also referred to as the Lay Fraternities of Saint Dominic or Lay Dominicans since 1972, is a Roman Catholic third order affiliated with the Dominican Order. Lay ...

, and twice proposed the creation of a Dominican contemplative congregation to her diocese's bishop

Louis-Zéphirin Moreau Louis-Zéphirin Moreau (1 April 1824 – 24 May 1901) was a Canadian Roman Catholic prelate who served as the fourth Bishop of Saint-Hyacinthe from 1875 until his death in 1901. He was also the cofounder of the Sisters of St. Joseph of St. Hyac ...

. He noted such a congregation was already existent in her local area, he and suggested to her the formation of an teaching congregation instead. On September 12, 1877, Bergeron and three sisters (two of whom were teachers) established the

in an abandoned schoolhouse in La Présentation. The school began admitting students divided into two groups of boys and girls from the morning of September 17, 1877. Death, the leaving and or illness of multiple candidates affected the congregation in its early years but it survived on local congregation donations and received heavy criticism from the diocesan hierarchy. For the first two years, Bergeron was Mother Superior, during which she adopted the name Sister Saint-Joseph on August 17, 1878, but, on Moreau's advice, she relinquished the role to a more educated sister who was more able to deal with the school boards. She was either the Assistant Superior or General Councillor until 1925. Bergeron made the perpetual vows of obedience and poverty on March 19, 1980. In 1911, Bergeron visited the Western Canadian missions in

Lorette, Manitoba Lorette is a local urban district in the Rural Municipality of Taché, located 25 km southeast of Winnipeg, in the province of Manitoba, Canada. The French-speaking Métis traders and farmers who first settled the area named it Petite Pointe ...

and Marieval, Saskatchewan that were both established in 1901. The congregation also extended into Ontario and New Hampshire.

Personal life

She liked gardening and sewing. On April 29, 1936, Bergeron died in Saint-Hyacinthe. Her body was buried in the mausoleum in Saint-Hyacinthe Cemetery.

Legacy

The Elisabeth Bergeron Centre was opened in her name in September 1969 to promote the cause of her beatification and canonization and her life. Bergeron was eventually beatified in Rome in 1976, and she was declared venerable on January 12, 1996 by

, after the Congregation for the Causes of Saints gave recognition of her "heroic virtues, especially her humility, her understanding and love of the Church and her submission to the will of God". Some buildings in the Saint-Hyacinthe area are named after her and the Elisabeth Wednesdays that took place on nine successive weekends from 2005 to 2009 were held to promote her work.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Bergeron, Elisabeth 1851 births 1936 deaths French Quebecers Pre-Confederation Quebec people 19th-century Canadian nuns 20th-century Canadian nuns Burials in Quebec Pre-Confederation Canadian expatriates in the United States 19th-century venerated Christians 20th-century venerated Christians Founders of Catholic religious communities Canadian beatified people Beatifications by Pope Paul VI Venerated Catholics by Pope John Paul II