By Msgr. Noel C. Burtenshaw

After our recent special supplement, we all know that the Archdiocese of Atlanta is 25 years old. In 1956 the North Georgia diocese was divided from the mother Diocese of Savannah. The Savannah Church came into being in 1850. And four years before that happened, the Sisters of Mercy were turning out well mannered, supremely educated, young Catholics in St. Vincent’s Academy in Savannah.

In 1846 these women of Mercy seemed to be everywhere. “They were ‘walking nuns,’” says Sister Madeline Roddenberry, patient advocate at St. Joseph’s Hospital, “because they shunned the life of the cloister. They originally took to the streets in Ireland caring for the uneducated, the sick, poor and taking care of the unwanted.” The Sisters of Mercy were founded in Dublin in 1831 and this year they are looking back at 150 years of service on every continent and in every ministry.

The sisters are best known in Atlanta for St. Joseph’s Infirmary. With only 50 cents in the pockets of their habits and a private home with a few beds the great hospital was started. Until 1978 when it opened outside the city it opened doors of mercy and healing down on Ivy Street. The sisters opened the first school of nursing on that spot also. And it was there, in the heart of Atlanta, that the sisters and their hospital became a famous center of vascular and lung care.

But that tradition began only in 1880. Long before the healing ministry began, Atlanta and North Georgia had knowledge of the “walking nuns.” In 1866 four sisters came from Savannah to open a boarding school along with a day school in Immaculate Conception parish. Mother Vincent came as the first superior.

In 1871, the Mercy missionaries traveled north of Atlanta and opened a school in the city of Dalton. This new foundation closed two years later when some of the sisters died, victims of a yellow fever epidemic.

In 1880 as the nursing sisters began the new infirmary on Ivy Street in Atlanta, just next door, in what would become Sacred Heart parish, teaching sisters began a little school.

“They were everywhere,” says Sister Madeline, “but not only in the State of Georgia, all over the world the Mercy nuns were on the move.” How true those words are. History tells us that these ladies of mercy were on an unstoppable march that would take them to South America, Australia, Central America, Africa and the West Indies before 1900. And it had all begun with an Advent idea by one courageous woman in 1831.

Catherine McAuley was born in Dublin in 1778 and devoted her early years to the needs of the oppressed poor of her city. So successful were her efforts, many young women joined with her to form the Sisters of Mercy. Almost immediately the “walking nuns” looked to foreign missions to serve. In Catherine’s lifetime, the ministry spread to England and Scotland. And in 1843, just 12 years after the foundation, Sister Francis Warde brought the Mercy Sisters to the New World. Two years later these women, offering the healing words and service of Jesus, were to be found in many states in the union, including the State of Georgia.

The Sisters of Mercy are the largest group of women Religious in the English-speaking world. Today these “walking nuns” of the Dublin slums are extending their healing and educational ministries to the needy in every corner of the globe. In the U.S. almost 10,000 sisters carry the spirit of Catherine McAuley to minds and bodies.

“Our studies show,” says Sister Madeline, “that 75 percent of the American population lives within 25 miles of a Mercy hospital. On any given day 20,000 people receive Mercy care. And, furthermore, over 70,000 lay people are involved in our Mercy ministry.”

That’s how Catherine McAuley would have wanted it, merciful help from the hands of the sisters and anyone else willing to serve.

Catherine and her companions took their first vows as religious on Dec. 12, 1831. One hundred and fifty years later on Dec. 12, 1981 special celebrations will mark the evening throughout the world. Archbishop Donnellan and the priests of Atlanta will concelebrate an anniversary Mass at the Shrine of the Immaculate Conception. “We began our Atlanta history at the Shrine,” says Sister Madeline. “It is fitting that we mark this moment at that historic mother church too.”

So, two histories come together in that great event on Dec. 12. As the Diocese remembers 25 years of life in this year of 1981, the Sisters of Mercy, still the “walking nuns” on their merciful missions, will recall 150 years of service.

We should finish this article with a flourish. We, perhaps, should give the Latin motto of the sisters and translate it into a fitting epilogue. But, a keen search uncovers none. Catherine McAuley in forming her community gave the sisters one world to live by.

The word, of course, was Mercy.