This fall, as we welcome students back to campus for the 2024-2025 academic year, Archives & Special Collections (A&SC) welcomes a number of new collections centered on the ministries and lives of Catholic women religious. These archival transfers bring full circle outreach to women religious communities in the Bay Area and beyond, first begun in 2015, with the donation of the scholarly and professional papers of Sandra M. Schneiders, I.H.M., S.T.D., the first woman and non-Jesuit faculty to teach at the Jesuit School of Theology, in Berkeley, California. These were followed in 2019 by the donation of the Sisters of the Holy Family Archives (SHF Archives), which paved the way for outreach to other congregations: SHF was the first congregation to commit their archives to Santa Clara University, and they also established two generous endowments, one for the long term care of their collections and a second to support A&SC’s collaborative archival efforts with other women religious congregations.
By the end of the calendar year, A&SC will host a full complement of women religious centered archival collections, including the following:
Holy Family Day Home Archives (San Francisco, CA)
The Holy Family Day Home was founded by the Sisters of the Holy Family in San Francisco in 1900. The Day Home provided a safe place for children of working families. Through the work of the Holy Family Day Home – as well as other day homes – the Sisters made immeasurable contributions to early childhood development and education as well as providing important response and relief work following the 1906 San Francisco earthquake.
United States Province of the Holy Union Sisters Archives (Fall River, Massachusetts)
The archives of the Holy Union Sisters United States Province (HUS archives) document the work of the sisters active in education among working-class, minority, and immigrant communities in the Eastern and Southern United States, as well as overseas in Cameroon, Vietnam, Tanzania, Argentina, and the Caribbean.
Sisters of St. Louis USA/Brazil Community Archives (Woodland Hills, CA)
The Sisters of St. Louis are an international community of Catholic women religious founded in Juilly, France in 1842 by Abbé Louis Bautain. The order expanded in 1859 when the first Irish foundation was established in Monaghan, Ireland. The order has since continued to expand, with foundations in Belgium, England, Ghana, and Nigeria, among other places. In 1949, the Sisters of St. Louis arrived in California to begin teaching in Catholic schools in the Los Angeles area, beginning with Nativity School in El Monte, CA. From there, the Sisters began teaching in many other elementary and high schools in the region and expanded their ministries to include many social services. Most recently, the Sisters of St. Louis established a mission in Brazil in 1976.
Sisters of the Presentation of the Blessed Virgin Mary (San Francisco, CA)
The Sisters of the Presentation of the Blessed Virgin Mary Archives reflect the institutional history of the Sisters and their various individual ministries since the time of their foundation in San Francisco, California in 1854 up to present day. The unique historical materials reflect the sisters’ viewpoint of participation in these ministries and that of their relationship to those served through these
ministries. Collections spanning the years since 1854 document the sisters’ lives and their
ministries in California, New Mexico, and Washington; and on sisters’ ministries in response to Vatican II, including mission work in Mexico and Guatemala, and their involvement in social justice issues.
Tacoma Dominicans and Associates (Tacoma, WA)
In May 1893 the Dominican Sisters arrived in Tacoma to establish a school for Saint Patrick Catholic Church. The Tacoma Dominican Sisters began Saint Patrick Catholic School on September 7, 1893 with 70 students enrolled. It was to be the first official free parochial school west of the Mississippi River. The Sisters were to receive support by taking up a collection, in person, during the Masses on the first Sunday of each month. The Sisters of Saint Dominic and Associates minister in Washington, California, and Arizona. Their ministry includes education, parish and hospital ministry, and ministry to the poor, sick, elderly, new immigrants, and women’s empowerment.
Sister B. (Bonnie) Emmanuel Bryant Sky-Arch Hermitage Archive (St. Albans, ME)
The Hermitage was established with the generous support of the California Province of the Society of Jesus, now known as the Jesuits West Province. The Hermitage Archive includes a selection of materials from Sister Emmanuel’s days as a member of the Our Lady of Guadalupe Poor Clare Monastery of Roswell, New Mexico, materials generated during her period of exclaustration from said monastery, and materials generated or acquired in the process of establishing the Hermitage. These materials reflect Sister Emmanuel’s living the eremitical life outside of an institutional congregation but consecrated under Canon 603 under Bishop Joseph Gerry, O.S.G., PhD, of the Diocese of Portland, Maine, devoting her life to God through a stricter withdrawal from the world, the silence of solitude, and assiduous prayer and penance.
The North American Conference of Associates and Religious (NACAR)
NACAR was founded in 1996 as an inter-congregational membership organization that promoted and supported leadership within the associate movement, helping lay women and men find ways to embrace and live the charism of religious communities outside of consecrated life.
Since at least 1965, religious sisters have outnumbered religious priests and brothers by an average of 4 to 1, and yet little has been written about sisters’ work until recent decades. As many religious institutes across the country are preparing for permanent closure, A&SC is one among a number of existing or emerging collaborative archives focused on preserving and making accessible women religious archives.