Making His Merciful Love Visible

We are women of faith, service, and communion.

Founded by Mother M. Anselma in 1869,

our congregation continually seeks to follow her example in "looking upon Him whom we have pierced" (John 19:37).

Grounded and rooted in the love we receive from the Pierced Heart of Christ, our charism of "seeking to make the Merciful Love of Christ visible" imbues and transforms the way we live and love. We are constantly invited to a life of conversion through the example of our Holy Father St. Francis as we seek to fully live our vows of poverty, chastity, and obedience.

The center of our consecrated life is our union with the Heart of Jesus Christ,

renewed and deepened through encountering Him in community and personal prayer.

It is only through this union that we personally encounter the Merciful love of Christ

in order to make it visible to the world through our service.

The mystery of His Merciful Love is often proclaimed through the Gospels, the tradition of the Catholic Church,

and particularly through the witness of the Saints.

In our community, we participate in this mystery through our devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus.

“We want to look always upon Him Whom they have pierced.

In our human limitation we can look only in one direction because we only have two eyes!

Therefore, we must turn away from everything else.

In our vow of Poverty, we turn to God and expect everything from Him.

In Obedience, we listen only to His words.

In the vow of Chastity, we turn completely to Him and expect everything from Him.

We do not only make our vows, but we want to live them seriously; we want to celebrate them.

Only then do they give us life and bring us joy.”

- Mother M. Sixtina Reul, FSGM

O Jesus, a soldier opened your side with his lance, so that through the gaping wound, we might know the charity of your Heart; which loved us unto death, and that we might enter into your unutterable love through the same channel by which it came to us. Approach, then, O my soul, the Heart of Christ, that magnanimous Heart, that hidden Heart, that Heart which thinks of all things and know all things; that loving Heart; all on fire with love. make me understand,

O Lord, that the door of your Heart; was forced open by the vehemence of your love. Allow me to enter intothe secret of that love which was hidden from all eternity, but is now revealed by the wound in your Heart.

~St. Bernardine of Siena, Franciscan

Making His Merciful Love Visible

We are women of faith, service, and communion.

Women's Discernment Retreat