University Press of America
Pages: 206
•
Trim: 6 x 9
978-0-7618-6584-1 • Hardback • May 2015 • $79.00 • (£61.00)
978-0-7618-6585-8 • eBook • May 2015 • $75.00 • (£58.00)
Subjects: History / United States / State & Local / Middle Atlantic (DC, DE, MD, NJ, NY, PA),
History / Social History,
History / Study & Teaching,
History / United States / 20th Century,
Religion / Christian Living / Women's Interests,
History / Women,
History / Oral History,
History / Urban History
Mary Helen Beirne SSJ, EdD, is a trained historian and educational leader. She wrote Ready for Any Good Work with the input of many sisters.
Acknowledgments
Preface
Chapter 1Forging Our Identity: 1650–1944
Chapter 2 Embracing Our Identity: 1944–1965
Chapter 3Rediscovering Our Mission: 1965–1969
Chapter 4Renewing Our Mission: 1969–1979
Chapter 5Expanding Our Mission: 1979–1989
Chapter 6Deepening Our Vision: 1989–1999
Timeline: 1944–1999
General Councils: 1944–1999
This work demonstrates well how religious life for the Sisters of Saint Joseph, Chestnut Hill, evolved over the years. Indeed, given the changes that came about in the Roman Catholic Church during those years, it is more or less true for all congregations of women religious actively involved in ministry outside their congregation. And this study brings home the depth of change that women religious both brought about and experienced. . . .The book is excellent in its detail of how influential the documents of the Second Vatican Council were in reframing religious life and making it more relevant to the twentieth and twenty-first century.
— American Catholic Studies
The Sisters of Saint Joseph play an integral role in the story of Philadelphia Catholicism. Ready for Any Good Work documents the Congregation’s ministries and history . . . in light of Vatican II’s mandate to read the “signs of the time” and the major changes taking place in the Church and Philadelphia during the latter half of the twentieth century. Readers will be especially pleased to note that the authors are not afraid to include topics that may be controversial or painful, such as the numbers of women who left the Congregation in the 1960s and 1970s. Ready for Any Good Work is a valuable addition to the growing history of women religious in the United States.
— Margaret McGuinness, professor of religion, La Salle University