St. Rose Philippine Duchesne was born in Grenoble, France, in 1769. She joined the Society of the Sacred Heart and in 1818. When she was forty-nine years old, she was sent to the United States. She founded a boarding school for daughters of pioneers near St. Louis and opened the first free school west of the Missouri. At the age of seventy-one, she began a school for Native children, who soon came to call her “the woman who is always praying.” Her biographers have stressed her courage in frontier conditions and her singlemindedness in pursuing her dream of serving Native Americans.
If we were to get a nickname, would it be something like “the woman who is always praying” or “the man who is always charitable” or “the family that is always thinking about others?”
A prayer written by St. Rose Philippine: “Lord, You alone are the Center in which I find rest. Give me Your arm to support me, Your shoulders to carry me, Your breast to lean upon, Your Cross to uphold me, Your Body to nourish me. In You, Lord, I sleep and rest in peace. Amen.”
