Joan Riedley’s favorite teachers the first 12 years of her life were Ursuline Sisters of Mount Saint Joseph. Of course, all of her teachers were Ursuline Sisters. Perhaps it shouldn’t be a surprise that when it came time for her to choose a religious community, the Ursuline Sisters were the obvious choice. Sister Joan, who…

When Barbara Nell Monaghan was in high school, she took an aptitude test that told her she would make a good inspector. Following her graduation, she moved from her home in Central City, Ky., to Hammond, Ind., where two of her sisters lived. She got a job working at Inland Steel, inspecting large sheets of…

The school year had just ended on June 2, 1954, when Jane Louise Johnson made an appointment with Ursuline Sister Jean Claire Ballard, who was the principal at St. Joseph Catholic School in Mayfield, Ky. The sisters at the school were leaving for Maple Mount the next day, but Sister Jean Claire told Jane Louise…

Sister Catherine Kaufman knew she had a calling to religious life. She just wasn’t sure which community was best for her. She was born Helen Marie Kaufman on the hottest day of 1931 in the tiny town of Dahlgren, Ill., southeast of Mt. Vernon. She was the second child of Charles and Gertrude Kaufman, following…

Ursuline Sister Jane Falke had to grow up fast as the oldest of eight children. With her mother often pregnant with a new sibling, Sister Jane did much housework and gained adult skills at an early age. She’d also learned from her father what it was like to make life-changing decisions at an early age.…

Ursuline Sister Patricia “Pat” Rhoten grew up in a home with no running water in the tiny farming community of Palmyra, Neb. There was a well about 30 steps from the house, and along that path her mother decorated with a white picket fence and rose moss. Along another flower bed her mother put rocks,…

Sister Margaret Marie Greenwell felt called to do something special with her life. She’s glad she chose the Ursuline Sisters of Mount Saint Joseph to make that happen. Sister Margaret Marie was born Mary Helen Greenwell in New Haven, Ky., an area of central Kentucky that is so heavily Catholic it is referred to as…

Sister Judith Nell Riney grew up just a short hike from Mount Saint Joseph, in an extended family that included several Ursuline Sisters. So it isn’t surprising that she says: “I always had the idea of a religious vocation in the back of my mind.” But one person was very surprised – her boyfriend, when…

There’s a song that contains the lyric, “There’s a longing in my heart for God,” which summed up how Ursuline Sister Angela Fitzpatrick felt while growing up. “I was always yearning for something more,” she said. “I felt God near me and calling me.” Sister Angela took the first step toward answering that call when…

Ursuline Sister Marie Goretti Browning was taught by Ursuline Sisters and Sisters of Loretto. Two of her brothers were Passionist priests and her sister, Jane, joined the Ursulines and changed her name to Sister Clarita. But it was none of these people who showed the woman born Isabel Browning that her future should be with…