Phase Five: Preparations
It must have seemed to Marie that she was constantly finding dead ends. Nevertheless, Father Hugh Kelly, her spiritual guide, encouraged her to draw up more definite plans about the society.
“At the end of my five years-long illness I went again to hospital for an operation, after which they thought there was little hope of my living. During that time my director came in and released my mind greatly by saying I could once more begin to think and pray as regards the work of the missions. From that day, in an extraordinary way, I became stronger. I began to sleep and in a short time I was well enough to leave the hospital. But then I found myself again, with the one great difficulty: the Holy Father had not spoken on religious being allowed to do maternity work and have vows.”
Marie thought about going to Rome, but in 1933 she was able to tell the Pope’s representative in Ireland, Archbishop Paschal Robinson, about her ideas. He said these were an inspiration from God, but not to do anything until the Holy Father spoke. She was disappointed because she had gathered a group of women who were interested to join her “with the one idea.”
“I didn’t know him and I didn’t know how I would get to know him and then I heard that my own doctor happened to be his doctor. So I asked him would he give me an introduction. He met me most graciously. I showed him a little sketch I had written in Africa in 1921.
“He said to me, ‘Miss Martin, that is an inspiration from God, but don’t take one step to become a religious until the Holy Father speaks.’ To cheer me up, he said, ‘That may be either in ten years or a hundred years hence but God will accept your desire to do the work. Don’t even take a house or live together.’
“Monsignor Riberi happened to be His Excellency’s secretary. His Excellency told him of my visit and what my request was. Monsignor Riberi did not quite understand what exactly I needed or what I wanted to do, because he had not been on the missions, but His Excellency Paschal Robinson knew very well and said it was really a work that was very necessary.”
Marie Martin was a woman of discretion. She said, “I came away with his blessing and I knew that God at this moment wanted me to do nothing but to remain unknown and hidden.”
This must have been very difficult but Marie was also astute. She decided to get more spiritual formation. She was very interested in the Benedictine spirit, with its balance of work and prayer; approach to the liturgy; and emphasis on hospitality. She wanted to find a Benedictine monastery to learn the fundamentals.
“Now, I thought, in case it was in ten years that the Holy Father did speak, would it not be well for me to get some spiritual formation for my own soul and later on to have to pass on to my companions, if God ever blessed me with this great desire to be able to have a group of women for the work in Africa? 
I was always greatly interested in Benedictine spirituality and I thought that if I could get somewhere near a Benedictine monastery, somewhere where I could get just the principles and fundamentals of religious life, so as to have a good solid basis, so that afterwards God, in His own way, could form the spirit of the Order in any way he wished to meet the needs of the Church and time – but where to do that I didn’t know. I didn’t know at that time of any Benedictine monastery being in Ireland. So I was thinking of going off to England.”
Phase Four: A Failure?
Marie Martin was a woman of great integrity. She was persuaded to complete her religious training in the Holy Rosary Congregation in Ireland but did not feel she could take her vows at the end. She had always wanted to do medical work and did not believe that she would be doing God’s will in a teaching congregation. From the start she felt she was in the wrong place and left in 1926.
“When I arrived home I was naturally very tired and worn out over three and a half years in Africa. I had taken my vows, private vows to His Lordship, Bishop Shanahan. All that this world had given me, as His vicar, I had given to him, for God. I’d given my obedience. I went to my director and told him of what had happened and he said, ‘The first thing you must do now is to ask to be released of your private vows, for your whole situation has changed.’
Marie went to Bishop Shanahan and told him that she did not feel she would be doing God’s will by entering a teaching congregation. She had always had the idea of doing medical work on the missions and felt that was God’s will for her. He begged her to give it a try. Marie agreed, saying that she would do anything for the missions, but only under one condition: that she enter the new congregation as any postulant or novice would, with the same freedom and that if she didn’t feel it was God’s will she could leave. The bishop consented.
Marie continued,“With that I was released of my private vows and I went to see the Mother Prioress of the convent, who were going to start this new work. I humbly asked for admission and the first thing she said [was], ‘Remember, Miss Martin, if you enter this Order, you’ve got absolutely nothing to do with the founding of it. This has now been given into our hands by Bishop Shanahan and you just enter as a novice or postulant in any other congregation.’
“I said,“Mother, I’m very grateful to hear those words because I feel this is the only way I could enter, because … I do not feel that it is God’s will for me, but the bishop has asked me to give it a trial and I am only willing to do so.’
Marie entered the congregation at Killeshandra and did her postulancy. For a long time she felt she was in the wrong place, but her director told her to continue. She finished her spiritual year and felt the same way, but again her director told her to continue. She complied but said,“I finished my second year but I could not take my vows for I did not feel I was doing the will of God.”
Marie later saw God’s providence working because she had completed her novitiate but at this point she again felt uncertain and confused. With so many obstacles in the way of starting a women’s medical missionary group, she decided to devote her life to prayer.
“I therefore left and found myself in the same position, not knowing what to do. We could not be religious at that time and undertake the works that were nearest to my heart and that was the care of the mother and child at childbirth. So I thought the best thing to do was to enter Carmel.”
She applied to the Carmelites, who told her that she had to get all the votes of the religious in the house and to come back for their answer. When she returned on Easter Tuesday she met the prioress, who told her she had all the votes. Marie was thankful that she could now give her life in prayer and sacrifice that someday God will find someone to start a congregation for the care of the mother and child in mission countries.
The prioress said, “While you have the votes I’m afraid I can’t accept you. After Mass this morning I got a very strong inspiration that I should advise you not to enter here, but to persevere in trying to find an order that would do the work that you see and believe so necessary for the Catholic missions.”
Many people would have given up but Marie was undeterred. In Scotland she met a priest, Father Agius, SJ, who said he was founding a medical missionary Order.
Marie said, “I was disappointed. I went back to my director and told him … that during the time that I’d been waiting for my answer from Carmel I’d been over to Scotland, where I‘d heard of them founding an Order which seemed very like that I was dreaming about. I met the director, who was a Jesuit. He told me all about the work, that they were going to have vows, that they were going to do all branches of medical work, and that they were going on the missions.
Her director advised her to go back for a year. If she believed that it would fulfil the work necessary for the missions she should remain. If not, she should come home.
Marie helped out at a hostel that Father Agius had started. The work was very hard and there was no religious training. She begged the priest to leave the work, or to get others to do it for a year or two, until the women who wanted to join had religious training. He did not agree so the women left, often leaving Marie practically alone. She returned to Ireland in 1929, her health broken down, and for the next five years she was an invalid.
Marie said, “I was broken down in mind and body and heart. I didn’t know what to do or what to think and all I could do was suffer with Our Divine Lord and ask Him to show me clearly what he wanted. During that time … I began to think and pray and formulate, and yet my director said it could never be that a religious with vows could do maternity work. So I put it out of my head and I just thought I was a failure and that nothing could be done but to live at home, where I got strong. At that time the doctors thought I would never be able for any active work again. However, God has His own ways of doing things.”
Phase Three: Lay missionary
Marie was a courageous woman who expected the same of all MMMs. She was also very persistent. One day a priest, Father Thomas Ronayne, asked her if she had ever thought of doing some work for God. The priest asked if she would think of helping a Bishop Shanahan, home from Nigeria, who was looking for religious women for his area.
“I continued on nursing among the poor in our own parish and one day went to confession to a priest whom I knew very well and he said to me, ‘Have you ever thought of giving yourself to God and doing some work for Him?’
“So I said, ‘Yes, Father, I have been thinking but I wonder am I worthy of such a call and I don’t know where to go or how to begin. I’m not very much attracted to any of the Orders I know.’
“And the priest said, ‘What about the missions? There is a bishop over here now from Nigeria. He has been all around Ireland looking for religious, anyone to go out and to take the place of the Sisters of Cluny who had been in his vicariate, but had to leave as they had not enough Sisters. He wants religious. He can’t get them. Would you think of going out and helping him?’ And he gave me his address and I thought I’d go down and see him.”
“I went home. I didn’t say much about it then to Mother. I went down to see Bishop Shanahan and he told me his story.”
The bishop told her that where he was in Africa there was no one to care for women and babies at birth or care for the sick. She offered to help, saying she had very little to give, but she loved God and people.
“So to get rid of me, he said, “That’s a very big thing.” He said, “Go off. Come back again in a week’s time and then I’ll give you my answer.”
“So I went away and I prayed as I never prayed before, that if it was God’s will that I would get out to Africa and help the people out there until such a time as he was able to get a religious Order. I came back sharp to the clock of eleven o’clock on that Tuesday morning. The bishop opened the door himself.
“Oh,” he said, “I’ve been praying I wouldn’t see you again. I don’t know how I could ever do what you want.”
The bishop did not encourage her but Marie said she was not afraid to go alone. If she trained in midwifery, she could be ready in six months. He said he would discuss it with his council in Africa and Marie should do her training.
“He went to Africa. I went to the National Maternity Hospital in Dublin, delighted to be starting some real work which would help to bring to, I hope, pagan countries the great gift we have in Ireland of the Christian family. The home is, as you all know, the basis of all Christianity. Where the home is Christian, all else will flow from that.
“So I went in and there I was doing my training, and while I was there, there was another lady who was doing her medicine [Agnes Ryan, a medical student]. She heard of my intentions and she, too, thought she might like to come. So we waited for the bishop to send me an answer and one day I got a cable: ‘Urgently needed if you do not mind coming alone.’
“Well, I didn’t feel my vocation depended on anyone but God, so naturally I didn’t mind going alone, but in the meantime to make things easier for the bishop, this girl had also volunteered to come with me. So I cabled back that I was ready to go alone, but if he could accept a companion I thought I had one that would come with me. We finished our course. We sailed off to Africa and when we arrived at Calabar, there we were met by the priest who had originally advised me to meet Bishop Shanahan.”
Marie Martin was a woman undaunted by obstacles. Marie and Agnes finished their courses and sailed to Africa in 1921. When they arrived in Nigeria, they were told they were not being asked to do medical work but to run a school and to teach catechism.
“He said, ‘I have bad news because I’m afraid you’re not going to be asked to do medical work. The bishop wants you to take on a school of four hundred children, girls, and five hundred women for catechism.’
“I looked at him. ‘Father, you know I couldn’t teach. I’ve no qualifications for teaching.’ And I looked to my friend and I knew she was a B.A., an M.A, with all the qualifications that this world can give, but she was a bit disappointed. I said to her, ‘After all, the world wasn’t redeemed though great works. Whatever obedience asks, let us do.’ And this was our ticket off the boat. Once the priest heard that we were ready to do what the bishop wanted he was very willing to take us off and to bring us up to the bishop and handed over the Saint Joseph’s School in Calabar Province.”
Though disappointed, Marie taught catechism while Agnes managed the school. After a few months Agnes became ill and went home. Marie now worked with the people of Calabar as best she could and the people looked after her.
“There we worked together for a very short time. I, not being an educationalist, took charge of the convent, of the catechumens, and of the house girls, while she took all the work of the schools. We were only working a very short time together when she got ill, and so ill that after two months, the doctor advised she went home. So I was left alone with my Africans and there we worked together…
“We had five hundred women at night to teach catechism to, and they, too, were all beginning to lose their fervour and their ideals, but I worked among them as best I could. I travelled right through the country of Nigeria, through the bush. Many a time living in a little house with no windows or no doors, the wild animals all around, and my only companions were five African girls. But how they looked after me! … They lit a fire and one watched at night to see that nothing would happen … These are the people that I saw and longed to have some Congregation, some group of women, who would love them and who would sacrifice their very lives to give them the gift that we ourselves have. How it was to be done, I did not know.”
In Nigeria Marie met people in great need of health care, especially for women in childbirth and for children. She knew one of the obstacles at that time was the Church’s ban on women religious practicing surgery or obstetrics. She stayed for three and a half years. During that time she met Bishop Shanahan and his council to discuss founding a missionary congregation for women in Nigeria. Marie was to be the foundress.
“In God’s providence, after three years a Sister of Charity [Sister Mary Charles Walker] came out to relieve me, because the bishop in the meantime had been to Rome and told them of my idea of having a congregation specially dedicated to Our Lady for the care of the mother and the child. And the advice he got was that I remain in Africa and did my novitiate there, she to be my novice mistress. She also had to take over all the work of that parish.”
It now seemed that Marie’s dream was being realized and she began her religious training in Nigeria. She was about to receive her habit when a telegram arrived.
“I entered my novitiate and I was just about to receive my habit when a cable came from Ireland. First of all [when] I saw this cable, my first thought was my mother, that she was dead. So I went into the Blessed Sacrament and before opening it I said, ‘Dear Lord, give me the grace to accept this as you would.’ 
And then with courage I opened the cable and before reading it I looked down to see who it was from. I saw it was the bishop so I read with a heart free. And this was from him, saying, ‘Come home and join the novitiate’, which was being organized or started by the Dominican nuns. I looked at the tabernacle and there I immediately remembered the life and the words of Our Lord: ‘I came on this earth to do the will of my Father who is in heaven.’
“Come home.” Bishop Shanahan had changed his mind, deciding to begin the new society in Ireland. Dominican Sisters in Dublin would now be responsible for the foundation. Marie later described this as the hardest obedience in her life. She was a woman of tremendous faith. Now she was sustained by remembering the words of Jesus.
“I therefore, before leaving the chapel, promised Our Divine Lord I would go home by the next boat. ‘Twas lucky I did, for when I went out and I told Mother [Sister Mary Charles] of my decision and of the cable, she was naturally very distressed because she was going to be left alone in the country with all the work to do. After a short time she saw I was right, but then when I met the priests, they said, ‘Oh, if you go home there will never be a congregation of medical missionaries.’
“I said, ‘Father, obedience will never stop any work. If God wishes this, nothing will stop it.’ Therefore I prepared myself and I went home by the next boat.”
Phase Two: War
World War I began while Marie was still trying to decide what to do next. She saw an opportunity to do good and break away from home so she started Red Cross nurse training. Soon after, fighting started in the Turkish peninsula of Gallipoli and two of her brothers, Tommy and Charlie, were deployed there.
“’Now, what to do?’ That was the question I kept asking myself. I loved home and I knew I was going to find the sacrifice of parting with Mother a great, great sacrifice. So I kept praying and then the Great War came, and I thought, well, now here is an opportunity of going out to do good and at the same time to break away from home. And that by breaking away from those we love, that I would more clearly see the will of our Divine Lord, Jesus Christ. So I volunteered and not knowing much about nursing I thought it would be a good plan to be trained first. So I got entrance into one of the large hospitals in Dublin to start my training. I was only there a year when I was called. Gallipoli had started. My brothers had gone there and … much help was needed. So all those who entered as Red Cross nurses in this hospital were asked to volunteer for Gallipoli. We were all ready. We went out.”
She sailed for Malta in October 1915 and was posted to a military hospital, where soldiers wounded at Gallipoli were brought. While there, Marie learned that her brothers were wounded and that Charlie was missing in action.
In 1916, Marie was sent to nurse in France and cared for soldiers suffering from gas poisoning and terrible mental wounds. She could hear the roar from the front line throughout the terrible Battle of the Somme. One evening she got the news that Charlie had died. Grief-stricken herself, in a letter home she tried to comfort her mother.
She wrote,“It is really impossible to realize that we shall never see his dear face again.”
Marie Martin was a woman who experienced the horrors and carnage of war.
“When Gallipoli was finished, then we were sent to France. From there I came home once again to my happy home. One of my brothers had been killed and the other seriously wounded. But I got the welcome from Mother. She was so glad to have me back. But during that time in France I saw what one can do nursing, as a nurse. I just thought, what a wonderful thing it would be if we could have a group of women dedicated to God, heart and soul, with only one thought, to love Him and to love souls, and through that to give them the comfort of the Catholic Church. How this was to be done I’d no idea but that stuck in my mind so I prayed and waited.”
Mother Mary’s Story
Marie Martin: Foundress of the Medical Missionaries of Mary
Marie Martin was a pioneer in health services, in women’s development and education, and in women’s religious life. In a public address she gave in Boston in 1952, she expressed concern about telling the story of how MMM began because, she said, “It is a very simple one, so simple that I really feel it may not interest you.”
The story was far from simple. She encountered many difficulties on the long road to founding the Medical Missionaries of Mary. Her vision was clear: dedicated women were needed, women who would bring health care to places where there was none, and would give particular care to women and children. She wanted the group to be international from the beginning.
This frail woman was a person of faith and courage, with a deep love of God and other people. She welcomed diversity and saw the need for MMMs to have freedom to make decisions, to be courageous, and to be professional in their work. This required a deep spirituality. 
At the time, for her and for others who shared her ideas, it was radical thinking.
Marie Martin was deeply human and often felt confusion when the way was not clear and frustration when she was misunderstood. Above all she wanted to discover and follow God’s will in her life. It was an improbable story. When you read about that story you will realize just how improbable it was.
In the following account, Mother Mary’s own words are noted in black.
Phase One: Backdrop
Who was this woman who inspired women from all over the world to bring hope and the healing love of God to millions? Born in Ireland in 1892, the second eldest of twelve children, Marie loved her home and family. She enjoyed the social whirl.
As in every family there were difficult moments. After a drive home during a snowstorm when she was twelve, Marie contracted rheumatic fever. When she was fifteen, her father, a wealthy merchant, was killed in a shooting accident.
“I was once a young girl and I lived at home, in a very happy home. I was one of twelve children and happened to be the eldest girl, with eight brothers, so you can imagine the number of times my hair was pulled. But we enjoyed life and we were all very happy together. I went to school, but only when I was fourteen years of age, as I had been very delicate and had rheumatic fever and therefore was not allowed to do any much schooling. And even when I went to school I was most of the time being cured of my rheumatism, in a place called Harrogate with the Holy Child Jesus nuns. When I came home, what was I going to do with my life?
“I was very fond of nursing the sick and the poor, so when I had all my home duties done and being at home with my brothers at night, Mother used to allow me to go out and visit the sick and poor, but our first duty was our home, for she always said to us, “Now girls, if you at home you will also have the brothers. If not, you will find they will be going to clubs, etc.” So we all dined together every night and about half past ten or eleven, when I felt I had done my part, I used to go out then and visit all the poor people of the parish, settle them down for the night, the cancer cases, the tuberculosis cases, those who were suffering, preparing for death. As I’d go I just wondered what I should do with my life and I prayed and asked God to show me His will.”
This was a passionate woman who fell in love and thought seriously of marriage.
“I was very fond of life. I enjoyed everything: tennis parties, dances, and so on, just like every normal girl. I thought the marriage vocation was a wonderful one. I only thought of my mother, she, the mother of twelve children, twelve souls for God. Oh, what a vocation! Could I be that? And I had determined that if it was God’s will that I would get married and be like Mother.”
Marie Martin was a woman who had a profound relationship with God. A turning point in her life came one day during a visit to the local church.
“Each day before I went into town I used to call in and pay a visit to the Friend of friends and tell Him of all my ideas. This day I was going in, and strange to say, I was thinking more seriously about the matter and I just fell to the foot of the altar and I told Our Lord about my anxiety and my ideas for the future, asking Him to let me know what He would wish and like a flash I saw that if I became a religious, and especially a missionary, I would be the mother of millions and millions of souls. I made up my mind then and there 
that with God’s help that I would go and offer myself somewhere to do mission work and to be the mother of souls and if He was good enough to call me to be His spouse.
“I left the chapel. I went into town and I met my friend, and as you know I had my mind made up by then: marriage was out of the question.”
Years after founding the Medical Missionaries of Mary, Marie said of Gerald, “He was the person I most loved in all the world.”
The following are excerpts from the introduction to a larger publication, The Seed of an Idea, that was published in 1984.
The Seed of an Idea
(Written by Sister Ruth Carey, first published on the occasion of the death of Mother Martin, January 1975)
The ancient heroic Irish saga, the Fianna, relates that on an occasion, Finn, the hero-leader was asked what music he liked best. He spoke of the song of the blackbird, the screaming of the eagle, the sound of the waterfall, the baying of the hounds. But when Oisin, the poetic dreamer, was asked what music delighted him, he replied: ‘The music of the thing that happens.’
For nearly forty years the friends of the Medical Missionaries of Mary have been listening to Oisin’s favourite music; indeed, they have been creating it – mostly in tempo rapido, providing an occasional crashing crescendo, with rare, very rare periods of andante, the musicians moderately slow. Never has the tempo been lento, never has the time been slow. Most of you were personal friends of the Foundress of MMM, the late Mother Mary Martin, and associate her immediately with “the music of the thing that happens”, a routine of one thing after another and sometimes everything at once. So looking back on her life it is difficult – even for us – to believe that there was a time when MMM did not exist, that it was not ever thus, or that its emergence was preceded at one time by a long period of what seemed eternal waiting – the years from 1918 to 1937. These were the years when the future Mother Mary was 26-44 years of age. To hang on to an uncertain ideal during that span of a woman’s life is in itself not without significance; when there was nothing to do but wait.
An ironic fact about war is that while it hastens the development of destructive forces, it also hastens the development of more positive forces that constructively influence a later day. So it was in the case of the Foundress of the Medical Missionaries of Mary. At 25 years of age, auburn haired and vivacious, she had returned from World War I full of her experiences as a Voluntary Aid Defence nurse; and also full of an idea.
Our western civilisation today rests on ideas; ideas originally voiced before a handful of men. The Greek philosophers spoke their ideas to those who stood nearby. The ideas of these men were so great they spread almost of their own inherent force. It has ever been so with ideas – little ideas which may have been shouted loudly to the multitudes soon fell by the wayside, but ideas spoken softly to the few flourished and grew. It was thus with the ideas engendered in that slightly built, rather frail young “war veteran”. Her idea was a vivid realisation of the enormous apostolic possibilities of medical work. Her experience nursing war wounded opened her eyes, very round and very blue, on medical missionary horizons. She could see it all. Time would tell whether or not her idea came from God, and whether or not He would use her to translate it into reality.
Many important missionaries had already shared this vision. But all were powerless to do anything towards making it a reality, because since the Middle Ages, religious were not allowed to engage in surgery or obstetrics, and this applied equally to religious men and women. Many missionaries had represented the need, and the urgency of the need, for medical missionaries. Rome was examining the whole question. The question was: what was the place of medical work in the missions? Secondly, who should do the work? Thirdly, how were they going to be trained? Fourthly, are Sisters suitable at all for this kind of work? Fifthly, if they are, to what extent can they do it? These were the fences, but the young girl back from the war saw only the horizons. All avenues she explored to reach her goal turned out to be blind alleys, fruitless efforts leading nowhere, long years when life seemed to be merely passing by. The trial and error, the waiting, the atmosphere of it all. We want to share with you now some ideas “spoken softly to the few” and taken from our house annals. They cover one period of “waiting” – the last, although she did not know it – in the future Mother Mary’s efforts to found a congregation of religious Sisters who would devote themselves to the medical apostolate in mission lands.
The size of an idea – with Benedictine Spirituality
This period begins in Grafton Street, Dublin. The future Mother Mary was out shopping and met her aunt who was on a similar errand. In an exchange of ‘news’ her aunt told her of the troubles of her friend, Dom Gerard Francois, the Prior of the Benedictine Priory, as it then was, at Glenstal, Co. Limerick. Glenstal was a rambling castle built on Norman lines and owned by the Barrington family. In 1927 it had been taken over by a handful of monks from the Benedictine Abbey of Maredsous, Belgium, and founded as a Benedictine Priory in honour of their Irish Abbot, Dom Columba Marmion, who had died there four years previously and in fulfilment of his cherished dream of seeing the Benedictines back in Ireland. (The Benedictine monasteries in Ireland had been entirely destroyed during the Reformation.)…
The size of an idea – shared. “Spoken softly to the few”
At the interview, Mother Mary told the Prior of her idea for founding a medical Congregation She offered her services to the College and in recompense asked that, while living as seculars, because on the question of religious doing full medical work no pronouncement had been made by Rome so far, she and her future companions would receive some education in the spiritual and religious life. The Prior was delighted. All necessary permissions were requested, and granted.
The idea planted
March 1, 1934. Mother Mary went to Glenstal and on the Feast of Saint Joseph, March 19, she was joined by her first companion, now Sister Mary Patrick, MMM, who apart from routine vacations has given the thirty best years of her life to the missions.
March 21, Feast of Saint Benedict. She and Mother Mary took over the management of the boy’s college.
For the future MMM it marked a decisive stage in the development of the beginnings, although this fact was still hidden from their eyes. For Glenstal, it marked the end of a period of domestic embarrassment – but unfortunately not of uncertainty.
The idea germinating
“A grain of wheat must fall into the ground and die. . . but if it dies it yields rich fruit” Jn. 12:24.
All went well for a few weeks. Then the future Sister M. Patrick’s father fell ill and she had to go home. Months went by before she could return and it was not until mid-August that they were settled in once more. All went well again – for another two weeks during which they were busy preparing for the boys’ return to college in September. Then an accident happened to Mother Mary. One day, when going through the boys’ dormitories with Dom Bede Lebbe, who was then Prior, a radiator which was loose from the wall fell on her right foot and crushed the toes very badly. With all the speed possible at that time, she was taken from Glenstal to St. Vincent’s Hospital, Dublin. After a short time her condition became alarmingly serious. Penicillin was not yet on the market, antibiotics as we know them today were non-existent. Gangrene set in. Would the leg have to be amputated? Yes, the surgeon said. The physician thought no – the heart would not stand the operation. After much cogitation, discussion and conferences, the leg was saved and three toes were amputated.
Christmas 1934, the patient still very far from recovery and facing the long pull back to health, was discharged from hospital and went to convalesce with her mother at home in Greenbank, Monkstown, Dublin. In the new year, Mother Mary consulted Father Hugh Kelly, S.J., her spiritual director, and Dom David Maffei, Sub-Prior and Novice Master at Glenstal, who was appointed to look after the nucleus of the Congregation. It was decided that the future Sister Patrick and another young girl who had offered herself, now Sister M. Magdalen, MMM, who has devoted most of her religious life so far to promotion work for the Congregation, should continue at Glenstal under the spiritual guidance and help of Dom David, until Mother Mary was able to return. February 12, 1935, Dom David started his formal instructions on the religious life. And thus the last stage is revealed with Mother Mary convalescing in her home, and the two pioneers being educated in the religious life at Glenstal….
In the years 1918-34 Miss Martin was nurturing her idea and putting it into practice at a personal level. Shortly after her return from World War I she met Bishop Joseph Shanahan, C.S.Sp., Vicar Apostolic of Calabar, E. Nigeria, and responded to his appeal for the very work she had visualised, the care of mothers and babies. She trained as a midwife and sailed for Nigeria in May 1921. There she worked for three years in closest contact with African women.
Her years there convinced her of the urgent need for competent medical help on the missions, especially for maternity work. While waiting for permission she did what she could to prepare for the day when the congregation of Medical Missionaries of Mary, which she felt it was her charism to found, could be established with the approval and blessing of the Church.’…
June 25, 1935. Mother Mary left Dublin by the evening train and arrived in Glenstal when all were at Compline, and in the midst of a thunderstorm. It was a surprise for the staff for they were not expecting her. She was very happy to be back and received a great welcome from Dom Bede Lebbe, Dom David, Father John, the Cellarer, as well as from the two future MMMs of course. She looked very frail and thin and was very weak after her long illness. She was lame and could not wear a proper shoe on her injured foot, but wore a cloth one instead.
November, 1935. The little community could now live a more regular religious life with their order of time, hours of prayer and regular spiritual instruction. Dom Bede Lebbe, the Prior, had a great influence on the future MMM. As a friend and monk of Abbot Marmion he had made his own that great master’s spirituality. Dom Lebbe was himself a scholar of European fame with a Doctorate in Literature and Music and was in himself the essence of humility and simplicity, he had a very human character and was always bubbling over with joy. At this time he was a great help to Mother Mary and he in turn depended very much on her for the management of the College.
February, 1936. Mother Mary went to Kylemore Abbey, Co. Galway, to make an eight-day retreat which Dom Bede Lebbe was giving to the Benedictine nuns. The morning Mother Mary came out of retreat Dorn Bede Lebbe handed her a copy of the Universe which gave with banner headlines, a copy of the decree issued from the Sacred Congregation of Propaganda Fide, Rome, allowing religious women to do maternity work and also full medical and surgical work; in fact, the right to practice medicine in all its branches.
The Sacred Congregation said that its practice had always been to have the methods of the apostolate conform to the varying needs of time and place; that the significance of medical work, especially maternity work, had been brought home to it by reports from Bishops, Vicars Apostolic and missionaries all over the wide mission fields of the world, and that after mature study it had decided that medical work, especially for women and children, should have better provision made for it in the future. Consequently it expressed the desire for the foundation of new religious institutes of women who would dedicate themselves principally to that work, and the wish that already existing institutes should take on this work also. It emphasised the necessity for the best and most-up-to-date equipment and training. It insisted that all that concerned the spiritual education and security of such religious should be abundantly guaranteed. This decree is a landmark in the history of Catholic missions and was decisive in the history of MMM. To Mother Mary it was like a direct and gracious answer to her prayers and years of waiting. Now “the stone was rolled back”. With this instruction she felt she had the full support of the Church for her work.
In Glenstal, the future MMMs also read the decree in the paper and praised and thanked God that the way was now open.
Mother Mary returned to Glenstal and all rejoiced together. Then she went to Dublin to consult with the Apostolic Nuncio about the steps to be taken. He suggested she should write to Rome, which she did, stating her aims and ideals, and that she already had a nucleus to begin with.
The Size of an Idea
May 11, 1936. Permission came from Rome to found the Congregation. The following letter from Mother Mary at Glenstal to two MMM students in Holles Street Maternity Hospital, Dublin, gives news of it.
“God be forever praised, loved and thanked in all things. This morning Father Prior received an answer to our humble petition. This is the chief part, I shall show you the whole letter when I see you on Thursday, please God, when I shall be in Dublin.
“We shall need great prayer now – first of thanksgiving and then of petition, that we may be guided in all the steps we take to carry out the instructions of the Sacred Congregation of Propaganda Fide; to find a Bishop and then a nun to train us. God will give us all, and you will see, vocations also. Praise God in all you do in love and gratitude.
“I must end up this letter now as I have so many to write today. I shall see you this week please God. All send their love to you.”
Mother Mary and the little group had planned to leave Glenstal by September 1936 and in the meantime, while negotiating to get placed in a diocese, Mother Mary’s mother, Mrs. Martin, came to the rescue and offered her a basement not in use in her home “Greenbank”, Monkstown, Dublin, as a temporary residence. Miss Ethel Martin, Mother Mary’s sister, who was always willing to lend a helping hand, helped to fix up the temporary quarters for the Sisters at Greenbank while her brothers regarded the whole affair much as most’ brothers would. By this time there was a community’ of five counting two newcomers in training in Holles Street Maternity Hospital, Dublin, who now came to Greenbank basement for their days and nights off.
Hardly had they settled in here when events took another sudden turn. In September 1936, His Excellency Archbishop Antonio Riberi, Apostolic Delegate to East and West Africa, came on a visit to His Excellency the Nuncio, Dr. Paschal Robinson, at Dublin. When Mother Mary had visited the Nuncio in 1933, Monsignor Riberi had been the Nuncio’s secretary. In the meantime, as Apostolic Delegate in mission territories he had seen for himself the urgent need of medical missionaries in all the missions he had visited. He hardly needed a serious motor accident to persuade him further, but he had one, and difficulties of hospitalisation drove the lesson home. So, one of the first things he did when he arrived in Ireland was to enquire from His Excellency the Nuncio if that lady was going ahead with the contemplated work. She went to see him and told him how far she had got and the present situation.
His Excellency, Archbishop Riberi, there and then suggested she should go to Africa and make the foundation and first novitiate there. he was due for visitation in Nigeria, and if the Vicar Apostolic of Calabar agreed to having the Congregation erected in his Vicariate, the providential visit of His Excellency would permit this to be done with the minimum of delay. The vicar Apostolic, Monsignor Moynagh cabled: “Come sailing in December”. Three passages were booked on the Abosso. A little farewell party was held in the basement kitchen at Greenbank. Dom Bede Lebbe, Father Hugh Kelly, S.J. (Mother Mary’s spiritual director) and Miss Ryder, constant friend and provider, were there. The following year in his Christmas letter to Mother Mary, Dom Bede referred to it: “I remember the nice reunion of last year, in the kitchen -so much joy and charity, so many hopes: and now some are fulfilled. You are three professed! All the rest will come in His time”.
Meantime the Annals relate exciting events:
January 18, 1937. Mother Mary and her two companions arrived in Africa. By February 6, 1937, all three were settled in their new home in Anua, 30 miles by road followed by an hour by launch from Calabar, where the Prefect Apostolic Monsignor Moynagh resided.
Saturday, February 20, 1937. The Apostolic Delegate Archbishop Riberi arrived. He came over from the mission with his secretary and Monsignor Moynagh to see Mother Mary and had a long discussion regarding plans for the future. She stayed up late that night preparing data for Monsignor next morning as he had to prepare his statements for Rome.
Saturday, February 27, 1937. Mother Mary did not feel well.
Sunday, February 28, 1937. Mother Mary was not able to stay for Mass and had to retire to bed.
March 2, 1937. Monsignor Moynagh came with the letters and petitions ready for Rome.
Wednesday, March 3, 1937. Mother Mary got a heart attack at 11 p.m. Miss Powell and Miss Darcy (two nurses from Ireland helping in the mission hospital) and Doctor Dunleavy were called. During the night, at Mother’s own wish, Monsignor Moynagh was sent for and he came and gave her the last Sacraments. She feared she was dying and said good-bye to the Sisters. She was happy and at peace.
Thursday, March 4, 1937. Mother Mary feeling a little better today. Doctor Dunleavy came to see her. He himself was not feeling well and went to bed after doing the Dispensary.
Friday, March 5, 1937. His Excellency Archbishop Riberi came to visit Mother Mary and gave her great hopes of an early reply from Rome. Doctor Dunleavy very ill. Nurse Darcy stayed up with him all night.
Saturday, March 6, 1937. His Excellency Archbishop Riberi left this morning. Monsignor Moynagh went with him as far as Emekuku and brought back Doctor Noeth, a German mission doctor, to see Mother Mary and Doctor Dunleavy.
Sunday, March 7, 1937. Doctor Noeth advised sending Doctor Dunleavy to the Government Hospital at Port Harcourt. He was taken there that same day.
Tuesday, March 9, 1937. We got a terrible shock today when news came from Port Harcourt that Doctor Dunleavy had died. R.I.P. The remains were taken from Port Harcourt to Anua.
Wednesday, March 10, 1937. Solemn Requiem Mass at 8 a.m. for Doctor Dunleavy and the funeral took place afterwards. He was buried in the mission compound.
Sunday, March 14, 1937. Mother Mary running a temperature of 102 today and feeling very weak.
Monday, March 15, 1937. Mother Mary very ill today, still running a high temperature.
Tuesday, March 16, 1937. Mother Mary still very ill. We wired Doctor Noeth to come, which he did in the evening. He gave us good hope.
Wednesday, March 17, 1937 (St. Patrick’s Day). Mother Mary was poorly today and Doctor Noeth had to return to his mission hospital.
Monday, March 22, 1937. Monsignor Moynagh wired for Doctor Noeth again although Mother Mary is feeling a bit better but very weak.
Tuesday, March 23, 1937. Doctor Noeth came today and arranged for Mother to go to the Government Hospital in Port Harcourt on Thursday. He advises she goes home.
Thursday, March 25, 1937. Holy Thursday and Feast of the Annunciation. Father McGettrick came over about 5.15 a.m. and brought Mother Mary Holy Communion. He came back later with a car and they set out for Port Harcourt, the future Sister M. Magdalen going with them. Doctor Noeth joined them en route at Aba. When the hospital doctor, Doctor Braithwaithe, saw the patient he said she must go home on the next boat.
March 26, 1937 Good Friday. We went to the ceremonies in the mission. All is so quiet and still after the anxious events of the last few weeks. We are wondering how Mother Mary is today.
March 27, 1937 Holy Saturday. Monsignor Moynagh came from Calabar. He was very anxious about Mother and said he would consult Archbishop Riberi who was in Onitsha about cabling Rome regarding the petitions. The whole suspense and anxiety is caused by the fact that she would have to leave for home before the reply came. Monsignor said he would not take the responsibility of keeping her if the doctors advised against it.
March 29, 1937 Easter Monday. We are still in suspense, no news of Mother, no news from Rome. The hospital and dispensary are closed, everything very still and quiet.
March 30, 1937 Easter Tuesday. Great news and jubilation. The reply from Rome has come to Monsignor Moynagh, all petitions are granted. Laus Deo. The Congregation was to be canonically erected, Mother Mary professed, and her two companions to do six months canonical Novitiate.
March 31, 1937 Easter Wednesday. A wire came from Mother Mary today to say she had received good news from Monsignor Moynagh. We recited the Magnificat and Te Deum.
April 2, 1937 Easter Friday. Monsignor Moynagh arrived from Calabar today. He was very happy over the good news from Rome. He said he could not give any decision on anything until he saw Mother Mary. He was going to Port Harcourt next day and was anxious for her Profession straight away. We said it might be possible that we should not be there owing to the difficulty of transport and accommodation.
April 3, 1937 Easter Saturday. Monsignor Moynagh, Father Cullen, Mother M. Fidelis and Mother M. Bernard of the Society of the Holy Child, went to Port Harcourt today.
April 4, 1937 Low Sunday. Mother Mary was professed today in Port Harcourt Hospital. MMM is canonically erected. Te Deum laudamus.
The details of the little ceremony are best summarised in Mother Mary’s letter home, to her mother in “Greenbank”.
Catholic Medical Mission,
European Hospital,
Port Harcourt,
Southern Nigeria.
April 6, 1937.
My dearest Mother,
With joy I write to tell you of the great news. MMM has been erected and I was professed on Low Sunday. The infant society was born in a hospital. By kind permission of Doctor Braithwaithe, Monsignor Moynagh had Mass and the beautiful little ceremony. Nothing could have pleased me more, it was so hidden and so simple. I took for my name Sister Mary of the Incarnation. Miss O’Rourke and Miss Moynagh have been asked to make great acts of detachment for they were not present at the ceremony. The Reverend Mother (Mother M. Fidelis, SHCJ) and Mother M. Bernard, SHCJ, our Novice Mistress had to be there. Also two of the Killeshandra nuns came for it.
It is naturally a great consolation after all these years to have the approval of the Holy Father, the Church, and to be a Spouse of Christ in a medical missionary society. Now, the great responsibility begins and the hard work, but I shall with God’s help go forward as I did in the past with absolute trust and confidence in God’s loving Providence renewed in courage and strength knowing He will complete the work He has begun.
You will be anxious to hear about my health: it is improving slowly. The great difficulty is to gain much strength in this great heat. I hope in a day or two to be able to dress and walk about a bit so as to be on my legs before sailing which will be on April 21. I will tell you all in detail when I get home. It is a wonderful little story and all arranged by God.
…
Your devoted child in Jesus & Mary,
Sister Mary of the Incarnation
(Sister Mary Martin MMM)
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Since the early years when our MMM’s Founder Mother Mary Martin began the Congregation in 1937, the Sisters have been in the news and making headlines. Mainly because of our overseas work and pioneering spirit, the Sisters are often featured in news or media stories.
Here is a sample of some of the stories told about MMM Sisters in the news.
Sister Sheila along with other walkers taking “Steps for Hope.”
Medical Missionaries of Mary’s new awareness event for Lent (Drogheda Life)
The former Bakhita House, in Malden, Massachusetts, was home to human trafficking survivors
and the sisters from Boston congregations who helped them recover. >>> more
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Nationality: Irish
Congregational Register No: 96
D.O.B. 10.04.1919
First Profession: 18.03.1946
Died: 22.05.2006 Aged: 87 years
Anne Teresa Bennett was born in Milltownpass in County Westmeath, Ireland. She had three sisters and one brother. Anne was educated at the at the local Mercy Convent and after leaving school helped out both at home and in the family-owned shop, before she entered MMM in 1943, aged 24. In religion Anne took the name Sr. Mary Annunciata.
Nationality: Czech
Congregational Register No: 192
D.O.B. 16.08.1922
First Profession: 08.09.1950
Died: 06.02.1992 Aged: 69 years
Caritas, baptised Marie, came from Czechoslovakia and first heard of MMM when she arrived in Rome as a refugee. Because she was already in the field of nursing, she felt attracted to the healing mission of the congregation.
