Portal:Christianity/Selected biography/January 2006

  Blessed Mary MacKillop (1842 - 1909) was the first (and to date the only) Australian to be beatified. In 1867, she and South Australian priest Father Julian Tenison Woods set up a new order called the Sisters of St Joseph, a charitable organisation which soon set up schools, providences for the elderly and refuges for single mothers and children all over Australia and New Zealand. MacKillop experienced many difficulties with Australian bishops, who were outraged at her refusal to give them power over the order; she was even excommunicated because of this. She was soon exonerated however, and continued her inspiring work right until her death.

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