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Australia’s next saint may be a Sydney woman who died of spinal tuberculosis in 1920 at the age of 28.
On Tuesday, Eileen O’Connor was officially awarded the title of ‘Servant of God’ by the Vatican. This is the first of the steps to be taken before a person can be declared a saint.
The official process for declaring O’Connor a saint began in March this year after the Archbishop of Sydney Anthony Fisher set in motion a formal process for her beatification.
“Eileen was a young woman who received the love of God, multiplied it in her heart, and passed it on to others. It is my hope that the heroic and saintly example of Eileen O’Connor will inspire everyone to live faithful lives as disciples of Jesus Christ,” Fisher said when announcing her cause.
On hearing of O’Connor’s Servant of God status, Fisher said: “Eileen’s was a life of immense suffering and, judged by today’s standards, many would have viewed it as lacking in dignity, value or hope.
“That she is on her way to possibly being our next saint shows even a short life, marked by incredible suffering, can be an inspiration to all and reminds us of the dignity of every human life.”
When she was 21, O’Connor and a local priest, Father Edward McGrath, co-founded the religious order of Our Lady’s Nurses of the Poor.
The order – also known as the ‘Brown Nuns’ because of their distinctive brown cloaks and bonnets – was committed to caring for the sick and dying poor in their homes.
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