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Saint Urszula Ledóchowska
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Saint Urszula Ledóchowska

The Ursuline who founded the Ursulines of the Agonizing Heart of Jesus

Rank
Saint
Kind
Virgin, Founder, Religious
Life
1865 – 1939
Era
20th century
Feast
29 May
Countries
Poland, Austria, Italy
PolandAustriaItaly

Life story

Julia Ledóchowska was born on 17 April 1865 at Loosdorf in Lower Austria, into a Polish noble family. Her sister was Maria Teresa Ledóchowska, founder of a missionary society, and her brother Włodzimierz later became Superior General of the Jesuits. In 1886 she entered the Ursulines in Kraków and took the name Maria Ursula of Jesus.

In 1907, with the blessing of Pius X, she was sent to Saint Petersburg to serve the Polish community there. She opened a boarding house and educational work for Polish girls. When the First World War broke out, the Russian authorities forced her to leave because she held Austrian citizenship; she went to Finland, then Sweden and Denmark, where she helped organise aid for war victims and set up schools for exiled Poles.

In 1920 she returned to Poland and founded the Ursulines of the Agonizing Heart of Jesus, also known as the Grey Ursulines, on the basis of a convent at Pniewy, where her remains now rest. The congregation spread to Italy, France and other countries, and its generalate was moved to Rome in the 1920s. The sisters worked with children, young people and boarding schools. Her years abroad had made her a figure known well beyond Poland, and many of the sisters she gathered came from families touched by the war and by displacement.

She died in Rome on 29 May 1939. John Paul II beatified her on 20 June 1983 in Poznań and canonised her on 18 May 2003 in Saint Peter's Square. Her feast is on 29 May.

Works and witness

  • Entered the Ursulines in Kraków in 1886
  • From 1907 ran a boarding house and school for Poles in Saint Petersburg
  • During the war aided victims and exiled Poles in Finland, Sweden and Denmark
  • Founded the Ursulines of the Agonizing Heart of Jesus on 7 June 1920 at Pniewy
  • Canonised on 18 May 2003

Saints from the same country

Saint Stanislaus of Kraków, Saint John Paul II, Saint Maximilian Kolbe, Saint Faustina Kowalska

References

  • Martyrologium Romanum
  • Dicastery for the Causes of Saints – biographical profile
  • Ursulines of the Agonizing Heart of Jesus – congregation history

Written by Anawim from documented history. Some details about ancient saints rest on tradition and are marked as such.