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school sisters of notre dame minister in the diocese

“Our mission as School Sisters of Notre Dame is to proclaim the good news, directing our entire lives toward that oneness for which Jesus Christ was sent.”
October 2009 marks the 150th anniversary of the School Sisters of Notre Dame in the Belleville [Alton until 1877] diocese.

Twelve years after their arrival in the United States, the School Sisters of Notre Dame came to Belleville, Ill. In October 1859, Mother Caroline Friess arrived with nine sisters and two candidates in response to the request of Rev. Peter J. Baltes, pastor of St. Peter. The sisters would staff and run the new girls’ boarding school, Immaculate Conception Academy, and teach in the lower grades of the parish school while a male teacher taught the upper grades. As the only Catholic parish in the city, St. Peter consisted of German, French and American parishioners. [Chronicle, Milwaukee motherhouse] Eventually, the sisters would assume the teaching responsibility for all the students.

In 1862, Mother Caroline wrote: “Belleville, beautifully located about 15 miles inland from the Mississippi River, justifies its name. The inhabitants made many sacrifices to erect a building combining a school and an institute for youth.” [#28] She continued, however, to describe how there was not sufficient funds and the building was offered to the sisters if they agreed to accept responsibility for the debt. Mother Caroline prayed and stated that she could not decide quickly. “Finally, love and confidence triumphed over reason…For this purpose the sisters are saving in every possible way and depriving themselves of many things. May God bless their sacrifices.” [#28]

The sisters were quickly recognized as excellent teachers and invitations for their staffing of schools came from parishes within the city and rural areas of the diocese.

During the past 149 years, more than 3,000 School Sisters of Notre Dame have ministered in more than 90 schools/parishes, high schools, elementary schools and boarding schools within the Diocese of Belleville.
They also established a college, LeClerc College for women, from 1938-1949. More than 230 women, born in or from a parish in the diocese, have entered the School Sisters of Notre Dame.

In 2008, SSNDs in the Belleville diocese minister as elementary school principals, teachers in college and elementary schools, parish life coordinators, pastoral associate, directors of religious education, parish ministers, spiritual directors, diocesan archivist and ministry to the bereaved and aging. They serve at St. Peter Cathedral, Queen of Peace, St. Luke, Blessed Sacrament and Meredith Home in Belleville; and in Anna, Beaver Prairie, Carlyle, Centralia, Fairmont City, Marion, Millstadt, New Baden and Salem.