Mother Rogers of Maryknoll (1882-1955)

Today in 1882, Mary Josephine Rogers was born in Roxbury, Massachusetts, to Abraham T. Rogers and Mary Josephine Plummer. Known as Mollie, she grew up in a middle class family. She was one of a handful of Catholics at Smith College, where she graduated in 1905. While at Smith, she was impressed with the example of her Protestant classmates who went off to the missions. When she returned to Smith as an assistant professor of Biology, she started a mission study club for Catholic students. In 1908, she returned to Boston, where she spent her spare time helping Father James A. Walsh of the archdiocese’s mission office. In 1911 Walsh and Father Thomas Price organized the Catholic Foreign Mission Society of America, better known as Maryknoll. In 1912, a group of women offered their services to Maryknoll, and Rogers joined them after she took care of her family obligations. The group developed into the Foreign Mission Sisters of St. Dominic, better known as the Maryknoll Sisters. Rogers took the name Mary Joseph, and in 1925 she was elected Mother General. By the time of her death in 1955, the community numbered 733, with Sisters working in Asia, Latin America and the United States. She received honorary degrees from Regis College in Boston and Trinity College in Washington D.C., and a Doctor of Letters from her alma mater, Smith College. Mother Mary Joseph died in October 1955, at the age of 73.
(The first Maryknoll Sisters are seen here. Mother Rogers is first row, second from the right.)

(Adapted from the community website)