Missionary Oblate Sisters

In an important feminist study, Rosa Bruno-Jofre offers a sensitive and nuanced picture of how a women's organization, the Missionary Oblate Sisters, a bilingual teaching congregation in Manitoba, dealt with both the larger patriarchal structures and the differing views, traditions, and attitudes of Sisters from disparate French Canadian communities in Manitoba, Quebec, Saskatchewan, Ontario, and the United States. Bruno-Jofre draws extensively from private archives and oral histories to bring to light the inner life of the congregation. She demonstrates that the Sisters played an important role in building a French Canadian identity in Manitoba and Quebec and provides a glimpse into their relationship with the Oblate Fathers in their capacity as auxiliaries in the residential schools.The book concludes with an analysis of the recent efforts of the Congregation to reformulate its mission and shape its future in terms that remain faithful to the vision of the founders while taking into account the changed circumstances of the Church at the beginning of the twenty-first century. The Missionary Oblate Sisters celebrated its centenary in 2004.