POOR SISTERS OF SAINT FRANCIS. – A religious institute founded in Aachen by Franziska Schervier, who in 1845 associated with four other young women to place themselves at the service of the city’s poor, with the aim of alleviating their material and spiritual miseries.
They rented a small house, from which they ventured out only to care for the sick in their homes or to cook and distribute meals in soup kitchens. Later, they also opened houses where they sheltered women of ill repute, seeking to bring them back to God and society. Their example attracted many vocations, so much so that in 1878 the municipal authorities of Aachen entrusted them with the care of a large hospital for contagious diseases; from there, they were called to many other cities. Cardinal Geissel erected the pious association as a congregation on 2 July 1851, giving it the Rule of Saint Francis and certain statutes to observe. Having spread to Germany, France, Denmark, and even America, the institute received the decree of praise on 20 August 1870 and definitive approval on 6 October 1908. At present, the houses number 123, divided into 6 provinces, with 2,482 sisters.
Gulio Mandelli
POOR SISTERS OF SAINT FRANCIS OF PERPETUAL ADORATION. – An institute founded on 20 December 1860 at Olpe (diocese of Paderborn) by Teresa Bonzel.
Within a decade, it spread rapidly, but the laws of the *Kulturkampf* in 1875 slowed its development in Germany, while it extended vigorously in America, where six sisters settled in 1875 at the invitation of the ordinary of Fort Wayne, in Lafayette. In addition to perpetual adoration of the Blessed Sacrament, the sisters devoted themselves to the care of the sick in hospitals and at home, as well as to the education and instruction of poor children and girls in schools, orphanages, boarding schools, and the like.
The institute received the decree of praise on 13 April 1897 and papal approval on 30 January 1931. At present, the sisters number 2,527, distributed across 202 houses and 4 provinces.