Josephine Van der Schrieck, commonly known Sister Louise, was an American Roman Catholic nun. She was the leader, under whom the Sisters of Notre Dame de Namur and their associated educational institutions were established across the American Midwest and E.
Background
Josephine was born on November 14, 1813 at Bergen-op-Zoom, Holland, the tenth of the thirteen children of Joseph and Clara Maria (Weenan) Van der Schrieck, who though ardent Catholics suffered little in person or in fortune during the Napoleonic wars. Baptized Josephine, the child was reared in her native village and in Antwerp where the family moved about 1817, seeking both freedom from the politico-religious system, and enlarged opportunities in the exporting business in which the father and elder sons grew prosperous.
Education
Louise Van Der Schrieck was schooled in a private academy and in the newly established institute of the Sisters of Notre Dame at Namur, a French foundation established at Amiens by Blessed Julie Billiart. Thereafter she continued her educaton under private tutors at home.
Career
While studying Louise Van Der Schrieck assisted in the household, and devoted her spare time to religious missionary and social work among the oppressed poor of Antwerp and especially among the apprentice girls in the lace factories.
She could find little outlet for a life of service and hence with parental consent went to Namur, where in 1837 she entered the novitiate of the Notre Dame nuns. As discipline in her crowded home had been strict, she easily accepted the severe rule of privation, work, and prayer, and was professed as Sister Louise, May 17, 1839.
In the meantime Bishop John Baptist Purcell was petitioning the superior of the convent and the bishop of Namur for a colony of teaching nuns for Cincinnati, Ohio. His request was finally granted and on September 3, 1840, eight volunteers, of whom Sister Louise was the youngest, started for America under Sister Louise de Gonzague (died 1866) as superior and Father Louis Amadeus Rappe, a missionary who later became first bishop of Cleveland, as a protector.
Arriving at the wharves of Cincinnati on October 31, the sisters were established in a house on Sycamore Street, the first permanent foundation of the community outside of Belgium. The French Ladies met with favor not only among Catholics who attended their poor school and Sunday schools and boarding academy but among the socially aspiring women of the little packing and commercial town who would learn lace-making and a smattering of French.
When in 1845 Sister Louise was named superior the Notre Dame convent had become an accepted institution in the community, and its numbers were increasing through local vocations and enlistments from Belgium. In 1848 she was appointed superior-provincial with a jurisdiction over all future foundations east of the Rocky Mountains, in which capacity she continued until her death.
At her death in Cincinnati her pioneer work was generally acclaimed.
Personality
Sister Louise Van der Schrieck was deeply religious and charitable. She was a capable administrator.
As a superior, she exacted strict obedience under a firm, benevolent rule; she clung steadfastly to the connection with Namur and to the original rule and purpose of the foundress even at the expense of rigidity and stiffness; and she tactfully managed bishops who vainly sought to make the community in their dioceses independent or diocesan.