About Our Lady of Mount Providence Convent in Baltimore, Maryland:
The Oblate Sisters of Providence is the first successful Roman Catholic sisterhood in the world established by women of African descent. It was the work of a French-born Sulpician priest and four women, who were part of the Caribbean refugee colony which began arriving in Baltimore, Maryland in the late eighteenth century. Father James Hector Nicholas Joubert, SS, a Sulpician priest discovered it was difficult for the Haitian refugee children to master their religious studies because they were unable to read. He heard of two devout religious Caribbean women who were already conducting a school for black children in their home in Baltimore. In 1828 those two women, Elizabeth Lange (later Mother Mary Lange ) and Maria Balas accepted his proposal to start a sisterhood with the primary mission of teaching and caring for African American children.
After adding two more women, Rosine Boegue and American-born Theresa Duchemin, they began studying to become sisters and opened a Catholic school for girls in their convent at 5 St. Mary’s Ct. in Baltimore. Thus began Saint Frances Academy. It is the oldest continuously operating school for black Catholic children in the United States and is still educating children in Baltimore.
The first women religious order of women of African descent was officially founded on July 2, 1829. In December of that year the four sisters and the school moved to a rowhouse at 48 Richmond Street. This location would be the mother house for the order for the next thirty one years. In the next few years the order and school quickly outgrew the row house and purchased some adjoining properties. A bigger school and new chapel were built in 1836. The new chapel is especially significant because it was not only for the use of the convent of the Oblate Sisters of Providence but was also used by Baltimore’s black Catholics. This would be the first time American black Catholics had their own separate chapel for worship, baptisms, marriages, confirmations and funerals.
Today their facilities include The Mount Providence Child Development Center (infants/toddlers through kindergarten), Saint Frances Academy (High School) and OSP Retreat and Conference Center.
Traveling to Our Lady of Mount Providence Convent in Baltimore, Maryland:
Address:
Oblate Sisters of Providence
701 Gun Road
Baltimore, MD 21227
Tel: +1 (410) 242-8500
email: info@oblatesisters.com
Click here for the official website of Our Lady of Mount Providence Convent in Baltimore, Maryland.