BLESSED MARIA LUIZA MERKERT

(In 2007, Maria Luisa Merkert, the Blessed Foundress of the Congregation of the Sisters of Saint Elizabeth, took place in the Basilica. More information on the beatification and her biography can be found here.)

On September 30, 2007
an extraordinary event took place in our parish church.
His Eminence, Cardinal José Saraiva Martins
Prefect of the Vatican Congregation for the Causes of Saints,

proclaimed Blessed 

the great woman of Nysa, the Silesian Samaritan woman,
co-founder of the Congregation of the Sisters of St. Elizabeth

Maria Luiza Merkert

Blessed Maria Luiza Merkert was born in Nysa on September 21, 1817. Her family was closely related to the Church. Maria grew up with her mother and her sister Matilda, who was several years her senior. Her father died when she was still an infant. When Klara Wolff in Nysa in 1842 came up with the idea of nursing the sick and lonely in their homes, she found devoted companions in the Merkert sisters. Franciszka Werner joined them. The need was urgent, because after secularization in 1810, there were no church charity institutions, and there was hardly anyone in Nysa to pay for hospital treatment, in the face of raging epidemics.

On September 27, 1842, four young girls made an act of devotion in front of the painting of the Heart of Jesus - they undertook to help those in need, regardless of religion, nationality and gender. They lived in one room given to them by the bishop in the house of altars (clergy who only said mass) and from there they went to the city every day.
They took care of the sick, cooked meals for the unemployed and the poor. In times of strict morals, girls who walked around houses where men live were almost revolutionaries. Nuns could only be cared for by women (until the outbreak of World War II, the Superior General of the Elizabethan Sisters had to ask the Holy See to care for boys in orphanages run by nuns).
In order to change a secular charity association into a religious congregation, the church authorities ordered young Nysa women to enter the novitiate of the Borromean Sisters in Prague and learn about the principle of religious life there. Boromeuszko ran closed nursing homes and hospitals, the sisters from Nysa wanted to look after the sick and the poor at home. Neither the townspeople nor the Bishop of Wrocław liked this, who threatened that a private association founded by novices would never be approved by the Church. These troubles lasted 10 years, and only thanks to the support of the Nysa magistrate and several priests, the sisters obtained the approval of civil and church authorities for their activities. In 1859, Maria Merkert obtained for the Society of the Sisters of St. Elżbieta, diocesan approval issued by the Bishop of Wrocław, H. Förster. That same year, at the first general chapter, Sr. Maria Merkert was elected the first Superior General. She performed this function until her death.
In 1860, the first group of sisters with Maria Merkert made a religious profession - vows: poverty, chastity and obedience, and a vow of service to the sick and the poor.

As Superior General, Mother Mary strengthened the structures of the young community through her careful and consistent actions. At her election, St. Elżbieta Turyńska.
In the years 1863-1865 she built the Motherhouse in Nysa, which became an extremely strong center of charity and where, in 22 years, she prepared nearly 500 sisters for religious life and service - mainly from Silesia; she founded 90 religious houses, 12 hospitals, many nursing homes for the elderly, numerous educational and educational institutions (kindergartens, nurseries, orphanages, elementary and vocational schools, etc.).

When Maria sent her sisters to the sick, no one in Silesia had heard of nursing schools before. So she organized nursing courses for them. Young postulants (candidates for sisters) learned to care for the sick alongside older sisters working in various hospital departments, only then took their exams and went to look after the sick themselves. At the end of her life, Maria Merkert was appreciated by both church and secular authorities. Mother Mary received many decorations for the service of the sisters. Most of them were sold and the funds obtained were allocated to the needs of the poor. To this day, one cross has survived to thank the king for his Samaritan service during the Polish-French war.

She wrote the agenda of the Gray Sisters' houses (1866), she contributed to the drafting of the Society's constitution (1869); obtained a decree of praise from the Holy See (1871); implemented the process of obtaining the legal personality of the Association from the state authorities (in 1864 it was obtained by the Charity Institute of St. Elizabeth in Nysa). An important decision was the start of charity and educational work by the Sisters in previously purely Protestant German countries and in the Scandinavian north (Hamburg, Altona, Eisenach, Królewiec, Stockholm). Mother Mary prepared the new religious community for final approval by Pope Leo XIII in 1887. 

The internal stabilization was accompanied by the rapid external development of the Congregation. The very dedicated work of the sisters, especially during the epidemic (Matylda Merkert and Klara Wolff paid for her with their lives) won them hearts and favor, and courageously undertook the care of wounded soldiers in military and field hospitals in the three subsequent wars of Prussia against Denmark (1864), Austria (1866) ) and France (1870-1871) - recognition and support of the Prussian king, which was important in relation to the legislation of "Kulturkampf" (“Culture struggle”), which began in 1871. Only for a short time did he slow down the spontaneous development of the Congregation. Mother Maria died in Nysa on November 14, 1872 at the age of 55. It left a stabilized work, already present in many European countries. She was buried at the Jerusalem Cemetery. After the exhumation, on July 16, 1964, her mortal remains were placed in the crypt under the Holy Trinity chapel in the church of St. James and St. Agnes in Nysa. After the canonical recognition on March 2, 1998, Maria Merkert's remains are placed in a new coffin, in the marble sarcophagus of the Holy Trinity chapel.

Since 1897, her writings and testimonies about her life have been collected. There were and still are thanks for her intercession with God. The centenary of her death mobilized to compile an extensive biography of her (Fr. Edward Frankiewicz, OFM). In 1985 the beatification process began in the Diocesan Curia in Opole.

For more information on the Congregation of the Sisters of Saint Elizabeth and Blessed Maria Luisa Merkert, please visit the folllowing: www.selzbietanki.com, www.elzbietanki.nysa.pl.