St. Julia Maria Ledóchowska (1865-1939)

Feast Day: May 29
Canonized: May 18, 2003
Patron of Polish girls, orphans, educators

Saint Julia Maria Ledóchowska was a Polish nun who established the Ursulines of the Agonizing Heart of Jesus, also called the Grey Ursulines, an order dedicated to “the education and training of children and youth, and service to the poorest and the oppressed among our brethren.”

She was born in Austria into a Catholic family steeped in the faith. Her uncle was a cardinal and primate of Poland. Her sister founded a missionary community; her brother became superior general of the Jesuits.

She entered the Ursulines in Krakow, taking the name Maria Ursula of Jesus. She would go on to become mother superior in 1904 and founded Poland’s first residence for female university students.

Saint Julia established a home for Polish children in St. Petersburg, Russia; in Finland, she established a free clinic for the sick and translated a catechism. Expelled from the Russian Empire at the start of World War I, she went to Sweden to found a girl’s school and started an orphanage in Denmark. In 1920, she established her Ursuline community.

She died in Rome, shortly before the outbreak of World War II. She was canonized by Pope St. John Paul II.