THE MORAL STAKES OF PROTECTING PUBLIC HEALTH PROGRAMS
HEALING AS HOLY WORK BY ERICA TORRES
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omen religious communities’ health care ministry began long before modern-day hospital systems or health insurance companies that we see and experience today. Their mission is grounded in concrete experiences, a deep understanding of what happens when people are unable to receive adequate care, and an unrelenting commitment to upholding the dignity of all people. One of the pioneers in health care access was Margaret Anna Cusack, later known as Mother Francis Clare, who was born in Dublin, Ireland in 1829. She didn’t set out to found a healthcare system; her mission was to confront the suffering she saw around her that she believed to be both avoidable and unjust. And yet, her ministry—and her conviction that charity alone can never address the root causes of illness and poverty—has had lasting impacts on Catholic health care and the entire health care system today. After converting to Catholicism in her late 20s, Cusack became a Poor Clare Sister and was sent to Kenmare, Ireland, to help found a convent there. It was here in Kenmare that she started working for a more equitable society through public ministry. She experienced first-hand the effects of famine, poverty, and the oppression of women and children and dedicated her ministry to feeding the hungry while also fighting for housing rights, education, and for the rights of women. 10
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“If Mother Francis Clare were alive today, she would remind lawmakers that systems that deny care to the poor violate both justice and peace. The well-being of the sick is not expendable; it cannot be simplified to some budgetary line item that can be struck for the sake of saving money. Eventually, she founded her own community: The St. Joseph’s Sisters of Peace. Mother Clare was also a prolific writer; many of her books addressing the realities of injustice and calling the church to accountability and action are still available today. It’s evident from both her writing and her work that she understood public health in a strikingly holistic way: as inclusive of not only medical care but also safe housing, adequate wages, education, and equal access. Across the Atlantic Ocean, at roughly the same time, another woman religious was also building a health-care ministry. Esther Pariseau, later known as Mother Joseph of the Sacred Heart, was born in 1823 in Quebec, six years before Mother Francis Clare. Like Mother Francis Clare, she also entered religious life in her 20s, joining the Sisters of Charity of Providence. Ten years later, she was sent to what is now Vancouver, Washington to serve in the mission diocese there. Over the