1. Elizabeth Prout, known as Mother Mary Joseph of Jesus, was the founder of the religious congregation of the Sisters of the Cross and Passion.
22 Facts About Elizabeth Prout
1. 2.
Elizabeth Prout was born in Coleham, Shrewsbury, England on 2 September 1820.
3.
Elizabeth Prout's conversion was met with great negativity by her parents.
4.
Elizabeth Prout began to feel a strong attraction to the religious life and Rossi advised her to join the Sisters of the Infant Jesus in Northampton.
5.
In 1848 Elizabeth Prout joined this community where she initially found great happiness.
6.
At that time the Passionist was giving a parish mission at St Chad's in Cheetham Hill, Manchester, and it was there that Rossi advised Elizabeth Prout to make her home, teaching in the parish school.
7.
Elizabeth Prout soon established herself in the parish by visiting the sick and poor in some of the poorest areas of Manchester, teaching workers in the cotton mills and Irish immigrants fleeing the Great Famine.
8.
Elizabeth Prout felt that she wanted to establish a more regular life for her and her companions and thought first of joining an existing religious institute, but then, with the advice of Rossi, believed she was called to found a new congregation.
9.
The life proved so strict that eventually all of Elizabeth Prout's companions left her.
10.
Elizabeth Prout was called the Institute of the Holy Family.
11.
At her clothing Elizabeth Prout received her new religious name, Mother Mary Joseph of Jesus.
12.
The next two years saw the sisters working unceasingly, to such an extent that their health was neglected and many of the sisters fell ill, being too poor to afford the services of a doctor; Elizabeth Prout was called upon to nurse the sisters herself.
13.
Elizabeth Prout opened a school at St Mary's, Blackbrook, and took charge of St Anne's School, Sutton.
14.
The sisters earned their living as best they could; they knew, like the people around them, what poverty was, and at times Elizabeth Prout was forced to beg.
15.
Elizabeth Prout too had become a Passionist and joined Father Dominic Barberi in his work in England.
16.
Elizabeth Prout obtained permission from the bishop to go to Ireland to beg for alms for her Institute and there met with Spencer.
17.
On her return from Ireland Elizabeth Prout found the situation even worse than when she had left.
18.
Elizabeth Prout died of tuberculosis on 11 January 1864 at the convent, Sutton St Helens Lancashire.
19.
On 23 October 1863 Elizabeth Prout was elected Mother General, but her health was failing, and she was near total physical collapse.
20.
Elizabeth Prout died on 11 January 1864, physically broken by her labours, but with the future of the congregation secure.
21.
Elizabeth Prout was dressed in her habit and buried at the Passionist Church of St Anne's, in Sutton, St Helens near Liverpool, where Dominic Barberi and Ignatius Spencer were buried.
22.
Elizabeth Prout's body was exhumed on 20 June 1973 and on 30 July reburied beside Ignatius Spencer and Dominic Barberi in the new shrine at Sutton.