“And the name of that boat was Love”
Sister Dolores Armer, foundress of the Sisters of the Holy Family wrote, in one of the early years:
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Augustine McKeon as a young woman
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I saw a river that must be passed in order to reach the Kingdom of Heaven and the name of that river was suffering. And I saw the boat which takes so many souls across that river, and the name of that boat was love.
The above, short paragraph really sums up the life of Sister Augustine McKeon, the fifth woman to join the fledgling community. On March 19, 1880, along with Sister Dolores and Sisters Joseph, Agnes, and Magdalene, she made her first profession of vows and kept them in a spirit of love and patience until her death on August 19, 1890. For that space of ten short years, she was subject to severe headaches and debilitating illness almost constantly.Early in her religious life, as a further complication, she had a severe accident that seriously affected her spine. Yet she had a bright disposition and seemed to grow more loveable as she grew more afflicted.
Even though she suffered such weakness and pain throughout a short religious life, unable to do much in the way of ministry in the day homes or religious education centers, she kept herself busy at the convent. She was often in charge of the Sisters’ home, seeing to its cleaning and order, and to the distribution of new clothing as each needed it.She sometimes assisted Sister Dolores in the upkeep of the altars of St. Mary’s Cathedral and kept herself busy making scapulars and painting small cloth bags for gifts to benefactors of the Sisters’ many projects for poor families.
At her death one of the Sisters wrote: “Sister was so well beloved by all…her long illness, which was borne with such patience that it endeared her to all. It will be ten years next month since she was taken ill, and although ill so long she was not at all emaciated, being simply beautiful in death as she was in life. She was tall in stature, fair complexion, deep blue eyes fringed with jet black eyelashes, being very calm and dignified in her bearing, but always kind and gentle. She looked so natural in death, so pure and beautiful.”