Teresa Lalor

Teresa Lalor, V.H.M., (christened Alice) (b. circa 1769 in Ballyragget, County Kilkenny, Ireland; d. 9 September 1846, in Washington, D.C.)^[1][2][3] was an Irish immigrant to the United States, and a nun, co-foundress, with the Most Rev. Leonard Neale, S.J., the second Archbishop of Baltimore, of the first monastery of the Visitation Order in the United States.

Life

Her childhood was spent in Ireland with her sisters.^[1] At her request, John Lanigan, the Roman Catholic Bishop of Ossory, made arrangements for her entrance into a convent of his diocese which her family opposed. She however, instead agreed to accompany her sister, Mrs. Doran and her husband, an American merchant to America, during the winter of 1794^[1]. They arrived in America 5 January 1795.^[1][4]

Moving to Philadelphia in 1797, she became acquainted with Fr. Neale, then the pastor of St. Joseph's Church in that city, and under his direction she devoted herself to works of piety and charity with a small group of associates. The group went on to open an academy for the instruction of girls; but an epidemic of yellow fever carried off Miss Lalor's companions.

Father Neale was transferred in 1799 from Philadelphia, to become President of Georgetown College; she also went to Georgetown, D.C., and was for a time domiciled with a small community of Poor Clares, exiled from France. On the departure of the Poor Clares from America, Neale purchased a house^[1] for Miss Lalor and two companions to open a school of their own, a house which stood within the grounds of the later Visitation Convent, Georgetown, the oldest monastery of the Order in the United States .

The "pious ladies", as they were called, aspired to become Religious Sisters; Bishop Neale wished to affiliate them with the Visitation Order. The disturbed condition of affairs in Europe, due to the Napoleonic Wars, prevented this until 1816, when he obtained a grant from Pope Pius VII for the community to be considered as belonging to the Order of the Visitation. Mother Teresa and the two other Sisters were professed on the Feast of the Holy Innocents (December 26th) of that same year, and became the first Mother Superior of the Georgetown monastery.

She lived to see three other houses of the Institute founded, offshoots of the mother community: Mobile, Alabama in 1832; Kaskaskia (afterwards transferred to St. Louis), in 1833; and Baltimore, in 1837.

She died assisted in her last hours by Archbishop Samuel Eccleston, P.S.S., aged around 77^[5]. Her remains, with those of Archbishop Neale, are in the crypt beneath the chapel of the monastery which they founded.

References

1. ^ ^{a b c d e} Mother Teresa Lalor of the Georgetown Nuns of the Visitation, Great American Foundresses, Author: Joseph B. Code, Publisher:READ BOOKS, 2007, ISBN 9781406765755, Pages 180 - 205
2. ^ Mother Teresa Lalor (Irish-American religious leader) Britannica Online Encyclopedia
3. ^ Where did Mother Teresa Lalor die? Britannica Online Encyclopedia
4. ^ APPENDIX, I., "A Story of Courage: Annals of the Georgetown Convent of the Visitation of the Blessed Virgin Mary"
5. ^ A glory of Maryland poem (1917), Page 73

Attribution

•  This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Herbermann, Charles, ed (1913). "Teresa Lalor". Catholic Encyclopedia. Robert Appleton Company.  The entry cites:
  • LATHROP (GEORGE PARSONS AND ROSE HAWTHORNE), A Story of Courage (Cambridge, 1895);
  • MS. records of the Visitation convent, Georgetown, D. C., a short account of the life of the foundress of the Visitation Order in America.

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Name	Lalor, Teresa
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Date of death	1846
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