Mother Theodore Guerin’s canonization set for October 15

Mother Theodore came to the United States from France in 1840 to establish a Congregation of women religious in a dense forest adjacent to a remote community known a Saint Mary-of-the-Woods near Terre Haute. She was born Anne-Thérèse Guérin, Oct. 2, 1798, in the village of Etables in Brittany, France. She died at Saint Mary-of-the-Woods in 1856. Her remains are entombed in the Church of the Immaculate Conception at the motherhouse.

Mother Guerin spent some time in Fort Wayne, and the Adoration Chapel at our parish is the Mother Theodore Guerin chapel.

Mother Theodore Guerin helped found the first Catholic school in Fort Wayne. In 1846, she led a group of nuns to Fort Wayne, where they started St. Augustine’s Academy for Girls. It was located at the corner of Calhoun Street and Jefferson Boulevard.