Sisters of St. Francis of the Martyr St. George

Mother M. Anselma Bopp and Father John Gerard Dall founded the Order in Thuine, Germany, in 1869.

The Order expanded to the U.S. in 1923 with the founding of a Provincialate and Novitiate in Alton, Illinois, which continues to be the location of the Provincial House.

They are also located in other areas of Illinois, Missouri, Oklahoma, Nebraska, Kansas, New Jersey, Ohio, Washington, D.C., and Wisconsin, as well as on missions in Brazil and Cuba.

[1] The religious sisters have particular devotions to the Sacred Heart of Jesus, the Mass, the Eucharist, Scripture, the Liturgy of the Hours, and the Stations of the Cross.

[2] Their Franciscan Spirituality follows St. Francis of Assisi’s particular love for the Incarnation and Passion of Christ, as well as adoring and receiving the Holy Eucharist.

St. Francis prayed with his arms outstretched before the Crucifix, and the Sisters imitate this action as a prayer of abandonment and surrender to God’s Will.

The Sisters founded Saint Anthony's Health Center in Alton, Illinois, in 1925, but it was an infirmary until 1956 when it became a fully licensed hospital.

[5] The Sisters are currently teaching in the Dioceses of Springfield and Peoria, IL; Tulsa, OK; Steubenville, OH; Lincoln, NE; Metuchen, NJ; as well as the Archdioceses of St. Louis, MO; Kansas City, KS.

The Sisters also served in Rome, Italy, in Raymond Cardinal Burke’s residence when he was Prefect for the Supreme Tribunal of the Apostolic Signatura.

The vow of poverty is to renounce material possessions in order to live more freely and simply to follow Christ.

The time duration of this stage varies among different Orders, but for the Sisters of St. Francis of the Martyr St. George this period lasts anywhere from six months to two years.

During the first year, novices study the Franciscan Rule and the order's Constitutions and deepen their prayer lives.

The Martyr St. George was a soldier in the Diocletian military in Nicomedia when a war waged against the Christian religion.

This figure is only a symbolic representation that by his faith and Christian fortitude he conquered the devil, who is called a dragon in the Apocalypse.