The Maryknoll Sisters of St. Dominic, or simply Maryknoll Sisters, are a group of Roman Catholic religious women founded in the village of Ossining, Westchester County, New York, in 1912, six months after the 1911 creation of the Maryknoll community of missionary brothers and fathers. Until 1954, when they became a pontifical institute, the religious institute was known as the Foreign Mission Sisters of St. Dominic. The sisters use the suffix "M.M." after their names.
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History
The institute was founded by Mother Mary Joseph (née Mary Josephine "Mollie" Rogers), from Jamaica Plain, Massachusetts, a graduate of Smith College (1905).
The sisters profess the evangelical counsels and devote their lives in service overseas. They currently number close to 500 members from diverse cultural backgrounds serving in a variety of fields including medicine, communications, education, agriculture, social services and spiritual formation.
In the spirit of this "no two alike" diversity, the sisters serve the needs of the people where they are missioned, in about twenty-five different countries around the world.
Some of the schools the sisters founded are Maryknoll Convent School in Kowloon, Hong Kong; Holy Spirit School (later Maryknoll Sisters' School, now Marymount Secondary School) in Happy Valley, Hong Kong; Maryknoll College (now Miriam College) in Quezon City, Philippines; and the Maryknoll Academy (now Maryhill College) in Lucena City, Philippines.
In 1930, at the invitation of Archbishop John Joseph Cantwell, the order purchased a tuberculosis sanatorium in Monrovia, California in order to treat Asian tuberculosis victims within the Archdiocese of Los Angeles. The sanatorium was replaced with a modern hospital during the 1950s. The entire campus was converted into a residence for the order's retirees during the 1970s.