Information service of the Pontifical Mission Societies since 1927
Rome (Agenzia Fides) - Franciscan Missionaries of the Divine Motherhood FMDM is an international Catholic congregation of sisters following Christ in the spirit of St Francis of Assisi. Willing to serve anywhere in the world, one of the Congregation’s major undertaking was the building of Mt Alvernia Hospital in Singapore,
The Congregation started as a community of lay Franciscan women taking care of poor children in Holly Place, London in 1886. By 1896 they had become a religious congregation known aa missionary Sisters for the Home Missions. The Sisters were first trained as nurses in 1925. Their first hospital, Mt Alvernia was opened in Guildford Surrey in 1935. In 1937 the first appointed Mother General Mother Francis Spring brought new vision to the congregation sending out Sisters from England to open mission in Africa. Today there are 350 FMDM sisters in England, Scotland, Ireland, Rome, Nigeria, Zambia, Zimbabwe, Australia, Malaysia and Singapore.
In 1947 the congregation was pontifically approved and renamed the Franciscan Missionaries of the Divine Motherhood.
The FMDM history in Singapore can be traced to 1947 when three Sisters and some Irish Franciscan priests set of from England for Anlu, in China, but the Sisters were ordered to abandon their mission as communist troops advanced. While taking refuge with the Maryknoll Sisrers in Hong Kong and praying for the opportunity to return to China, the Sisters heard that the Bishop of Singapore was looking for a nursing order of sisters to take over a women’s TB hospital run by the colonial government. On 7 May 1949 the Sisters took on the job and subsequently the running of three TB wards of Tan Tock Seng Hospital, later known as Mandalay Road Hospital.
Although healthcare has been a major part of the mission today they are present in various ministries and geared especially to the family, children and women. The FMDM strive to be a channel of God’s material live, the help others to recognise the living presence of God in their daily experiences. (AP) (23/10/2006 Agenzia Fides; Righe:31; Parole:341)
