November 18 is celebrated as the Feast of St. Rose Philippine Duchesne. In 1818, with four others, Philippine joyfully and courageously travelled to the United States to found the first American house of the Society of the Sacred Heart, a log cabin at St. Charles, near St. Louis, Missouri.

Today, November 11, we celebrate the anniversary of the birth of Janet Erskine Stuart, one of our founding mothers, born this day in 1857. We thank the campus minister at Villa Duchesne / Oak Hill School for the attached prayer service.

In 1883, nearly forty years after she completed the fresco of Mater Admirabilis on a corridor wall of the Trinita dei Monti in Rome, Pauline Perdrau painted another study of Mary—one much less famous than her earlier work. Though its aesthetic qualities leave much to be desired, this later Mater, which is known in the United States chiefly through the copy made by Sister M.M. Nealis in 1935, rewards careful study and comparison with the Trinita fresco.