JOSEPHITE Sister Margaret McKenna knows a thing or two about Blessed Mary MacKillop and she’s more than happy to share that knowledge.
She is completing the final edit stages of a book on the history of the Josephite Sisters in Queensland spanning the century from 1870 to 1970.
Sr Margaret is well qualified for the job having also been involved over the years in the process leading up to the beatification of Mary from 1992-1995 as well as being the current archivist for her congregation in Queensland.
That’s in addition to having already published a monograph on “Mary MacKillop’s visits to the Diocese of Brisbane”.
“She visited the diocese on a number of occasions and actually travelled to lots of places around Queensland between 1870 and 1890, so I’ve gone through those visits and discussed what was the purpose of them and what we could find out from research,” Sr Margaret said.
She said Mary MacKillop used to refer to the state as “dear old Queensland” and had many friends in the area.
“When you go to the archives you can find letters from people she had met here in Brisbane,” Sr Margaret said.
She said her interest in history went back to her youth and she decided to offer to write Mary’s Queensland history following involvement in the beatification process.
“I was involved in the beatification of Mary MacKillop on behalf of the Josephites and I knew that the history of the sisters and Mary MacKillop in Queensland had never been written.
“When I returned to Queensland after 1995 I went to the leadership team and offered to write the history.”
Sr Margaret’s own history is rooted in Queensland with her vocation stemming from a deep interest in and desire to be like the Josephites she encountered in western Queensland.
“I loved the Josephites from, I think, the first time I met them,” she said.
“I started school at a little state school (at Brookstead, on Queensland’s Darling Downs) then went to the Ursulines in Toowoomba and then Dad bought a property out in the west, at Chinchilla.
“We moved out there and I went to the local convent school that was run by the Sisters of St Joseph.
“I was really impressed with them, I don’t know why.
Vocations are mysteries in a way but I looked at a number of different (orders) but decided on the Josephites.”
Sr Margaret said it wasn’t a comparison between orders as she was equally impressed by the education she received from the Ursuline Sisters who had connections with her own family and to whom she returned for her secondary education at St Ursula’s, Toowoomba.
“My family had members who were Ursulines and my mother’s family had a lot to do with the Ursulines when they came to Australia but I think I was really interested in the work they (Josephites) did with country children.”
Sr Margaret said the move to Chinchilla was something of an adventure for her and her two brothers.
“I had to learn to ride a horse and, although I didn’t, some of the children had to help with things like milking before they came to school.
“The sisters were part of that little local community and when I think back they offered us so much and I would say one of the best educators I had in my life was a Sister of St Joseph about fourth grade.
“She got us fired up about the fact that Leichhardt had gone through our town and I can remember riding along the side of the creek to see if I could find a tree that Leichhardt had placed an ‘L’ on.”
Sr Margaret joined the sisters around the age of 18 and was professed at the age of 21, and said she spent many years teaching in schools around Queensland.
She said her election to the Josephites’ general council in 1977 was a shock to the system but also an opportunity to meet more of her fellow sisters.
“I had to go to Sydney and part of the position with the general council was to visit fellow sisters.
“So I visited every convent in Western Australia, every convent in South Australia, a lot of convents in NSW and of course we met the sisters in Victoria and New Zealand.”
During the six years with the council Sr Margaret also spent a year studying in Chicago and while there visited Josephites who were overseas at that time.
She said following her time on the general council she was appointed provincial in South Australia, which was a tremendous background for writing the history.
“Not that I thought of it at that time, but I know the places and I know something of the culture of the state.”
Returning to Brisbane in 1990 Sr Margaret spent a couple of years working in the Centre for Church, Life and Mission on Leadership of the Laity before being asked to travel to Sydney to work with a fellow sister on the beatification of Mary on behalf of the Josephites.
The process took three years and, moving back to Queensland in 1995, she decided to put her background and interest in history to good use by offering to write the Queensland history of the sisters.
“The leadership team asked that I do it through the University (University of Queensland) so that set me on the path of research which was to become a mammoth task, more than I could have imagined.”
That task didn’t daunt Sr Margaret who went back to university to complete a graduate diploma then a masters degree and finally her PhD.
“The university didn’t accept what I’d done overseas in Chicago – I had a BA and AED – and I’d completed work in remedial education while principal at Our Lady of Lourdes, Sunnybank, and I’d also completed a Diploma in Theology.
“When I went to UQ I had to do a graduate diploma in history and at first I thought ‘Blow this’, but then I was always grateful that I did it because it introduced me to the most current way of doing history and it was a very good background to my work.”
Sr Margaret said that once the current editing process was completed she expected the 22-chapter book would be published by the end of the year or by early next year.
“You’d be really surprised what computers can do to footnotes – the manuscript is basically completed so it’s just very tedious at the moment.”
Sr Margaret said the book was part of her PhD thesis.
“I’m really turning the PhD thesis into a more readable book and adding in parts of the research that I really didn’t use for the PhD.”
