Saint Josaphata Hordashevska

Josaphata (née Michaelina Hordashevska; Ukrainian: Михайлина Гордашевська; 20 November 1869 – 7 April 1919) was a Ukrainian Greek Catholic religious sister in the Austro-Hungarian Empire. She was the first member and co-founder of the Sisters Servants of Mary Immaculate. Michaelina Hordashevska was born on 20 November 1869 in Lviv, then part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire and now Ukraine, into a family who were members of the Ukrainian Catholic Church. At 18, she considered consecrating her life to God in a contemplative monastery of the Basilian nuns, then the only Eastern-rite women's religious congregation. She attended a spiritual retreat preached by a Basilian monk, Jeremiah Lomnytskyj, whose spiritual guidance she sought. Hordashevska took a private vow of chastity for one year with his permission. She was to renew this vow twice. At that time, Lomnytsky, seeing that there was a need for active religious sisters to meet the social needs of the poor and needy faithful of the church, had decided to establish a women's congregation which would follow an active life of service. He did so with Cyril Sielecki, pastor of the village of Zhuzhelyany. Lomnytsky felt that Hordashevska would be an appropriate candidate to found such a congregation. Thus, she was asked to be the foundress of such a group, rather than follow the monastic life she had been considering. When she agreed, she was sent in June 1892 to the Polish Roman Catholic Felician Sisters to experience the life of community, which followed an active consecrated life. Hordashevska returned to Lviv two months later and, on 24 August 1892, took the religious habit of the new congregation and received the name Josaphata, in honor of the Ukrainian Catholic martyr Josaphat Kuntsevych.