Blessed Josepha Hendrina Stenmanns

Hendrina Stenmanns was born at Issum in Germany in 1852, the eldest of seven children, and as a girl already visited the poor and the sick with her mother. After school she worked as a silk weaver to help support the family, and at nineteen joined the Franciscan Third Order, which formed in her a spirit of simplicity and deep prayer. Her wish to consecrate herself to God was blocked by the Kulturkampf, and on her mother's deathbed she promised to care for her siblings. Years later she made her way to Steyl in Holland, where Father Arnold Janssen had established a house to train missionaries, and asked to serve there as a kitchen maid. She was nearly thirty-two, with no great plans beyond doing what she recognised as God's will at each moment.

After five years of hard and hidden work she became a postulant on 8 December 1889, at the foundation of the Missionary Sisters Servants of the Holy Spirit, professing first vows in March 1894 with the name Josepha. As directress of postulants she led young women into religious life with wisdom and understanding, and was known above all for her love of prayer.