Blessed Catherine of St. Augustine was born in France and given a good education. Since her youth she had a devotion to Our Lady and cared for the sick. Following the advice of St. John Eudes, she entered the Augustinian Hospitaller Sisters of Mercy of Jesus in 1644. (A nursing order) Catherine volunteered to go to the Quebec mission despite the objections of her family. On the voyage to Canada, she contracted the plague. During her life, she struggled with spiritual dryness and debilitating illnesses. She was a prodigy of sacrificial love, kind and gracious to all, and a great mystic. Blessed Catherine is considered a co-founder of the Catholic Church in Canada. Pope St. John Paul II beatified her in 1989.
