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| Sr. Caridad Tatayon,Senior Vice President for Miss ion Integration, St. Francis Medical Center |
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Serving the needy, healing the sick
What exactly is the mission of the DCHS?
Sister Caridad explains, "The Daughters of Charity were founded by St. Vincent de Paul and St. Louise de Marillac in Paris, France in 1633. We serve the Poor in 93 countries especially in the developing nations."From their founding days almost 400 years ago, the Daughters of Charity were unlike the established religious communities at the time. Saint Vincent de Paul, their founder, wanted the Daughters to be free to walk the streets of Paris in response to the needs of the poor which were great – abandoned babies, the homeless and sick living in the streets, hungry beggars everywhere – all of which pointed up a widening gap between the rich and the poor. Up to this point, all religious women were behind cloister walls, which meant they were enclosed within the monastery and performed a ministry of contemplative prayer. Vincent, in his shrewd wisdom, laid the foundation for the Daughters to maintain the necessary mobility and to live in the midst of those who were most abandoned.
"Let us seek out the poorest and most abandoned among us; and recognize before God that they are our lords and our masters, and that we are unworthy of rendering our little services to them," St. Vincent De Paul told the community of women he founded.From the very beginning, the community (sometimes referred to as "Sisters of Charity") was to serve the needs of the poorest and most abandoned in society.
From Europe, five nuns from the Daughters of Charity arrived in San Francisco in 1852, founding a hospital, an orphanage and beginning their work of caring for the sick. In 1856, six Daughters arrived in Los Angeles and within weeks began serving their community, establishing an orphanage and school. They began caring for patients brought to them even before they opened the Los Angeles County Hospital in 1858 and incorporated as the Los Angeles Infirmary in 1869. Until 1995, the Daughters of Charity hospitals were part of the Daughters of Charity
National Health System (now Ascension Health). In 1995, the Daughters of Charity, Province of the West, merged their hospitals with Catholic Healthcare West (CHW), responding to market pressures and perceived opportunities to strengthen the wider Catholic health ministry in California. In 2001, after careful reflection, the Daughters of Charity, Province of the West, withdrew from CHW. On January 1, 2002, the Daughters of Charity Health System was formed. Sister Caridad has been with the Daughters of Charity for more than 41 years. She relates, "I was born, raised and educated in Baguio including Nursing. I graduated from Baguio General Hospital School of Nursing almost 50 years ago. My family moved to San Francisco in 1962 and I joined the Daughters of Charity in St. Louis , Missouri five years later after working as an R.N. I finished my BSN while in St. Louis then was missioned to San Jose , California."| < Prev | Next > |
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