Providence Health & Services Honors Mother Joseph

Esther Pariseau, who later became Mother Joseph of the Sacred Heart, a Sister of Providence, was born on April 16, 1823 in St. Elzear, Quebec. In 1856, thirteen years after joining the Sisters of Providence, she and four other sisters traveled 6,000 miles from Montreal to Washington state. They soon directed their energies toward building much-needed services — caring for orphans and the elderly, educating youth, and visiting and healing the sick. Mother Joseph is acknowledged as one of the first architects in the Northwest, designing the original St. Vincent Hospital in Portland, Oregon, among many other projects. Yet, she was most renowned as a builder of services — devoting her life to seeing that the poor were cared for, the homeless sheltered, the sick tended, and the hungry fed. Read her full biography.

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