Mary Elizabeth Lange

In Baltimore, Elizabeth Lange observed that children of color were excluded from access to public education, as Maryland was then a slave state. Driven by her faith and possessing a personal fortune inherited from her father, she decided to open a free school in her own home, located in the Fells Point neighborhood, with the help of her friend Marie Magdelaine Balas. Together, they taught there as volunteers for about ten years.

In 1828, the Sulpician Father James Hector Nicholas Joubert, himself a refugee from Saint-Domingue, sought a solution to provide religious and general instruction for young girls of color. Impressed by the dedication of Elizabeth Lange and Marie Balas, and learning of their desire to consecrate themselves to God, he proposed that they found a religious community. With the approval of the Archbishop of Baltimore, Most Reverend James Whitfield, the girls' school (which would become the St. Frances Academy) was officially established.

On July 2, 1829, Elizabeth Lange and three companions (Marie Magdelaine Balas, Marie Rose Boegue, and Theresa Maxis Duchemin) pronounced their vows of poverty, chastity, and obedience. They thus founded the Oblate Sisters of Providence, the very first Catholic religious congregation for women of African descent in the United States. Elizabeth took the name Sister Mary (Mother Mary Lange) and became the first superior general of the institute, a position she held from 1829 to 1832, and again from 1835 to 1841.

Under her leadership, the congregation developed its works of education and charity. The sisters welcomed orphans and widows, educated freed slaves, and devoted themselves heroically to caring for the sick during the cholera epidemic of 1832 in Baltimore. To ensure the financial survival of their works in the face of poverty and lack of support, the sisters also performed domestic work, notably at St. Mary's Seminary. Despite the prevailing racism, material difficulties, and pressure from certain ecclesiastical authorities (such as Archbishop Samuel Eccleston, who suggested they dissolve the congregation to become mere domestic servants), Mother Mary Lange firmly maintained the institute through her unwavering trust in Divine Providence.

Mother Mary Lange passed away on February 3, 1882, at St. Frances Convent in Baltimore, at an advanced age. She was initially buried in the cathedral cemetery, then transferred to the New Cathedral Cemetery. Her reputation for holiness and inherited charity endured through the decades. In 1991, Cardinal William Henry Keeler, Archbishop of Baltimore, officially opened her cause for beatification and canonization, bestowing upon her the title of Servant of God. As part of this procedure, her mortal remains were exhumed on May 28, 2013, and transferred to the chapel of the motherhouse of the Oblate Sisters of Providence in Arbutus, near Baltimore.

The diocesan process having been completed, the Positio (the summary document on her life and heroic virtues) was transmitted to Rome. On February 27, 2023, the Dicastery for the Causes of Saints informed the congregation of the approval of the Positio. On June 22, 2023, Pope Francis signed the decree recognizing the heroic nature of her virtues, officially declaring her Venerable. For her beatification to be pronounced, the official recognition of a miracle attributed to her intercession is now required.

Mother Mary Lange's spirituality rests entirely on total abandonment to Divine Providence, summarized by her congregation's motto: "Providence will Provide." Faced with the discrimination she endured (as a woman, Black, and a French-speaking Catholic in a Protestant and slave-holding society), she countered with extraordinary evangelical resilience, drawing her strength from the Eucharist and prayer.

Her legacy is immense. The St. Frances Academy, which she founded in 1828, is today the oldest continuously operating Catholic school for children of color in the United States. The Oblate Sisters of Providence continue to work in the United States and abroad, perpetuating her mission of education and assistance to the most destitute. In August 2021, the Archdiocese of Baltimore also opened the Mother Mary Lange Catholic School, the first new Catholic school built in the city in nearly sixty years, testifying to the vitality of her memory.