Ministering in the Archdiocese

Sister Patricia Flass, SSJ and Sister Kathleen Navarra, SSJ

The Sisters of St. Joseph, Rochester, are a household name in Dallas County and the county seat, Selma, where the poverty rate is above 25 percent. Today that name is associated with Sister Pat and Sister Kathy who have been ministering with the Edmundite Missions in this area for over 20 years.
Sister Pat has had a variety of ministries, including directing an adult day care program, a food pantry, working at Catholic Social Ministries and now as a volunteer at Health Link, which is a free service to serve the needs of uninsured people living in Dallas County. Sister’s secondary ministry involves a program of inviting Religious from across the country to visit Alabama’s Black Belt to learn about the needs of the rural poor living there. This program is funded by a grant from the Catholic Sisters Initiative of the Conrad N. Hilton Foundation.
Sister Kathy is presently coordinating the Mission Academy for grades 7-10, an afterschool program which stresses academics as well as college and career opportunities. The students have visited colleges in the state including Spring Hill College and the University of Alabama. Their last trip was to Loyola University in New Orleans. This program, which also helps Academy parents, is funded by the same Hilton grant. 
The Sisters of St. Joseph of Rochester came to Selma in 1940. The Sisters began a partnership with the Edmundite priests who established a Mission there in 1937. Sister Pat said, “Our charism has an emphasis on unity and reconciliation and at that time we ministered with the Black people in the segregated South at St. Elizabeth School and Good Samaritan Hospital.”  Sister Kathy reflected “that one of our main refrains consistently calls us to ‘Quarter the city and do all of which a woman is capable.’  This brought me from the Mohawk Reservation in Northern New York to a soup kitchen in Rochester to ministering in rural Alabama ... My passion is working with our neighbor whomever and wherever."