Sr Angèle Nkamsi MSHR (right) pictured with Sr Kathleen Scullion MSHR, both members of the
leadership team of the Missionary Sisters of the Holy Rosary. Photo: John McElroy. The Missionary Sisters of the Holy Rosary remembered the birthday of their founder Bishop Joseph Shanahan last weekend, gathering in Dublin and at his birthplace in Borrisoleigh, Co. Tipperary. Bishop Shanahan founded the Missionary Sisters of the Holy Rosary in 1924, as Bishop and Vicar Apostolic of Onitsha in southeast Nigeria, where he had been on mission for 20 years. He is credited with converting many Nigerians to Catholicism and is remembered there to this day. He was born on June 6, 1871 and died in 1943.
Speaking from the site of the bishop’s birthplace in Borrisoleigh, Sr Bernadette of the Holy Rosary Sisters said in a video posted to the Sisters’ Facebook page that it is “always a joy to come visit this spot” .
“I look forward to where he will be canonised hopefully in my lifetime,” she continued, “and we’ll come here to say prayers and celebrate in gratitude to God for the gift of such a wonderful man that brought Christianity to us in Nigeria.”
Bishop Shanahan’s cause for canonisation was initiated in 1997.