Overview

In 1863 four Irish women arrived in Melbourne with few possessions, hoping to establish a new way of life. Their Irish background and financial condition were typical of many other women who arrived in these years. Atypical, however, were the ideals of these women who had recently dedicated themselves to a new French order of religious women, the Sisters of Our Lady of Charity of the Good Shepherd, and they arrived in Australia determined to devote their lives to women and girls facing social hardship and exclusion. Responding to a period of extraordinary social change and unrest in Australia, the Sisters of the Good Shepherd were soon at the forefront of welfare provision in Australia, eventually establishing foundations throughout Australia, New Zealand and Tahiti. The demise of institutional methods of care and the changes inaugurated by the Second Vatican Council, however, resulted in a radical restructuring of the Sisters' order and methods of care. No longer part of visible institutions, the sisters inserted themselves into the community around them, offering assistance to families, children, women in prison, and others in need, as well as taking the lead in many areas of social policy from trafficking of women to fair trade, and developing imaginative solutions for those in financial distress. Though their numbers have diminished dramatically, the energy of the sisters' charism has been taken up by many lay people, ensuring the continuance of Good Shepherd ideals into the 21st century.

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