See the combined video from all the Mercy schools, including ours, telling the story of Catherine McAuley and her Sisters.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=znn1OBKUzOY

OUR STORY OF MERCY

Our story of Mercy in Wellington begins with the coming of four young women, aged between 14 and 22 years with Bishop Viard in 1850 to establish the Catholic mission with a convent and school named St Mary’s. However, because of the poverty, loneliness and ill health, three of the young women had returned to Auckland by 1858 and the last, Teresa Walsh, died in March 1860 at the age of 28. In desperation, for fear that the whole mission would collapse, the bishop appealed to Bishop Pompallier of Auckland and Mother Cecilia Maher of the Auckland Sisters of Mercy for help.

Eventually, volunteers were called for and Sisters Bernard Dickson and Augustine Maxwell offered themselves together with Marie Deloncle, a postulant (new member). They set sail in midwinter and anchored in a stormy Wellington harbour over a week later after midnight on the 14th of June 1861 to find not a soul there to greet them. A messenger from the ship was sent to awaken the bishop at 4am who bewildered and embarrassed hurried to the jetty to meet them and took them to St Mary’s Convent where he appointed Sister Bernard as the Mother Superior and Sister Augustine as her Assistant.
Then with great generosity in response to Bishop Pompallier’s request for sisters, she sailed for Auckland in 1857 with five companions, one of whom was Sister Augustine Maxwell. It was these two remarkable Sisters of Mercy who came and joined the young volunteers who had endeavoured to keep St Mary’s and the Providence for Maori girls going after Teresa Walsh’s death. Besides teaching, Sister Bernard had the responsibility for the formation of novices and with the Profession of Vows of three women and the Reception of another young woman in 1863, the Congregation of Our Lady of Mercy was firmly established in Wellington, and once more education flourished at St Mary’s. 
Meanwhile the Mercy complex had grown to include a boarding school, a select day school and an infant school. It is reported that students came from as far away as Dunedin for the outstanding education offered at St Mary’s Convent High School – the name which continued until 1926 when St Mary’s was registered as a college. Thanks to the work of Sister Bernard and other sisters who followed her, St Mary’s was held in such esteem that when the University Entrance Examination replaced Matriculation and accreditation was introduced, the college was placed on the first list of schools empowered to accredit entrants to the University of New Zealand.
Sister Bernard  was a gallant woman who sowed the seeds of much we have the privilege of enjoying and carrying on today. May we never forget that in the words of Joan Chittister OSB ‘our history is the history of a thousand new beginnings, and this is the time to begin again’.

Sr De Porres, rsm.

Article added: Friday 24 September 2021