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Brigid Teresa McCrory was born on January 21, 1893, in the Townland of Clintycracken Brockagh, County Tyrone, Northern Ireland into a devout Catholic family.
At the age of 7, Brigid’s family moved to Mossend, Scotland. Their house was next door to the parish church of Holy Family, and that is where Brigid grew up. She loved to help the pastor, Father Dean Cronin, around the church. One of her duties was arranging flowers on the high altar for Mass.
When she was 9 or 10, Brigid changed her name to Bridget because she loved French. Not only was inspired not only by the parish priest, but also by religious sisters who came to the church to beg for alms for the sick and elderly people they cared for. Increasingly, she felt called to be a religious sister.
In 1912, left her home at 19 to join the Little Sisters of the Poor. Before leaving, the priest told her to pick any book she wanted from his library as a gift. So, Bridget closed her eyes and chose “The life of Saint Teresa of Avila.”
Bridget joined the Little Sisters of the Poor who devoted themselves to caring for the aged. After her novitiate year in La Tour, France, she became known as Sister Angeline de Saint Agatha. After her profession of vows, her order sent her as a missionary sister to the United States of America. She arrived on the feast of All Saints, November 1, 1915.
In 1926, Sister Angeline was named superior of the home of the Little Sisters of the Poor in the borough of Bronx, New York City. But during her annual retreat in 1927, Sister Angeline realized that she was not completely fulfilled in her order. She believed that how the order cared for the aged might have been fine in France, but in the United States, many of the French customs of caring for people did not work. She also felt that she could do little to make any significant changes in the order’s way of doing things. Therefore, she turned to Cardinal Patrick Hayes, Archbishop of New York at the time for his advice on her concerns.
The cardinal was very kind to Sister Angeline, and he suggested that perhaps she should expand her ministry to include the aged throughout the New York City area. So, with the cardinal’s blessing, in 1929, Sister Angeline, along with six other Sisters from the Little Sisters of the Poor, received permission from the Vatican to found a new congregation based on her ideas.
The local Carmelite friars helped Mother Angeline and her new community, so by 1931, the new community was formally named the Carmelite Sisters of the Aged and Infirm.
Mother Angeline served as superior general of the order until 1978. She liked to say, “If you have to fail, let it be on the side of kindness. Be kinder than kindness itself to the elderly.” She also told the sisters that they should always reach out and clasp the hand of an elderly person, for the human touch demonstrates human kindness.
The Carmelite Sisters of the Aged and Infirm serve in the United States of America and Ireland.
Mother Angeline died on her 91st birthday, January 21, 1984, at the St. Therese Motherhouse at Avila-On Hudson in Germantown, New York. Pope Benedict XVI named her a Venerable in 2012.
