Mercy Hirschboeck

Elizabeth Hirschboeck, known as Sister Mercy Hirschboeck, is one of these anonymous Holy people who should be less anonymous.  She fascinates me.  She was a Maryknoll doctor missionary from Marquette University.  She got a little press for her work in the Korea during the Korean War.  She started out at a clinic in Korea in 1931 when Japan occupied that country.  They she moves on in 1943 to the heat and snakes of a Bolivian Jungle.  Back to Korea in 1951 to Pusan clinic.  In two years, 200,000 patents were treated.  It was a big and busy clinic.  1954 she goes home to Kansas City to administer at a fully integrated hospital called Queen of the World.  An integrated hospital in 1954 is something considering that the Supreme Court finally decided that separate but equal schools were not so equal.  Then she runs the whole order for twelve years.  At seventy you would think she could kick back, but no.  She moves into a crime infested neighborhood in Manhattan with a a group of "contemplative" nuns and witnessed by her presence amidst crime, drugs and poverty.  Doctoring never stops for her.  She died in 1986, just as I was moving to San Francisco to take on some "soft" Paulist ministry.  Someone said her demeanor gave you the sense of her being holy.  Wow.  My demeanor gives you the sense of what?  Never mind.  Work on your own demeanor.