The Sisters of Hope

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Who are the Sisters of Hope?

In 1999, a group of women came together to begin an order based on the teaching and structures used by St. Brigid of Kildare. Over time, the order went dormant. In late summer 2018, Katherine Mary Martin (a wife, mother, grandmother, retired social worker, and priest) and Shawna Lea Osborn (a mother, nurse, and missionary) were approached about reconstituting the religious order for women of various walks of life. Both ladies were passionate about integrating the wisdom of spiritual mothers and saints into every day spirituality for the 21st century, including its application to contemplative prayer, multi-generational families, and caring for the sick and vulnerable. After much prayer, reflection, and discussion, both ladies who together had a combined 40+ years of experience in Benedictine life decided to follow God’s call in creating a unique Order for women.

Reconstituted on the Feast of the Holy Cross on September 14, 2018 by Abbess Katherine Mary Martin, Sister Shawna Lea Osborn, and Bishop Protector Derek Jones, the Sisters of Hope was created to be a nurturing and empowering ecumenical community who welcomes Christian women who are called to the tradition of prayer, work, study, contemplation, spiritual formation, and hospitality. Drawing from the ancient wisdom of great desert mothers and female saints, the Sisters of Hope use the integrated contemplative and active monastic order architype of St. Brigid of Kildare. Unlike other religious societies or orders that may use the modified Rule of St. Augustine for the basis of their contemplative and/or active monastic lives, the women in our Order feel drawn to a rule of life which goes deeper into humility, obedience, multi-generational families, caring for the sick, and so much more.

As members of the Order, our community observes a common way of life that binds us together for the purpose of fellowship, prayer support, encouragement, spiritual growth, hospitality, and service. The Order welcomes single, married, divorced, or widowed women from jurisdictions or denominations in the ancient tradition of apostolic succession. Since we currently do not live in a monastery, we do not follow the same rigorous schedule of prayer, work, worship, rest, and recreation that those in cloistered monastic life often follow. Although we are currently dispersed, we seek to set some standards that allow us to identify daily as monastics and to spiritually fellowship with our sisters in the Order from whom we may be physically separated.

The Order, which is a religious society as understood in the Constitutions and Canons of the Anglican Church in North America (ACNA), welcomes women who are called to enter into a formal relationship of Associate or Vowed Membership. Members identified as Friends of the Order may be male or female. Vowed Members take vows of stability to our community and the monastic way of life, obedience to our merciful Lord Jesus Christ and each other according to Holy Scripture and the Rule of St. Benedict, and continual cruciform conversion.

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