One of history's remarkable women, Catherine McAuley, was born in 1778 in Dublin. She founded the Sisters of Mercy in 1831. At a time of great poverty and political strife:

• she was an advocate of the poor, the sick, and the uneducated.
• she sought to bring educational opportunities and basic health care to those most in need.
• she established a new religious organisation, the Institute of the Sisters of Mercy, extending the Catholic Church's ministries of teaching and nursing.