Nano Nagle Venerated and Venerable: Part Three, The Vision Unfolds

In a take on the “nature or nurture” quandary as to how human character is formed, is the question are saints born or become so through their life experiences. Nano Nagle’s father predicted she would become a saint. As we continue our reflections on our San Francisco 170th Anniversary, we know that Nano Nagle was venerated by the people of her time and continues to be today. The Roman Catholic Church has also declared her Venerable, the second level towards canonization. In four reflections on the stages of Nano Nagle’s life, we will look at how she became both venerated and Venerable through the values, virtues, and vision she developed in response to the times in which she lived.


PART THREE

The Vision Unfolds

In 1748, Nano Nagle returned to Ireland at the age of thirty to live with her brother, Joseph, and his wife, Frances, in the City of Cork. Within a year, she had begun her first school. What was the source of her vision to begin such an undertaking?

Her vision sprang from the values and virtues Nano had been integrating into her character in the first two phases of her life: commitment to her Catholic faith and belief that her salvation path lay with instructing the children academically and in faith; the obligation of the wealthy to aid the poor learned in the salons of Paris, the Irish tradition of education, empathy for others and the primacy of relationships, courage in the face of on-going risk and suffering, and most of all the belief in the ever present God.

Nano knew that opening a school and especially one intending to give instruction in the Roman Catholic faith, could place her in serious conflict with the Government which forbade such schools in the Penal Laws. It could also place her in conflict with the influential Irish Catholics, like her brother who would fear retribution to the wider Irish community if her school was discovered. Therefore, she began her school in secret and did not tell her brother and sister-in-law in an effort to protect them.

Still very much a woman of her class at the beginning, “Miss Nagle” had her maid recruit the first girls for her school.  Operating from 8:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. each day, the children learned skills such as reading, writing, and math. Nano herself provided the religious instruction.

Embodying a social vision ahead of her time, Nano saw her schools as a means of social regeneration. Given skills and moral parameters, Nano was staging a social and economic revolution with her children. Boys with their math skills could attain positions in the newly developing merchant companies springing up in Cork. Girls were taught needlework of all kinds enabling them to find employment in the clothing industries instead of relying on prostitution as an income source. In an era where the belief of all classes was to “keep in your place,” Nano’s students would change that dynamic and be able to move upward their social and economic standing.
                                                                                                                                                    Nano’s first school on Cove Lane within a month had two hundred students, then quickly four hundred. As the word spread, Nano eventually founded five schools for girls and two schools for boys. The instruction went beyond the walls of the schools. As Nano commented at one point, “All my children are fond of instructing.” They carried what they learned to family, neighbors, and other world areas as they sought opportunities in the West Indies and other parts of the British empire. Three women came to join Nano in her work in the schools – Mary Ann Collins, Mary Fouhy, and Elizabeth Burke. Faithful to Nano’s vision, they would play an important role in the continuance of her mission.

For the next thirty years of her life, Nano’s deepening understanding of her call and vision would move her from “Miss Nagle” to the Lady with the Lantern. Following her busy days at her schools, Nano at night would visit the sick and elderly in their homes. She was a regular visitor at the city’s charitable infirmaries and established a home for poor elderly women.

As an early biographer notes, “By being with the poor, Nano learned to become poor,” changing her lifestyle to match those she served. Drawing on deep resources of love and courage, she presented a “humble appearance.” When her personal funds were no longer adequate to support the schools, Nano sought funds from merchants and family connections. While modern readers would consider this fundraising for a worthy cause, Nano was looked down upon for this activity which seemed like begging to her contemporaries.

Nano’s zeal did not diminish and towards the end of her life, she said, “If I could be of service in saving souls in any part of the globe, I would willingly do all in my power.” As one biographer notes, this statement “is the cry of a heart grown visionary in love.”

Like all founders, Nano wanted to assure her work and vision would continue. In Part 4 of this series, Nano’s efforts for that continuance will be explored, as well as her final years of service.