The origins of the Franciscan Sisters, Servants of the Cross in Laski according to archive materials

The Order of the Franciscan Sisters, Servants of the Cross was founded by Mother Elizabeth Roza Czacka in 1918. The official date of its origin is recognised as 1 December 1918, although we know that the congregation existed on an informal basis previous to this. The order’s main objective was to bring aid to blind people. It was to work closely with the Society for the Care of the Blind, which had been formed, also thanks to Roza Czacka, in 1911. The Order of the Franciscan Sisters, Servants of the Cross was the first female monastic order to be founded in the Polish lands after Poland regained independence. After a long period in which the partitioning power imposed drastic restrictions on monastic life and secret congregations had formed, there were few models for an order of nuns to follow. The source documents preserved in three archives in Laski – the Archive of the Franciscan Sisters, Servants of the Cross, the Archive of the Society for the Care of the Blind, and the Archive of Father Wladyslaw Korniłowicz – show the interesting way in which the founder developed the new order.