St. Walburg Monastery

• How We Serve
• Sponsored Ministries
• Social Needs Fund
  • Information
  • Funding Criteria
  • Recipients
• Center of Spirituality
• Because of the poor performance of our funds on the stock market over the past two years, we will be suspending the Social Needs Fund for the year 2010. We hope to resume giving grants in the year 2011. Please contact Sr. Deborah Harmeling in September, 2010 about the fund.
  

A 1930 graduate of Villa Madonna Academy, Margaret Hay Edwards was a lifelong friend and benefactor of the Benedictine Sisters of St. Walburg Monastery. A native of Appalachia where she taught high school mathematics and English for a short time, Margaret entered the medical profession after earning her M.D. from Temple University in 1949. She also earned a master’s degree in public health from Harvard University in 1960. Expertise in these fields, as well as her interest in teaching, led her to the National Cancer Institute in Washington, D.C. in 1963. It was here that she directed the NCI’s Training/Education Grant Program until her retirement in 1983. Dr. Edwards gave a lifetime of service to others, and the Benedictine Sisters are continuing this service in her name.

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Throughout the years God has blessed the Benedictine Sisters of St. Walburg Monastery with generous benefactors, wise leadership and the traditional monastic sense of good stewardship.

The 1995 bequest from a good friend, Margaret Hay Edwards, M.D., stirred in this community a deep sense of gratitude. This bequest provided an opportunity for St. Walburg Monastery to assist organizations/agencies which serve people in need. St. Walburg Monastery’s mission statement declares:

"We celebrate the presence of Jesus Christ and serve him in the young and the old, the sick and the poor, the stranger and the guest."

The community resolved to use the interest on a portion of Margaret Hay Edwards’ bequest to address the social needs of housing, hunger, health and education in locales where members of the community live and/or serve. These locales include the Dioceses of Covington and Lexington, Kentucky; the Diocese of Pueblo, Colorado; the Archdiocese of Cincinnati, Ohio.

Each year the community will distribute the funds available. Organizations and agencies with projects meeting the are invited to apply for funding. Email Sr. Deborah Harmeling for application materials.