St. Veronica Guiliani Monastery - Wilmington, Delaware

In 1985, Brother Ronald Giannone, OFM Cap., Fr. Thomas Hanley, personal representative of the Bishop of Wilmington, Delaware, and two Poor Clare nuns from the monastery in Langhorne, Pennsylvania visited the capuchin monastery in Uruapan, Michoacan, (Mexico). They met with Abbess, Mother Teresa Cacho, and with the President of the Federation of St. Francis and St. Clare, Mother María Inés Cacho. Bro. Ronald and his companions traveled to Mexico with the intention of asking the Sisters in Uruapan to consider the founding of a monastery in Wilmington, Delaware, where the capuchin friars have The Ministry of Caring, a service program for the poor. 

    

    As a follow up to the visit, Bro. Ronald wrote to Mother Teresa Cacho with the formal request for a new foundation from the monastery in Uruapan. Mother Teresa Cacho turned down his request. She felt that her sisters, though large in number, were too young to assume such an important new mission. Bro. Ronald was not about to take “no” for an answer. He approached the Minister General, Fr. Flavio Roberto Carraro, during his scheduled visit to the Capuchin New Jersey province. The Minister General decided to make a personal appeal, requesting the establishment of the new foundation. The sisters in Uruapan accepted this latest request as the will of God, expressed through the successor of St. Francis. 

    Fr. Ronald and his capuchin confreres, of the Province of the Stigmata in New Jersey, were looking for a prayerful community that would offer them spiritual support in their ministry to the local poor. On December 12, 1986, the Feast of our Lady of Guadalupe, eight of us left our beloved sisters in the monastery of Uruapan and our dear Mexico, to become missionaries in a new land. It has been 23 years since we first arrived in this country. We have been able to master the English language. We continue our process of learning and assimilating this country’s culture while, at the same time; endeavoring to live, joyfully, our vocation of contemplative prayer, in petition for our brothers and sisters throughout the world. 

(Text from: /www.capuchinpoorclares.org)