Teresa Kearney and the Little Sisters of St. Francis in Eastern Africa: A Revolution of Tenderness

This dissertation narrates the story of Teresa Kearney between 1903-1957 and the Little Sisters of St. Francis in Eastern Africa between 1959-2023 to argue that this story embodied the theological themes of mission, accompaniment, and charity to the peripheries that resound through Pope’s Francis theology of a revolution of tenderness. The dissertation will be guided by three questions. Firstly, how did Kearney’s story embody the themes of mission, accompaniment, and charity to the peripheries? Secondly, how do the Little Sisters of St. Francis extend Kearney’s themes of mission, accompaniment, and charity to the peripheries? Finally, how does Pope Francis echo Kearney’s themes of mission, accompaniment, and charity to the peripheries? Through archival research, interviews, and historical data on Kearney and the Little Sisters, the work is divided into six chapters. The first chapter introduces the entire dissertation by introducing Kearney, the history of Uganda, the literature review, the rationale of the study, and the organization. In the second and third chapters, this project narrates Kearney’s story by locating these chapters around Kearney’s workplaces in Uganda. The second chapter narrates Kearney’s mission at Nsambya. Then the work locates Kearney at Nkokonjeru in the third chapter as she formed the Little Sisters, humanized what she called the lesser brethren (lepers), and separated the Franciscan Missionary Sisters for Africa from the Franciscan Sisters of the Abbey. The fourth chapter reflects how the Little Sisters institutionalize Kearney’s work through its Superior Generals from 1959 through 2023. The fifth chapter examines how Mother Nasimiyu, one of the Little Sisters Superior Generals, advanced Kearney’s legacy of women empowerment through expansion, service to the poor, education, promotion of unity, and Kearney’s beatification Cause. The final chapter considers the pastoral and theological implications of Kearney’s story to the contemporary Church through the prism of Pope Francis and his theology of a revolution of tenderness. This theology is understood through the four themes of ecclesiology, mission, existential peripheries, and Franciscan spirituality that underline Kearney’s story. To understand the concreteness and workability of Pope Francis’ theology of a revolution of tenderness, the Church must narrate stories such as that of Kearney and the Little Sisters as people who have or are epitomizing Pope Francis’ theology.