Our arrival in Baden offered more opportunities for ministry. Diocesan priests requested us to staff schools in towns along the rivers and in Pittsburgh. In 1904, we began St. Joseph Hospital and Nursing School along Carson Street in Pittsburgh. The hospital remained a vibrant ministry, serving industrial workers and their families until 1977.

Between 1901 and 1945, the Congregation taught in 26 new elementary and three secondary schools, and established Mt. Gallitzin High School for Girls in Baden. We also remodeled our former Motherhouse in Ebensburg into an infant home where we nurtured newborns to toddlers from 1923 to 1959.

We also heard God's call to serve abroad.

From 1926 to 1947, 15 Sisters of St. Joseph of Baden went to Hunan, China, where we worked in orphanages and hospitals.

Our presence there ended in 1994 with the death of Sister Teresa Lung, a native of Hunan Province who entered our Congregation in 1933.

With Vatican II came changes that neither our foundresses nor we could have anticipated. Charged by Pope Paul VI to "return to our roots," we joined with Sisters of St. Joseph the world over to research our history and to refashion ourselves in the spirit of the original Sisters at LePuy, all of whom wore the clothing of their day.

Hence, in 1968, our community in Baden chose to wear the clothing of our day and distinguish ourselves among God's people with our service.

Over the last 31 years, more changes occurred: we began two missions in Brazil (1967 to 1994), one in Liberia (1979 to 1986),
and one in Jamaica (1993 to present).

We met the needs of people in 20 states, including some of the poorest regions in the nation. We have sheltered refugees from Cuba, Haiti, Vietnam, Cambodia, Laos, Bosnia and Kosovo and have been instrumental in helping all find homes in this country.

Though our ministries of education and health care continue, our services have widened to include social services, spiritual development and a gamut of other works.

Recently, we opened Girls Hope, a residential program for girls at risk and the first of its kind in the nation.

In 1997, Villa St. Joseph, a 120-bed long-term care facility with a specialized unit for Alzheimer's patients opened adjacent to our Motherhouse. The nursing home is a non-sectarian facility which treats men and women as well as our Sisters.

Mt. Gallitzin Academy continues to flourish, educating boys and girls pre-K through eighth-grade. The academy is a leader in technology education in the Beaver Valley area.

Today, the Sisters of St. Joseph are 296 women strong. We are chaplains, foster parents, pastoral ministers, doctors, lawyers, communication directors, drug and alcohol interventionists and counselors, retreat directors, college professors ... just to name a few "occupations." Our call to serve others extends from infants to the elderly, from a Native American reservation in Wyoming to a women's prison in Massachusetts, from shelters for homeless persons in Washington, D.C., to next door neighbors in Pittsburgh too ill to leave home.

This year, the Sisters of St. Joseph celebrate 350 years of service to God and neighbor. May God grant us the grace for 350 more.