Mary Theresa Dudzik

Mary Theresa Dudzik (August 30, 1860 – September 20, 1918) was an American Catholic religious sister who founded the Franciscan Sisters of Blessed Kunegunda. Today they are the Franciscan Sisters of Chicago.

Biography

Early years Mary Theresa Dudzik was born as Josephine Dudzik on August 30, 1860, in Płocicz in the Kingdom of Prussia (present-day Poland). She was one of six children of John and Agnes Polascyk. Dudzik was baptized at the Church of the Immaculate Conception in Kamien Krajenski.

In 1881, the Polascyk family emigrated to Chicago, Illinois. They became members of St. Stanislaus Kostka Church, the premier Polish national parish in the Pulaski Park neighborhood, She, along with her friends, generated the required funds for the charitable activities through “cleaning, cooking, and sewing in rectories and homes”.

In 1973, a possible miracle occurred due to Dudzik's intercession. During a crash on the Illinois Central Railroad, Jerry Lisiecki was seriously injured and became comatose. Doctors said he would never wake up. His mother in 1973 took leaves from a poinsettia plant on Dudzik's sarcophagus and place them on her bedridden son. She then prayed a nine day-novena. Lisiecki came out of his coma on the ninth day.

Dudzik was declared a ‘Servant of God’ by the Vatican in 1982 and in 1994 Pope John Paul II declared her to be venerable. However, after theologians and doctors at the Vatican examined the Lisiecki case, they declared that it was not a miracle.