Catherine Doherty
Catherine de Hueck Doherty (née Ekaterina Fyodorovna Kolyschkina; August 15, 1896 - December 14, 1985) was born in Russia to wealthy parents and came to Canada after escaping the Russian Revolution. She was a Catholic lay apostle, social activist, a pioneer in the struggle for interracial justice, spiritual writer, lecturer, and spiritual mother to priests and laity.
Servant of God Catherine Doherty CM | |
|---|---|
Doherty in 1970 | |
| Born | Ekaterina Fyodorovna Kolyschkine (in Russian: Екатерина Фёдоровна Колышкина) 15 August 1896 Nizhny Novgorod, Russia |
| Died | 14 December 1985 (aged 89) Combermere, Ontario, Canada |
During the Great Depression, she founded Friendship House, which served the poor in Toronto. After its closure, she opened Friendship House in Harlem, New York in 1938, serving the needs of the black community there.
In 1947, Catherine and her second husband, Irish American journalist Eddie Doherty, moved to the village of Combermere, Ontario, where the Madonna House Apostolate, a Catholic community of laymen, laywomen, and priests, developed and flourished.
Among her more than thirty books, many of which blended a profound spirituality of East and West, was the spiritual classic Poustinia. "A woman in love with God," she strived and taught others to live the Gospel without compromise.
Doherty's cause for canonization is under consideration by the Catholic Church.