VICTORY NOLL CENTER
1900 W. Park Drive
Huntington, Indiana 46750
(260) 356-0628

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VICTORY NOLL CENTER

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Visions Spring 2009
Visions Winter 2008-09
Visions Fall 2008

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OLVM History

Our founder, Father John Joseph Sigstein, was a man of prayer, vision, and action with great love and compassion for poor and oppressed peoples. He was driven by his sense of being part of God’s Mission, and by his devotion to Mary under her title of Our Lady of Victory.
While visiting in the Southwest, he was distressed by the poverty and by the many problems and needs of people that were not being addressed by any existing religious congregation. Fr. Sigstein founded Our Lady of Victory Missionary Sisters to meet some of those needs in the areas of religious education, social services and health care among the poor from a personal non-institutional perspective.
This ministry called for creative, daring and innovative women who knew how to translate dreams and prayers and visions into actions. It all began in 1922 with Julia Doyle and Marie Benes, our first two members, and continues today into the twenty-first century.
Growth of the new congregation was advanced by Archbishop John Francis Noll, through the national publication he founded and published, Our Sunday Visitor. Through his generosity the Central House, Victory Noll, was built in Huntington, IN, and named for Our Lady of Victory and Archbishop Noll. Both John Joseph Sigstein and John Francis Noll shared responsibility for the founding and growth of the community of the Victory Noll Sisters, each in his own way.
One of Fr. Sigstein’s favorite mottos was:

“Meet modern needs with modern means.”

This motto has shaped our evolution as a congregation from the way we dress, to the way we live in community and minister among the “people of God.”
Will Frey, a friend and co-worker of Fr. Sigstein in Chicago, assisted our first Sisters in New Mexico. He was a versatile handyman and shared his gifts and talents with the Sisters and the people among whom they lived and worked. Will was our first Associate, working in partnership with the Sisters and the people, working together to continue the mission of Jesus.
Since working with the poor was a priority of this new congregation, Fr. Sigstein set up a network of Associates across the country who were to raise funds that would help the Sisters with their own survival needs. These groups of Associates would also send food, clothing and religious goods to be distributed among the families and children in need.
From the beginning Father Sigstein was an image breaker with his resistance to the traditional habit. Our original dress was referred to as a uniform, without traditional rosary hanging from the belt, veil completely covering hair or hem to the floor. Many attempts were made to change the image of Victory Noll Sisters to bring them into line with a more conventional picture of women religious. 
Criticism and objections that the Sisters met with in the 1930’s and following decades – that they could not be real religious because of certain externals that were innovative – sounds quaint and trivial now; but remember this was still long before Vatican II.
Vatican II called for a return to the original spirit of the founder, guided by the changed conditions in the Church and world. What was obsolete, irrelevant in the modern world, was to be discontinued.
Father Sigstein and Archbishop Noll are buried in the cemetery at Victory Noll. Usually Bishops are buried in their Cathedral but Archbishop Noll felt that he would get more prayers here.

More of Father Sigstein’s mottos:

“Pioneers as we are in the work of our Blessed Lady of Victory,
we must blaze a path that is straight and true. . .
faithful to our original foundation.”

“Remember to keep yourself always in the Presence of God.”

“All for Jesus through Mary.”

“Have a smile for all even when your own heart is heavy.”

“Go to the poorest first. Always have preference for them.”

“Always keep your first fervor.”

Our Lady of Victory Missonary Sisters is an American Missionary Congregation founded in 1922 — serving the poor and oppressed in a personal, non-institutional way

+ Proclaiming the Gospel
   + Working for Justice
      + Empowering the Laity

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OLVM BLOG from Victory Noll Sisters

MONTHLY REFLECTIONS from Sr Martha Wordeman