Hands-on medical care is a tradition rooted very early in church history, beginning with the healing ministry of Jesus and continued by his apostles and the early Christian community.
St. Basil the Great created the first hospital in the fourth century. And St. Benedict’s rule in the sixth century mandated care for sick monks.
Today, religious sisters in the United States continue their communities’ long history of health care, seen as a “work of love” that cares for both “body and soul.”
