About | Dominican Nuns of Summit, NJ

Our Beginnings

St. Dominic de Guzman (1170- 1221) gathers together a group of women converts from the Albigensian heresy at Prouilhe, France, in 1206. Forming them into a community of prayer and penance, he associated them with the holy preaching of his brethren, the friars of the Order of Preachers, founded in 1216. Under Dominic’s fatherly care, monasteries were founded in San Sisto, Rome, and Bologna, and spread throughout Europe.

For His Honor and Glory

In 1880 in Calais, France, Fr. Damien-Marie Saintourens, O.P., and Mother Rose of Saint Mary Werhle, O.P., found a community of Dominican cloistered contemplative sisters whose special apostolate is the Perpetual Rosary. While keeping the monastic observances, the sisters were also to be “Mary’s Guard of Honor, ” contemplating the mysteries of salvation presented in the Rosary.

The first American Perpetual Rosary monastery was established at the Blue Chapel, Union City, NJ, in 1891. In 1919, fifteen sisters led by Mother Mary Imelda Gauthier, O.P., left there to found the Monastery of Our Lady of the Rosary in Summit, NJ. Two more foundations issued from our monastery: North Guilford, CT (Our Lady of Grace Monastery) in 1947, and Cainta, Philippines (Monastery of Our Lady of the Rosary) in 1977.