Honorary doctorate for champion of Boston’s immigrants.
Wednesday, August 13th, 2008

An Irish nun who has championed the rights of immigrants in the United States has been awarded an honorary doctorate in humanities from Stonehill College in Massachusetts.

Sr Lena Deevy received the honour for her involvement in “international solidarity efforts that have promoted peace and justice".

A native of Crettyard, Co Laois and a member of the Little Sisters of the Assumption, Sr Deevy is the executive director of the Boston Irish Immigration Center, a non-profit, self-help agency that serves the interests of immigrants from Ireland and elsewhere.

She was conferred with the degree by Stonehill College’s Richard B. Finnegan, professor of Political Science.

He said Sr Deevy’s entire life had involved “widening the thresholds of possibility for the transient, transplanted, and disenfranchised”.

The professor said she had spent twenty years in Ireland spearheading community efforts in poor neighbourhoods before coming to Boston to study.

He said her academic research – at the Harvard School of Education - provided the basis for the Irish Immigration Center, which was created to support Irish immigrants moving to the US.

But the Centre’s mission, Prof. Finnegan said, has evolved since it was launched in 1990 and now helped immigrants from no fewer than 112 countries.

“It is an inspirational beacon on the same "city upon a hill" where early settlers arrived centuries ago,” he proclaimed.

“Indeed, although you hail from a small island that has known more than its share of hunger, sectarian conflict, and diaspora, your message of acceptance and multicultural understanding builds bridges across all global communities,” he told her.

He said that Sr Deevy had dedicated her life “to grassroots activism that improves the lives of the poor and, particularly, of immigrants”.

She had helped Boston newcomers to become contributing neighbours, colleagues, and citizens, the professor declared.

He said she had earned the degree for work in helping to promote peace and justice in Nicaragua, El Salvador, South Africa, and the Philippines, for her steadfast aid to people separated from their homelands and people.

He said the Laois-born nun had a “collaborative spirit” that allowed her to “look beyond potential barriers of race, language, and place of origin”.

Sr Deevy, who originally trained as a nurse in a Welsh hospital and worked at a Dublin maternity hospital before choosing to join the Little Sisters of the Assumption.

She said she took a break to study in the US but ended up staying after “a jolting Harvard-inspired intern programme” which she said opened her eyes to poverty and racism in Boston.

In 1996, she received the Isaac Hecker Award for her outreach to all immigrant groups and her work to combat the accompanying racism.

Stonehill College was acquired by the Congregation of Holy Cross in 1935 as a seminary and a Catholic college for men but has been run by lay trustees since 1972.