Born in Ballynunnery, County Kilkenny, Ireland, on July 22, 1860, Johanna Butler was educated in parish and private schools and in 1876 became a novice in the Congregation of the Sacred Heart of Mary in BÄziers, France. She took Marie Joseph as her name in religion. In 1879 she was sent as a teacher to the order╒s convent school in Oporto, Portugal, where in April 1880 her novitiate ended and she entered into full membership in the order. In 1881 she was transferred to a convent school in Braga, Portugal, where she became superior in 1893.
In 1903 Mother Marie Joseph was directed to take charge of the order╒s school in Sag Harbor, Long Island, New York. She also had responsibility for expanding the work of the order in the United States, and to that end in December 1907, aided by a gift of land from a cousin, she opened Marymount School in Tarrytown, New York. By 1919 the school had developed into a college for Catholic women, and under her guidance it became a leader in Catholic higher education for the modern world. Other Marymount schools were later established to spread the work of the original: in 1923 Marymount Academy of Los Angeles, now Marymount College in Palos Verdes Estates; in 1923 Mariemont in Paris; in 1930 Mariamonte in Rome; in 1936 the two-year Marymount Manhattan College in New York City. In all 14 schools, 3 of them colleges, in the United States and 23 schools, novitiates, and other institutions in other countries were opened by the order under her influence. In 1926 she was elected Mother General of the Congregation of the Sacred Heart of Mary, making her the first American head of a Catholic order based in Europe. In 1927 she was naturalized a U.S. citizen. In addition to educational institutions she founded the Mother Butler Mission Guilds for social service and instituted the retreat movement for laywomen. She died in Tarrytown, New York, on April 23, 1940. In 1948 her cause for canonization was opened.
