Sister Clare Crockett on the road to Sainthood

Sr Clare Crockett

The sainthood cause of Sr Clare Crockett is to open early next year. In a ceremony in Madrid on January 12, she will be declared a 'Servant of God'. Sr Clare, a Sister of the Home of the Mother order, (SHM) died in the 2016 earthquake in Playa Prieta, Ecuador.

Clare Crockett was born in Derry in Northern Ireland on 14 November 1982. As a young child she loved to act and be with her friends. A lively student, in secondary school she was most passionate about literature and theatre.

She joined an acting agency at 14 and got her first job at 15. She worked as stage actor, writer and director, and as a TV presenter for Channel 4, and was offered a position at Nickelodeon which she turned down. She loved partying. Clare landed a small part in the 2002 film Sunday, about the events of Bloody Sunday in Derry in 1972.

After a religious experience in Spain on Good Friday 2000, she felt called to religious life. She felt confirmation of her call in the months afterwards, including from a priest at World Youth Day 2000 who told her surprising details of her childhood. During her final school year she felt torn between her worldly life and her call to vocation, and her worldly life seemed to be winning out. However, further religious experiences and the continued feeling of having a call helped convince her. In summer 2001 she went back to the convent of the Servant Sisters of the Home of the Mother (SHM) in Spain, where she took the name Sister Clare Maria of the Trinity and the Heart of Mary.

Clare worked in Spain, the United States and Ecuador, doing pastoral care duties, hospital chaplaincy, teaching and missionary outreach. She was known for her interpersonal skills and was much loved by her pupils. As part of her work, she voiced the character of Lucy in the children's series "Hi Lucy" which aired on EWTN for many years. It was still showing as "Lucy and Friends" on their Europe and Asia-Pacific TV channels as of May 2023.

On 16 April 2016, while she was playing the guitar and singing with her companions, the house where she was staying collapsed due to the 2016 Ecuador earthquake. Hours later she was found lifeless under the rubble. She died due to multiple injuries in Playa Prieta, a community of Riochico, Portoviejo, Ecuador.

Her body was flown back to her home town of Derry and laid to rest in the new area of the City Cemetery on Lone Moor Road.

The SHM Sisters said in a press release: "Her overflowing joy led many souls, especially young people, to discover that true happiness is found only in God. Her coherence of life and her total dedication in the various apostolates she carried out in Spain, the United States and Ecuador managed to transmit the message that only God can satisfy our hearts when we gives ourselves totally to Him. After her death, the surprise was to discover that Sr Clare had not finished her mission of evangelization. The thousands of messages and mails we have received and continue to receive from more than 50 countries bear witness to this.

"Throughout these eight years, many people have continuously requested that the necessary steps be taken to study the sanctity of Sister Clare Crockett. The Servant Sisters of the Home of the Mother, after praying and reflecting intensely on what we should do, saw in this desire of the faithful a clear indication that the Lord was asking us to request the opening of the process of Sister Clare Crockett on the diocesan level.

"His Excellency, Antonio Prieto Lucena, Bishop of the Diocese of Alcala de Henares, has accepted our request. He will preside the opening ceremony of the cause for the beatification of Sr Clare Crockett on January 12, 2025, in the Cathedral of Alcalá de Henares, Madrid, Spain, at 5.30 pm.

The Servant Sisters of the Home of the Mother have been constituted as the petitioner of the cause in which Sr Kristen Gardner, Servant Sister of the Home of the Mother, has been named postulator.

Let us thank God for this important step in the study of the life and virtues of our dear Sister."

LINKS

Watch a documentary about Sr Ciare: www.youtube.com/watch?v=-0LKZm2BqZo

Home of the Mother Sisters: www.homeofthemother.org/en/