Abstract

Matylda Stefania Anna Ustjanowicz was born in Szczakowa near Chrzanów on 12 March 1875. In order to receive education, she was sent to the School of Immaculate Sisters in Niżniów, where she graduated from general and secondary school, run by Marcelina Darowska, the founder of the Congregation of the Sisters of the Immaculate Conception. Between 1893 and 1894, Matylda Ustjanowicz learnt for the profession of a home teacher under the watchful eye of sisters. In 1894, she took her matriculation examination at the State Female Teachers Seminary in Lviv. In the following years, she worked as a home teacher.

On 7 December 1899, Matylda Ustjanowicz joined the Congregation of the Sisters of the Immaculate Conception in Jazłowiec. She took the religious name Zofia from the Heart of Jesus. She made her perpetual vows on 5 May 1907. Before the outbreak of World War I, she worked as a master of the boarding school and head of the research and educational institution in Niżniów. Between 1909 and 1920, she was the superior of the local monastery. During World War I, these buildings were turned into a war hospital, where the nuns helped wounded, ill and dying patients under the watchful eye of Sister Zofia.

In the interwar period, Sister Zofia worked as a teacher and director in the secondary schools of the Congregation in Nowy Sącz and Jarosław. At that time, she attended numerous catechetical courses and passed an exam for a secondary school teacher in history in 1927. In 1934, she was approved as the director of the Private Teachers Seminary of the Congregation in Maciejów. In August 1939, she became the director of the monastery. In 1938, she was awarded the Gold Cross of Merit in the field of private education. In April 1942, Sister Zofia was ordered to take the position of deputy superior and then administrator of the monastery in Nowy Sącz. In May 1944, she returned to Niżniów. She died a martyr's death, murdered by Ukrainian nationalists in Rusiłów near Jazłowiec on 23 August 1944.