Foundations
Brighton, Victoria 1947
An opportunity to care for people with mental illness came in 1947, an area of health care that Sisters of St John of God were eager to include in their many ministries.
An existing private psychiatric hospital was on the market in Brighton, a suburb of Melbourne, when Archbishop Daniel Mannix invited the Sisters of St John of God to buy the property and continue to run the hospital.
The Sisters responded to the invitation, which became the beginning of 50 years of caring for people, men and women, with psychiatric illness by the Sisters of St John of God at Brighton. Several developments and extensions occurred during that time.
Changes in the understanding and treatment of mental illness led to the closure of the hospital in 1999. Resources have been invested in other forms of psychiatric care, provided through St John of God Health Care. www.sjog.org.au
