When Constance and Her Companions—the Martyrs of Memphis—won Lent Madness in 2026, it was a delightful surprise for the Episcopal Diocese of West Tennessee.
Lent Madness, a March Madness-style online tournament featuring saints and other figures from the Christian tradition, is meant to be fun. But for those of us in Memphis, seeing Constance and her companions make their way through the bracket and ultimately win felt like something more than a game. It was an opportunity to tell a story that belongs not only to Memphis, but to the wider Church.
That story was introduced to thousands of Lent Madness participants in part through the writing of Neva Rae Fox, a New York-area writer and longtime participant in Lent Madness. Fox had encountered Constance and her Companions years earlier through the Episcopal Church’s calendar of saints. When she was assigned them for Lent Madness this year, she was thrilled.
“I’ve been doing Lent Madness for decades,” Fox said. “That’s how I first learned about Constance and her companions. There were a few things that struck me about them, and I always kept them in mind.”
One of those things became the theme Fox carried throughout her Lent Madness writing: “Remember their names.”
Remember Their Names
The names are Sister Constance, Sister Thecla, Sister Ruth, Sister Frances, the Rev. Charles Parsons and the Rev. Louis Schuyler. Two others survived the epidemic.
“Yes, we are honoring these men and women,” Fox said, “but let us honor them by their names.”
That simple phrase—remember their names—became especially meaningful in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic. Fox saw a connection between the experience of a modern pandemic and the story of Memphis in 1878, when yellow fever swept through the city.
But the parallels only went so far. The conditions the Sisters of St. Mary faced in Memphis are almost unimaginable to us now.
“They didn’t have air conditioning,” Fox said. “It was hot, it was muggy.”
And they weren’t wearing shorts and T-shirts.
“They were wearing their full regalia,” Fox said.
They Stayed
While many people who could leave Memphis did, Constance and her companions stayed. They cared for people who were sick and dying, took in orphans, fed them and found homes for them. From their makeshift clinic at St. Mary’s Cathedral, they cared for people who were dying in the streets and dealt with the bodies of those who had died.
“They were there,” Fox said. “And they had prayers that they prayed every time. And they kept their ministry to God in the forefront.”
That, perhaps, is the part of the story that resonates most deeply: they stayed.
“They were ordinary people who found themselves in a situation and they were called by God,” Fox said. “We are the same way. We may be ordinary people, but we also are called by God.”
The ordinariness of the Martyrs of Memphis is important. The women who came to Memphis were primarily young teachers from elsewhere, sent to establish a school. The clergy came from different places, too. They could not have known exactly what they would face when they arrived.
“They became a team right away,” Fox said. “A lot of times it takes time to grow to be a team… But they didn’t have time. And they recognized they didn’t have time.”
They came together and did the work in front of them.
The Ministry of Presence
That witness is particularly striking when viewed from the perspective of St. Mary’s Cathedral, where the memorial altar honors Constance and her companions. One can’t help but think about the history of the Cathedral and the wider Episcopal Church in West Tennessee. The Sisters of St. Mary served a city that had only recently emerged from the Civil War, in a time when segregation and racial injustice were deeply embedded in American life. Many of the people they served during the yellow fever epidemic were already margenalized with little ability to leave Memphis.
Against that backdrop, the witness of the Sisters of St. Mary takes on another dimension. Their ministry was one of radical presence: they stayed with people who had been abandoned by much of the city.
For Fox, that ministry of presence remains central to her own understanding of lay ministry.
“I’m not ordained, but I am a firm believer in lay ministry,” she said. “And lay leadership.”
She calls it “the ministry of presence” or “the ministry of witness.”’
“Sometimes you just have to let people talk to you,” she said.
That ministry can be as simple as welcoming people who have come into your church for the first time, showing them where the restrooms are or helping them find their way around. It can mean feeding people, volunteering at a food bank or responding when a neighbor is in need.
“There’s a place for checkbook ministry,” Fox said. “But for me, and maybe for you too, maybe for most of us, we find ourselves in situations where we just know we have to do something.”
They Showed Up
That is one reason the story of Constance and her companions continues to matter. Their sainthood did not begin with extraordinary power or status. They were ordinary people who found themselves in an extraordinary circumstance and responded to what they believed God was asking of them.
“They were called to do this, and they showed up,” Fox said.
As we look ahead to 2028, when the Diocese of West Tennessee will commemorate the 150th anniversary of the Martyrs of Memphis, we have an opportunity to remember their names in a deeper way. St. Mary’s Cathedral is beginning to look toward that anniversary, and each year around Martyrs Weekend, members of the St. Mary’s Episcopal School community participate in remembering and caring for the graves of the martyrs at Elmwood Cemetery.
And now there is another connection.
During Holy Week 2026, five Episcopal congregations in West Tennessee that have been doing ministry together for several years voted to become one congregation. From a list of roughly 25 possible names, they chose St. Constance Episcopal Church.
Saints Come From Us
Perhaps that is why Lent Madness gave us such a gift this year. A playful competition brought a Memphis story to the attention of people far beyond West Tennessee. Fox’s book club, for example, is predominantly Roman Catholic, and she began sharing Lent Madness with them. They knew little about the saints.
“They’re just amazed, like, where do these saints come from?”
Fox’s answer is simple:
“They come from us. They come from our personas. They come from our history. They come from our humanity.”
The invitation of the saints is to remember that ordinary people can become witnesses to extraordinary love.
And so, in the spirit of Lent Madness and in anticipation of the 150th anniversary of their martyrdom, we remember their names:
Sister Constance.
Sister Thecla.
Sister Ruth.
Sister Frances.
The Rev. Charles Parsons.
The Rev. Louis Schuyler.
“Remember their names,” Fox said.
And perhaps, as we remember them, we might also ask ourselves: Where are we being called to show up?
