Mother Julia Navarrete Guerrero, foundress of the Missionary Daughters of the Most Pure Virgin Mary, was born in Oaxaca, México in 1881. As an adult, she gathered together a small group of women who wished to serve the Church, but the Mexican Revolution was making this very difficult.

Knowing the difficulties Mother Julia and her group were experiencing, her home diocese requested that the sisters go to Texas to minister there, and this they agreed to do. 

Mother Julia and her companions arrived in the Diocese of Corpus Christi, on Oct. 24, 1916. Father Isidro Cavazos, the first pastor of Saint Martin parish in Kingsville, warmly welcomed the sisters.  Their mission, as Mother Julia saw it–to educate children and minister to adults–was now possible because of the support of the local Church. 

Saint Martin’s was the first parish in the diocese in which the Missionary Daughters of the Most Pure Virgin ministered, and with Father Cavazos’ help, Mother Julia and her sisters inaugurated a number of firsts for Kingsville and the surrounding area. On Nov. 3, 1916, the sisters held registration for the first Catholic school in Kingsville enrolling 75 students. Catholic education had begun in Kingsville.

Because of the bilingual character of Saint Martin parish, regular school instruction was given in Spanish in the mornings and in English in the afternoons.  On Sundays, Sister Consuelo Alemán and Sister Concepción Pro took to the streets, ringing a bell, to call children who were not in Catholic schools during the week to Sunday catechism classes. 

The sisters lived in solidarity with the very poor, serving especially low-income Mexican American families. During their early years, while their schools were still considered missions, the only financial assistance that the sisters received was $75 per month from the Catholic Extension Society.

Mother Julia served as superior of the Kingsville convent from 1924 to 1927.  Then in 1927, with five other sisters, she founded a convent in Gregory, Texas.  That same year, Mother Julia succeeded in re-opening a foundation which had been made in Robstown in 1916 but which had been closed down in 1920 because of a shortage of sisters. 

In all of the locations in which Mother Julia and her sisters ministered, they worked selflessly and zealously in the evangelization of all peoples–adults, youth and children. 

The Missionary Daughters of the Most Pure Virgin Mary continued to found or to work in other parochial schools in the Diocese of Corpus Christi, including in Taft, Falfurrias, Edinburg and McAllen, Texas, all at that time part of the Diocese of Corpus Christi. Ten Missionary Daughters of the Most Pure Virgin who devoted their whole lives to working in these schools and parishes now rest in peace and are buried in the cemetery in Kingsville.

In more recent years, the Missionary Daughters of the Most Pure Virgin Mary have expanded their ministry beyond Texas to Washington State and in New Jersey in order to serve the Catholic Church.  In these states, the sisters engage in pastoral ministry both to Hispanic immigrants and in Catholic schools. 

Wherever the need arises and in situations where the Missionary Daughters can help to meet that need, they are more than eager to do so. Through the years, the ministry of Mother Julia continued to contribute to the Church through the congregation that she founded.