Verena Bütler was born in mid-1848 in Switzerland as the fourth of eight children to the farmers Henry and Catherine; she was baptized right after her birth.[1] Her great-grandparents were Jeremias Bütler and Elisabeth Hoffmann; all her siblings were girls and one – Martina (1856–90) – became a Benedictine nun.[2]
She made her First Communion on 16 April 1860 after having received her Confirmation in 1856.[2] She finished school in 1862. Bütler became engaged at some stage to a man she loved but experienced a sudden religious experience that prompted her to break off her engagement in order to reflect on possible entrance into the religious life.[1] She at first tried to enter the Sisters of the Holy Cross of Menzingen in 1866 but left it after a brief period in order to return home and to discern her true calling.
Bütler joined the Franciscan Capuchin nuns at the convent of Mary Help of Sinners in Altstätten – at the encouragement of her local pastor – on 12 November 1867. On 4 May 1868, she assumed the habit, taking the religious name of “María Bernarda of the Heart of Mary”.[3] She made her solemn profession on 4 October 1871. She served as novice mistress from 1879 to 1880 and the superior of her house from 1880 until 1886.[4]
At the invitation of Pedro Schumacher, Bishop of Portoviejo, Bütler left for the missions in Ecuador on 19 June 1888 with six others and arrived on 29 July; there, she founded a religious congregation, the Franciscan Missionary Sisters of Mary Help of Sinners. In 1895 the period of anti-religious sentiment forced her and her fellow religious out of Ecuador to Colombia; she and fourteen others received an invitation from Bishop Eugenio Biffi to work in Cartagena in Colombia and Biffi received them on 2 August 1895.[1][2] Her order received diocesan approval on 12 January 1912 as well as the decree of praise and papal approval from Pope Pius XI on 30 April 1929 and 5 July 1938. The order was aggregated to the Order of Friars Minor Capuchin on 26 June 1905.
Bütler died in mid-1924. The pastor of the cathedral announced her death: “A saint has died in this city this morning: the reverend Mother Bernarda!”. Her order also operates in Brazil and Liechtenstein.[4] Her remains were later relocated in 1956. In 2005 there were 788 religious in a total of 125 houses.[2]
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