Help us remember our Sisters by sharing a story about a Sister who touched your life, or making a gift in their honor.
Mary Ann was a student at the College of Notre Dame of Maryland (now Notre Dame of Maryland University) for a year before going to Sacred Heart School in Baltimore as a teacher. Mary Ann continued to teach elementary classes at Our Lady of Fatima School in Baltimore, then taught high school social studies classes at St. Maria Goretti High School, Hagerstown Md. and St. Mark High School, Wilmington, Del. In her later years at St. Mark High School, Sister MaryAnn was a full-time library assistant.
From the very start Sister Rita had a happy disposition, a love of storytelling and conversation, a natural openness and kindness. As homilist at her funeral, Father John Clooney, former Watertown Pastor, shared some humorous stories and called Rita, “a good and faithful servant.” He recalled “her integrity and uprightness” and expressed the gratitude of the parish “for all she had been and done for us.” We also thank S Rita, may God welcome her home.
Helenann taught junior high in the US for eight years. Then she found her true calling, starting many long and adventure-filled years as a missionary to South America when she and her classmate Paula Armstrong joined our Sisters in Santiago, Chile. They were part of a second group that brought the total of SSNDs in Chile to 13. Along with teaching, they also harbored citizens being hunted by the corrupt government until they, themselves, became targets and had to flee.
In death, we say our ultimate human yes to God. Trusting in God’s power to bring us to the fullness of life, we conclude our earthly life with an act of worship: in the action of death we proclaim God as God, and ourselves as God’s creatures. We are called by God and sent by the community; we go in joy!
- You Are Sent, Constitution of the School Sisters of Notre Dame
