Age 87
Sister Margaret Mary, a Sister of Mercy for 70 years, taught at local elementary schools and parishes and ministered in Puerto Rico, Florida, Bolivia and Chile.
A graduate of Our Lady of Mercy High School and Catherine McAuley College in Rochester, New York, she received her bachelor’s degree in English and her master’s degree in education and reading from Nazareth College in Rochester, New York. An elementary school teacher for 22 years in the diocese of Rochester, she also was a certified reading teacher.
Sister Margaret Mary ministered for a year at St. James Catholic School in the Fajardo diocese in Puerto Rico. Next she studied in language school in Cochabamba, Bolivia, in preparation for her service as a missionary in Santiago, Chile.
Following her return to the United States, she served as a religious education coordinator and pastoral assistant at Holy Redeemer/St. Michael in Rochester and St. Stephen’s parish, in Geneva, New York. Following a year of study in clinical pastoral education, she became chaplain at St. Peter’s Hospital in Albany, New York, and a pastoral assistant at St. Vincent Medical Center in Jacksonville, Florida. Returning to Rochester, she was a companion and chaplain at Wesley on East, a nursing home in Rochester, New York, while also joining the prayer shawl ministry.