Age 97
Sister Mary K. (Kevin) Doughan was a Sister of Mercy for 77 years. She entered the Cedar Rapids Regional Community of the Sisters of Mercy of the Americas in 1945.
Sister Mary K. graduated from Viterbo University with a Bachelor of Arts in Education from Lacrosse, Wisconsin, in 1960. She completed her Master of Arts in Education – Guidance and Counseling from the University of Iowa, Iowa City, Iowa, in 1966.
Sister Mary K.’s first ministry was teaching. From 1942 to 1962, she taught in the following schools: St. Benedict’s, Decorah, Iowa; Immaculate Conception, and Cedar Rapids, Iowa;1958–1962, she was a teacher at Sacred Heart School, Waterloo, Iowa. From 1962–1972 she was a Counselor and Instructor at Regis High School in Cedar Rapids, Iowa. From 1972–1984 she worked in Campus Ministry/Director of Counseling at Mount Mercy College in Cedar Rapids, Iowa. From 1985–1991 she was a pastoral associate at St. Boniface Church in Garner, Iowa. She was a guidance counselor at Newman Highschool in Mason City, Iowa, from 1991–1994. In 1994 she began as a pastoral associate at St. John Parish in Clarion, Iowa. She stayed in that role until 2004 and worked in the parish as a volunteer until 2007.
Upon her retirement in 2007, Sister Mary K. volunteered as a volunteer teacher for RCIA at Mount Mercy University and ESL teacher at Catherine McAuley Center in Cedar Rapids. Sister Mary K. was a vowed member of the Sisters of Mercy for 77 years. She loved her ministries and prayed fervently for those lacking the needed resources.