Silver Jubilee of our dear Sister Mary Aloysia

On May 1st our dear Sister Mary Aloysia, who is 90 years young, celebrated her Silver Jubilee of Religious Profession. We share with you her vocation story as told to one of our sisters some time ago. Pictured is our dear Sister before Mass and enjoying the company of her great, great nephew in the parlor after Mass.

 

“Through the Narrow Gate”

Vocation Story of our dear Sister Mary Aloysia as told by herself

 

I lived in Detroit, Michigan with my mother and father and my older sister, Betty.  Dad worked for the DPW,  Detroit Public Works – at the dump.  He worked himself to death there  We were poor, but dad still did good deeds – like visiting his uncles Jack and John in Shipkey, Canada.  Mom worked for Burroughs Automative.  She kept the books.  Dad said she was the best bookkeeper they ever had.  Mom’s mom had died when she was 8 years old of a brain hemorrhage, and her dad died of the same thing when he fell off a ladder.  Mom was 14 years old at the time.  We were poor.  Every Christmas our “Rotary Uncles” brought us a Christmas box – with a present for everyone.  And in the summer, they hired out the Put-in-Bay boat and we went for a ride down the Detroit River and had a picnic lunch.  I’ll never forget them.  They were so good to us.

I wasn’t always handicapped.  When I was three years old, I cut my head.  Mom and dad took me to Hyland Park General Hospital.  They said I had blood poisoning and scarlet fever.  The Good Lord got me through.  After 52 days, they  said they couldn’t do anything more for me and sent me home.  Mom made me fried potatoes.  She was a good cook and made big, fluffy dumplings. She made me fried potatoes, and that brought me back.  I always loved fried potatoes after that, but we don’t get them much here.   From that time on, I had dislocated bones and I couldn’t walk easily.  Blood poisoning and scarlet fever, that’s what they always said it was.  I went to a wonderful school for the handicapped, Charles Oakmann School.  When I was sixteen years old, dad fixed up a bike for me, a twenty-six incher.  He fixed bicycles.  I taught myself to ride it on a walkway next to the house.  I scraped up my two fingers pretty badly from holding on to the handlebars and bumping into the house.  But I learned to ride.

I finished my schooling at Cooley High School.  My sister Betty got married to Ken and I went to work.  One night when I got home from work my dad was sitting in the arm chair. “Where’s mom and  sis?” I asked.  “They went to the hospital.” Sis was going down to the cellar when the latch broke and she tripped.  She went into labor, and the baby was premature.  That was my sister’s first child.  The baby’s name was Colleen.  Dad loved that baby. She had the biggest blue eyes and the sweetest smile.  And sis would put a big bonnet on her.  She was so cute with her diaper and big bonnet.  Dad died on May 2, 1950 of exhaustion.  He wasn’t practicing his faith, but the priest who came to see him on the night he died said he never heard such a good confession.

I had a couple of offers of marriage, but they fell through.  Then I went on a retreat at Mt. Mary, where the Sisters of Mary Reparatrix had their convent.  After my retreat, Mother Mary of St. Mildred became a good  friend of mine.  I talked to her about becoming a religious, but due to my handicap, I didn’t know who would accept me.  She said, “I know where you can go.”  And she told me where the Sisters of the Visitation were located – Toledo, Ohio.  After a couple of years, I contacted them and I talked to Mother Francis de Sales Cassidy who was very kind and encouraged me to come and I did in 1952.    I loved everything about the monastery.  It was a holy place. Everything was so beautiful.  Then my health broke and the doctor said it was too hard for me.  Mother said I would have to leave.  I didn’t want to go away, but I had to.

I went back home.  Mom was sick and, not too long after that, my sister got Parkinson’s Disease – that’s a terrible illness.   I got a job as the secretary and bookkeeper at St. Colman’s and I helped out at home with mom and Betty and my little nieces. For 20 years I was the secretary at the rectory. They had the cutest dog there, a miniature schnauzer named Linus.  One time he ate all the candy.  You should have seen the mess!  After that, we had to lock him up when Father’s housekeeper and I weren’t there to watch him.  Then they got computers, and I didn’t think I could do that, so I retired.  I had a couple of job offers, but I had been corresponding with Sister Mary Theresa and she thought I might try again at the Visitation.  Mother Mary Bernard said I would have to come on a retreat.  “That won’t be hard,” I said. So I came and I reentered.  I’ve been here 24 years. And on February 28th, I’ll be ninety years old.  Thirty-fours years away from the monastery and twenty-four back in.