Remembrance of the Life of Sister Mary (formerly Sister M. Susan Jean) McAuliffe SL

Loretto Sister Mary (formerly Sister M. Susan Jean) McAuliffe died Oct. 5 at Loretto Living Center on the grounds of Loretto Motherhouse in Nerinx, Ky. She was 82 and in the 60th year of her Loretto life.

This remembrance of Sister Mary is composed of her own words, largely taken from an interview she gave in 2016 just after she retired to Loretto Motherhouse Infirmary. The interview text has been rearranged into chronological order; otherwise, this is Mary’s story as she told it:

“I’m very grateful that I got to be both a teacher and a Sister of Loretto. I’m very, very grateful, because I feel like the best of my abilities were channeled through both of those vocations. I had wonderful parents. And we lived with my grandparents, or they lived with us. My parents were very social justice minded. My dad was a lawyer and a judge. So, that was kind of in my nature, But I, I don’t think I would have been as broad-minded as my dad. My dad’s law clerk was black, his bailiff was Hispanic. And I just assumed that was the way of the world, though it wasn’t in those days. But that was the way of my world. 

“In my postulant summer, I worked a while among migrants. My mom and dad came to visit. And here’s my dad, fluent in Spanish. He had learned to speak Spanish when he was young, as a ‘red cap’ at the depot. He learned from the people, and he had an ear for languages. We had all decided that we wouldn’t speak English at all, you know. It was a little quiet at first. But my dad was so at home with those people. I loved it. It was so neat. And they loved him. He was in his element.

“My mother had been a public school teacher in Denver, and teaching was certainly in my nature. Her students called her Missy. I went to East, a public high school In Denver. So, when they would talk about Missy, I knew they were talking about my mom, though they didn’t know she was my mom. I would hear the incredible impact that she had made on their lives. I mean, these are high school kids talking about a grade school teacher! It made an impact on me, and made me want to teach as a Christian in a public school. I thought I gave that up when I went to Loretto. I thought that was not something I would ever be able to fulfill. 

“My first memories of Loretto are when I was 4 years old. I met Sister Kathleen Tighe at St. Mary’s Academy in Denver. She was not teaching there. She was living there, teaching at St. Vincent’s. And then, she was teaching at St. Philomena’s where I went to fourth through eighth grade. She taught me there. And then, I lived with her when I taught at Loretto in Kansas City. So, we’ve been friends all of these years. And now we live together again at the Infirmary.

“I went to St. Philomena’s elementary school, and I had wonderful teachers there. Sister Rosemary Wilcox, who was Thomasine at the time, was my fifth grade teacher, and had a great impact on me. I lived with her at St. Mary’s when I was missioned there right after the novitiate. And Sister Patrick Marie Sharp — she was my seventh grade teacher. She was a marvelous teacher. And she became a very, very dear friend and mentor. Patrick Marie used to come [to Denver] every summer …  to summer school or summer gatherings at Loretto Heights. And I would be able to be out there with her. I met Sister Mary Dennis, too. She and Patrick Marie had it set in their minds that I was going to be a Sister of Loretto. 

“They used to tease me when I was in high school, because I was in a public school:  they’d get me in the middle of a group of Sisters, and they’d say, ‘Ask Mary where she goes to school,’ which was very embarrassing, because public school was not the thing. So I answered, ‘East High School.’ One time Sister Edwin Mary, who was the head of the English department where I later studied, said, ‘Isn’t that where our Mother General went to high school? Sister Mary Luke?’ And I said, ‘Oh, really? Uh-huh.’ Well, that was the end of the teasing. 

“So, we shared lots of fun things like that. Patrick Marie and I just were very close friends. She was Irish. I’m Irish. She was a mentor; wrote to me often. Through her I really saw religious life, through her eyes – the Community, the mission, the essentials of community life. She was the one who continued to follow me through life and encouraged me to come to Loretto.

“I was interested when I was a young, young child, but as I grew older I really got interested in boys and family life. I wanted 12 kids. I wasn’t that inclined to be a Sister. But Patrick was pretty persuasive. And so in my senior year of high school, I talked to the Sisters at the Heights, and decided that I would try it out and see if this was right for me.

“[I entered the novitiate in Denver. The] postulant year was not fun – not that it’s supposed to be fun — but, I knew it wasn’t religious life, because the Sisters I knew couldn’t have stood it, that I knew. All of my friends from the Heights left. I stayed, because I wanted to know whether this life was for me or not. [When we went to the Motherhouse as first-year novices], I had Sister Helen Jean for my novice mistress, and it was wonderful. She explained why things were different In Colorado. It was the first year of that novitiate. Vatican II was just happening. The Sisters in Denver knew they weren’t training us for religious life as they knew it. But they didn’t know what they were training us for.

“The great thrill about being at the Motherhouse was Sister Mary Luke, who was an observer at Vatican II. We got to hear directly from her what Vatican II was about. And we began to study some of the documents from Vatican II [as soon as they were published.] I began to know that this was my life when I was at the Motherhouse, as a first-year novice. When I returned to Denver, though, I actually took a leave in my second year novitiate — all but one in my class took leaves. I thought for sure I was leaving for good. But I didn’t. Mother Florence came to visit me — I was teaching in a special ed program in Indiana –  and she said, ‘Now, when are you coming back?’ That was a wonderful confirmation that, yes, I was supposed to be a Sister. [Still], I didn’t fully give in to it until I made my final vows. I was always holding out. But once I made my final vows, I haven’t had a moment of doubt since.

“I taught a year at St. Mary’s then went to Loretto in Kansas City for five years. Kansas City was a marvelous experience for me. It was the best professional experience, because it stretched me. Susan Swain and Vicki Quatmann and I, we were perfect matches. We taught so well together. I came back to Denver from Loretto in Kansas City to kind of be around because my dad especially needed special care. I found there were no vacancies in the Loretto schools in Denver, and we did not displace a layperson to put in a nun, which I agreed with.

“I knew Cherry Creek was a very progressive school district; our Kansas City faculty had gone out there to study their curriculum and methods. And so, I thought I’d just go out there and see what I [found]. I got some of my professors from Greeley, UNC, to go to bat for me. So, I was hired right away. It was God’s will that I got to teach in a public school. I had more Catholic kids in the public school than I had at St. Mary’s or Loretto in Kansas City.

“[After a couple of years, I was honored as Teacher of the Year. With the prize money I bought my first computer. So we had a computer, which we called ‘It.’ And that was the beginning of the technology program. I got another master’s degree, in school technology. If I’d done a thesis, it would have been Ph.D. But I was afraid they’d take me out of the elementary classroom and put me into administration, so I decided I wouldn’t do the thesis. Instead, I got to be on the team that introduced technology to all the Cherry Creek schools. I got to work with the whole district, and I got to stay in teaching. In the schools that I administered, I had them use students to teach the teachers. I called the kids techsperts, and it worked like a charm. 

“For me, teaching was the only way I could see to really save the world, one kid at a time. And that’s what I believed I was doing, When I received awards, [I felt] all Loretto earned those awards. They belong to us all. They speak about the education we’ve been given; the teachers we’ve had; they represent all the Loretto teachers quietly teaching in systems that don’t give awards. Every teaching award represents a celebration of Loretto education excellence.” 

Sister Mary’s wake and funeral Mass took place Oct. 26 at Loretto Motherhouse. Celebrating the Mass was the Rev. Trumie Culpepper (Father “Pepper”) Elliott.

Please keep Mary, her family and all her loved ones in your prayers. May she rest in peace.