(1934-2021)

There’s a beautiful quote from the ancient Greek statesman Pericles that is found on many tombstones which says, “What you leave behind is not what is engraved in stone, but what is woven into the lives of others.”

We are gathered in this sacred space today to honor and recognize our sister Clarice Moyle and her many gifts, gifts which are now woven as beautiful threads into our lives and the lives of her beloved family and dear friends …

These paragraphs began Sister Rosemary Finnegan’s homily for the funeral of Sister Clarice Moyle, a “valiant woman” in the mold of the one described in the famous reading from Proverbs 31, the funeral Mass’s first reading.

Clarice Marie Moyle was born on October 18, 1934, in Jacksonville, Florida, to James and Mary (Ohmer) Moyle. She was the second of the couple’s two children, born nine years after her sister, Grace.

Read more about Sister Clarice (PDF)

Memorial gifts may be made to Adrian Dominican Sisters, 1257 East Siena Heights Drive, Adrian, Michigan, 49221. 

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(1935-2021)

Frances Louise Guethlein, the future Sister Marian Edward, was born in Detroit on May 7, 1935, to Edward and Mary (Lucey) Guethlein. Edward was a native of Evansville, Indiana, while Mary came to the U.S. from Kilgarvin, Ireland, at the age of seventeen.

The couple had five children, of whom Frances was in the middle. She had three sisters, Barbara, Kathleen (known as Kay) and Joan, and a brother, Ed.

The Guethleins originally lived in St. Bridget Parish in Detroit, and Frances attended first and second grades at St. Bridget School. When she was in third grade, however, the family moved to Livonia, a Detroit suburb, and Edward and Mary enrolled their children at Our Lady of Sorrows School, which was staffed by the Adrian Dominican Sisters, in nearby Farmington as soon as the school had space for them.

Read more about Sister Marian (PDF)

Memorial gifts may be made to Adrian Dominican Sisters, 1257 East Siena Heights Drive, Adrian, Michigan, 49221.

 

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(1934-2021)

Literally and figuratively tall in stature and standing, Sister Maureen opened many doors and broke many glass ceilings in American Catholic higher education for women, religious and laypersons because of her contributions at St. Xavier University, Mercy College of Detroit and University of Detroit Mercy. Thirty-one years after the bold collaboration of her and Fr. Robert Mitchell, S.J. to make Mercy College of Detroit and University of Detroit a strong Catholic institution, she leaves a legacy that will benefit tens of thousands of future leaders in Michigan, the United States and the world for decades. — Dr. Antoine Garibaldi, President, University of Detroit Mercy

In his tribute to Sister Maureen Fay, one of his predecessors, after her passing, Dr. Garibaldi was honoring the Adrian Dominican Sister who had helped direct the consolidation of Mercy College and the University of Detroit and served for twenty-one years in the institutions’ presidency.

Sister Maureen was born May 18, 1934, in Chicago to Michael and Anne (Whalen) Fay. Michael was an Irish immigrant from County Roscommon who had come to America at the age of eighteen, while Anne was a Chicago native but was the daughter of an immigrant from Galway, Ireland. According to a biographical sketch of herself that Sister Maureen wrote for an Irish publication in Detroit, family lore had it that Michael had left Ireland one step ahead of the British, who were hunting him for his involvement with the Irish Republican Army. Sister Maureen said in her 2016 “A Sister’s Story” video that when her father got to Ellis Island, he wrote down his name in such shaky handwriting that the immigration official could not read it – and so the family name, Fahey, became Fay.

Read more about Sister Maureen (pdf)

Memorial gifts may be made to Adrian Dominican Sisters, 1257 East Siena Heights Drive, Adrian, Michigan, 49221. 

 

 

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(1937-2021)

The Detroit of the 1940s – complete with penny candy and Saturdays at the movies – was the environment in which Sister Arlene Seckel had her formative years.

Arlene Rose Seckel was born on August 17, 1937, in Detroit to Robert and Ruth (LaBell) Seckel. She was the couple’s first child, followed by Judy, Melvin, Patricia, Arthur, Kathleen and Donald. Donald came into the family in 1956 after Sister Arlene had entered the convent.

The Seckels lived in a series of rental homes during Sister Arlene’s childhood, and their frequent moves meant she attended multiple elementary schools. When the family moved into a subsidized housing unit on Detroit’s east side, in Holy Name Parish, Arlene became the babysitter for a whole cadre of younger children in the neighborhood, and on Saturdays she would walk all fourteen of the kids to the Nortown Theatre to take in the serials. A local grocery store was a regular stop along the way so everyone could buy their ten cents’ worth of penny candy. Sister Arlene wrote in her life story that she thought she inherited her love of movies from her mother, who even named her oldest after Arlene Dahl the actress.

Read more about Sister Arlene (pdf)

Memorial gifts may be made to Adrian Dominican Sisters, 1257 East Siena Heights Drive, Adrian, Michigan, 49221. 

 

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