(1939-2017)

“We come with awfully heavy hearts this evening to celebrate the life of Jude, our sister, our friend, our aunt, our cousin. She was one of us for a long time, and she was taken very quickly.”

So began the remembrance of Sister Jude Van Baalen by her Chapter Prioress, Sister Kathleen Klingen, at the Vigil Service held in Adrian on November 16, 2017. The “heavy hearts” to which Sister Kathleen referred had been made even more so by the unexpected and sudden circumstances of Sister Jude’s passing: only days before, she had suffered a brain bleed and been taken to a Chicago emergency room. From there, she was brought to Adrian, where she died on November 14.

Born Judy Marie Van Baalen on November 6, 1939, in Detroit, Jude, as she always preferred to be known, was the second child of Edward and Susan Lucille Flanagan Van Baalen. She had an older brother, Paul, and over time four more children – Susan, Marc, Edward, Mary, and Ann – were born into the family. As more little Van Baalens came into the world, the family moved to successively larger houses around the city, and as a result, Sister Jude attended four parochial schools: Gesu, Blessed Sacrament, St. John the Apostle, and St. Philip Neri.

Her high school years, however, were spent at Dominican High School, which brought her into contact with the Adrian Dominicans and planted the seeds of religious life. She wrote to Mother Gerald Barry on March 3, 1957, near the end of her senior year at Dominican High, requesting entrance into the Congregation, and became a postulant that June. When she was received into the novitiate in December, it was with the religious name Sister Jude Marie. One of her sisters, Susan, followed her into the Congregation in 1959.

Read more about Sister Jude (pdf)

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

Leave your comments and remembrances (if you don't see the comment box below, click on the "Read More" link).

(1941-2017)

“A woman of generosity and gratitude, a lover of children, cats, and life.”

That was how Sister Mary Jane Lubinski, OP, Adrian Crossroads Chapter Prioress, remembered Sister Patricia (almost always known as simply “Pat”) Janowicz at the Vigil Service held after Sister Pat’s death.

Sister Pat was born on May 27, 1941, in Wyandotte (Michigan) General Hospital, the only child of Sigmund and Frances (Lisek) Janowicz. All four of her grandparents were Polish, and she grew up surrounded by rich Polish traditions. Pat remembered in her autobiography that she called her grandparents either the “Wyandotte grandma and grandpa” (her mother’s parents) or the “Detroit grandma and grandpa” (her father’s parents) so as to distinguish which set she was going to visit.

When Sister Pat was very small, the family moved from an apartment to a small house in Dearborn, Michigan, and from there, in 1945, to a larger home on Detroit’s northwest side. Sigmund worked as a truck driver, hauling sand to make concrete, and as a little girl, Sister Pat, a self-described tomboy, played not with dolls but with toy trucks and sand.

Read more about Sister Pat (pdf)

Memorial gifts may be made to Adrian Dominican Sisters, 1257 East Siena Heights Drive, Adrian, Michigan, 49221. Funeral arrangements are being handled by Anderson-Marry Funeral Home, Adrian.

Leave your comments and remembrances (if you don't see the comment box below, click on the "Read More" link).

(1919-2017)

“Because I was born on December 6, 1919, I always knew in an unexpressed smug little way that I had something a bit more special than anyone else in my little world: MY birthday was on St. Nicholas Day. Santa Claus himself and I had a celebration in common.”

So begins the autobiography of Sister Susanne Hofweber, the second of six children born to August and Emily (Campbell) Hofweber. Baptized as Elizabeth Jane, she was the middle child of a set of three – with August (called Jack) the oldest and sister Dorothy born a year and a half after her – that was followed by a baby brother, Jimmy, who died at birth. Later, two more children, Billy and Marian, came into the family. ...

Sister Susanne was nine years old when the Great Depression hit. Her father lost his business and eventually the family was evicted from their home. As time went on, August was able to rebuild a business and even held two patents, one for the first self-contained domestic water heater and another for a process that allowed graphite to be used as a lubricant. With other investors, he was able to build that process into a thriving oil-refining company.

Read more about Sister Susanne (pdf).

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

(1920-2017)

Sister Helen Walsh, known also as Sister Rose Michaeleen, was born in Chicago on June 15, 1920. She was the second oldest of six children born to William and Rosemary (O’Sullivan) Walsh. 

Her parents were married at St. Bride Church on Thanksgiving Day in 1917. Because her dad was serving in the army, the couple walked out of church beneath an arch of soldier’s swords in military style. When the war ended, her father returned to his law practice. 

In her autobiography, Sister Helen described the arrival of her five siblings and the gifts of her parents.

The first child, Rosemary, was born on November 1, 1918, in a military hospital in Battle Creek, Michigan. Soon the war ended and the family moved to Port Huron, my father’s birthplace. When I was expected, my father took my mother back to Chicago, where he felt the best doctors could be had. However because of the speed of my arrival, a hospital intern was in charge and I arrived late on Sunday night June 15, 1920, at South Shore Hospital. When I was four, my brother Billie was born and the story was later told that I asked my mother if she could return him get a baby that didn’t cry so much. My last three siblings, Nan, Mary Jo and Joe, were born in Port Huron and all were surrounded by doting relatives.

Read more about Sister Helen (pdf)

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

Leave your comments and remembrances (if you don't see the comment box below, click on the "Read More" link).