(1934-2021)

Cheektowaga, New York, a suburb of Buffalo, was the birthplace of Annette Catherine McGorray, the future Sister Jeannine Therese.

Annette was the second of four children born to Vincent and Loretta (Kunzelman) McGorray, with an older brother, Kenny, and two younger siblings, Gladys and Frankie. The family lived in Mother of Divine Grace Parish before the church buildings themselves were even constructed; originally, Mass was celebrated in a commercial building that was also the site of other denominations’ services. 

Adrian Dominican Sisters came to staff the parish school once it opened in 1946, and it was in this way that Annette came to know the Sisters, although she herself never attended there.

The family lived near the church in a row of homes dubbed “the projects.” Behind their house, as it so happened, was an outdoor movie theater where patrons sat on blankets on the ground, rather than in their cars, to watch the movies, and little Annette quickly discovered that if she went over there the morning after a show she could find plenty of coins on the ground that had been dropped by people as they sat. She could also see the films from her room, and when her older brother got a job at the theater he hooked up a speaker nearby so she could listen to the sound.

Read more about Sister Jeannine Therese (pdf)

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

 

 

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