In Ministry - Stories

October 23, 2024, Houston, Texas – Sister Maureen O’Connell, OP, Director of the Secretariat for Social Concerns for the Archdiocese of Galveston-Houston, Texas, took an unconventional path to her vocation as an Adrian Dominican Sister. Born into a tight-knit Irish Catholic family in Chicago, she was the niece of Sister Mary Frances Coleman, OP, an Adrian Dominican Sister. 

Sister Maureen was educated by Sisters: the Adrian Dominican Sisters in first and second grades, the Sinsinawa Dominican Sisters for the rest of her elementary school years, and the School Sisters of Notre Dame in high school. “I was pretty clear that I wasn’t going to be a nun because everybody thought I was going to be a nun,” she said. “I think that’s why it took me a while.”

After her freshman year in college, Sister Maureen entered the Sinsinawa Dominican Congregation but stayed only for a few months. “I felt I was clear I didn’t have a vocation,” she said.

Sister Maureen attended Chicago Teachers College and finished her bachelor’s degree in education at DePaul University in Chicago. She also holds a Master’s of Social Work from the University of Houston.

She taught with Adrian Dominican Sisters for three years at Infant of Prague School in Flossmoor, Illinois. Among her teaching colleagues was a high school friend whose aunt was the first woman police officer in Chicago. When her friend Donna heard about the entrance exam for the Police Academy, she talked Sister Maureen into taking the test with her. “It was truly a lark,” Sister Maureen recalled. “There was no one in my family who was in the police. I took the exam and I was pretty high on the list – fifth.” 

She attended the Police Academy in June and, after graduation, was first assigned to the youth division to work with women and children. “It was a different spin on being a teacher,” she said. Later she was assigned to serve as a detective in the vice division. She served as a police officer from 1966 to 1977.

“There’s a sense of camaraderie in the police department,” Sister Maureen said. “I was 26 and adventurous for sure.” Being a Chicago police officer offered opportunities for exciting work, including undercover operations and serving on a security detail when First Lady Pat Nixon was in town.

While serving in the police department, Sister Maureen became friends with some of the Adrian Dominican Sisters teaching at Aquinas High School in Chicago. “That was the beginning for me in considering religious life,” she said.

She entered the Adrian Dominican Congregation in 1977, professed her first vows in 1980, and in 1982 moved to Houston, where she has since ministered in a variety of ways. After serving as a counselor, Sister Maureen founded Angela House, a residential program to help formerly incarcerated women prepare for healthy and independent lives in the greater community. 

“It’s amazing to see the resilience” of the women who came to Angela House, Sister Maureen said. She remembers being inspired “seeing what these women have to overcome even to get into the community after they’ve already paid their debt.” She continues to serve on the Board of Angela House.

Sister Maureen took on her current ministry as Director of the Secretariat for Social Concerns for the Archdiocese of Galveston-Houston in 2020, overseeing the Justice and Peace Office and the archdiocese’s Catholic Campaign for Human Development (CCHD), which offers grants to local anti-poverty and social justice programs. 

In 2022, the Office of Aging and Children’s Youth Services were added to her secretariat. “Our aging population is very vulnerable and the youth are also a very vulnerable population, so [they] fit into the area of social concerns.”

Sister Maureen’s responsibilities and activities are varied, including serving on the Cardinal’s Cabinet and on several boards in the archdiocese: St. Vincent de Paul Society; Catholic Charities; San José Clinic, a medical clinic that works with uninsured patients; and a shelter for women and children seeking asylum.

Her biggest challenge, she said, is “helping people to understand that Catholic social teaching is really the foundation of our faith and closely connected to the Gospel.” She works with parishes, priests, and lay people to help them understand Catholic social teachings. She also teaches them about Care for Creation. “Because this is such a big gas and oil community, people are often askance at care for creation,” she said. But an all-day event on the topic two years ago brought in about 120 people, she added. “It was a delight.”

Sister Maureen also relishes her work managing the CCHD grant process. She and a small group of people visit the organizations that have requested grants. She appreciates “seeing the people who don’t have the capacity to hire a grant writer and yet they’re the ones who are feet on the ground, serving people. It’s been a great privilege for me to work with them.”

Sister Maureen draws on her past experiences as a police officer and at Angela House in her current ministry. “I’m trying to make connections among other agencies and programs,” she said. “That’s what I did at Angela House. Who can we connect with that will help us further the mission?”  

She was honored on October 24, 2024, by the Emmaus Spirituality Center at its Journey with Emmaus Gala.
 

Caption for above feature photo: Sister Maureen O’Connell, OP, cuts the ribbon for a new facility of Angela House, a residential program to help formerly incarcerated women successfully transition into healthy lives in the community.

February 6, 2023, Adrian, Michigan – For Sister Carleen Maly, OP, education and the Adrian Dominican Sisters go hand-in-hand – from being taught by them as an eighth-grader to her past 15 years of ministry as Director of Adrian Rea Literacy Center, located at the Motherhouse.

A native of Detroit, Sister Carleen moved with her family to nearby Clawson, Michigan, when she was going into the eighth grade. “I thought my life had ended,” she said, “but the move to Clawson was one of the most wonderful things that could have happened in my life because that was the first and only time I had Adrian Dominican Sisters [as teachers].” She was struck by the joy of the Sisters and by their obvious love of teaching.

During her high school years, Sister Carleen never forgot the Adrian Dominican Sisters at Guardian Angels School. She frequently stopped in to visit, especially to see Sister Patricia Marie O’Rourke, Principal. 

Her thoughts again turned to the Adrian Dominican Sisters during a retreat in her senior year of high school. “It was during that weekend that I had time for prayer and talks about our life choices,” Sister Carleen recalled. “I really felt a strong urge in that time of prayer to follow through with talking with one of our Sisters about entering the Congregation.” After frequent talks with Sister Patricia Marie, she entered the Adrian Dominican Congregation in September 1959 with two classmates from eighth grade: Kathleen Voss, OP, and the late Gail Singel, OP.

Much to her surprise, Sister Carleen had an early experience of teaching when, in December of her postulant year, she was assigned to teach a fifth- and sixth-grade class at Sacred Heart School in Caro, Michigan, for the second semester. With the help of the other Sisters at the school, Sister Carleen made it through the semester. She learned from this and later experiences that teaching junior high school student was a “good fit” for her.

After profession, Sister Carleen taught at schools in Michigan and in the Dominican Republic. She later returned to the Dominican Republic with four other Sisters to start Centro Educacional de Bonao in the remote area of Bonao. The school was founded by a Canadian mining company to teach the children of the company’s workers. “We had people from 15 countries represented in the school,” with a complete Spanish track and a complete English track, she recalled.

From there, Sister Carleen went on to serve in pastoral ministry at two parishes in the Diocese of Orlando, Florida, and, in 1994, was elected to a six-year term as Chapter Prioress (Provincial) of the Florida Mission Chapter. Returning to Michigan to be closer to her mother, Sister Carleen worked with Sister Marie Damian Schoenlein, OP, Director of the Dominican Literacy Center in Detroit. After serving as Director of Vocation Outreach for three years, Sister Carleen was asked by Sister Marie Damian to help her start the Adrian Rea Literacy Center. Sister Marie Damian served as Director for one year and turned the ministry over to Sister Carleen.

As Director of Adrian Rea, Sister Carleen finds joy daily. “The joys are knowing that we are able to change people’s lives because we give them the gift of being able to read and write and speak in English,” she said. “In the course of our 15 years, we have tutored close to 1,500 learners with 1,200 tutors – all individualized tutoring,” Sister Carleen said. Currently, about 72 pairings come to Adrian Rea each week. About 90 percent of the learners are studying English as a second language.

Sister Carleen and the literacy center’s volunteer tutors work with many people who are at the lowest literacy rate. “They may have had some education in their country of origin,” she said. “A handful would have gone on to high school or college, but many reported that their highest was third grade in their country of origin.” 

Sister Carleen also finds her own joy when seeing the tutors’ joy as they help their learners to meet personal goals: communicating with their children’s teachers and doctors, helping their children with homework, and finding a better job. 

She feels especially blessed when the adult learners become citizens with the help of their tutors – and often with the help of the Congregation’s Immigration Assistance Office, directed by Sister Attracta Kelly, OP, an immigration attorney. 

“Our Congregation has committed to helping people through an onsite place where they can seek a consultation and information about their immigration status to see if there is an opportunity to apply for citizenship,” Sister Carleen explained. “What we do in partnership is ask that the tutors help the learners study the 100 questions involved in the citizenship test.” 

Whatever the learners’ goals might be, Sister Carleen has committed to providing a safe place and a “welcoming environment” in which they can work toward those goals. “It’s difficult enough for adults who are embarrassed, especially for people whose first language is English,” she said. “We welcome everyone and I would say that that’s the atmosphere. It’s a relaxed atmosphere but a place of business, a place of learning.”