She was one of 10 children born to Irish immigrants. She wrote of her high school years, "The four years I was in High School I walked to school and afternoons I
worked and walked every day-rain or shine-snow-sleet-cold. It took me 40 minutes if I hurried and I did
hurry because my work was piece work and I earned $.28 a day if I worked
hard-tacking shanks for shoes [shanks are the narrow part of the sole of a
shoe, lying beneath the instep]." After high school, she worked for 3 more years before beginning nurses training. She did private duty nursing before becoming a public health nurse. She entered religious life at the "old" age of 31.
After her novitiate, she was assigned to work at various hospitals until she retired. But in her retirement she still tried to help out in any way she could, whether it was visiting elderly people in their homes, working in the community library or doing crafts projects to give as gifts. She was very prayerful and spent many hours in the chapel speaking to her divine Spouse.
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| Sister Miriam Patricia ( in the background) with Sister Benedict Joseph. |
She suffered from arthritis but tried not to complain of the pain she was in. Mother Ellen remembered Sister Miriam Patricia as a "wonderful inspiration as a prayerful, thoughtful, cheerful, community
Sister. She was assigned to Taylor Manor
Nursing Home, after we took over its staffing in 1977. When she was not praying, she was busy
helping someone somewhere. The laundry
girls loved her; she used to go down and help to fold clothes. She made very attractive place cards for our
feast days."
Sister passes away unexpectedly after a heart attack in 1978, just 4 years after the community was given approval by Rome.
