Sr. Mary Stiefvater Celebrates 60th Jubilee

Sr. Mary Stiefvater, DW

Sr. Andrew Mary of the Incarnation

February 2, 1960, 60 years professed

Born on May 26, 1940, to Andrew and Agnes Hamm Stiefvater, Sr. Mary made her first profession on February 2, 1960. Reflecting on the past 60 years, one of her most satisfying experiences as a Daughter of Wisdom was her time at a mission in Bangalore, India, where she worked in an orphanage and with people suffering from leprosy. Sister always wanted to be a missionary and looks back fondly on her opportunity to be in service in a mission country. Her favorite memory of that time is “the beautiful faces of the people and the gratitude when we would change the dressings and attend to the people with leprosy. It is amazing that people can have so little and be at peace with what they have.”

Best known among the congregation as “a Brooklyn Sister”—one of the few that has lived in Brooklyn all these years—Sr. Mary served for over 20 years as a Pastoral Associate at Shrine Church of St. Jude in Brooklyn, NY.  During this time, she also volunteered for four years at both the Federal and City Prisons in New York City, praying with the inmates. Before that, Sr. Mary worked for over 15 years providing Home Attendant Training in Brooklyn, New York, and as program and hospital coordinators for BHRAGS Home Health Care Corp and the local Health Department. In the first decade of her career, Sister was a Public Health Nurse in Suffolk County, NY and a Nurse at St. Charles Hospital, Port Jefferson, NY.

A graduate of Our Lady of Wisdom Academy in Ozone Park, class of 1958, Sr. Mary earned a BSN degree in Nursing from Catholic University in Washington, DC in 1965 and an MS in Christian Spirituality from Creighton University in Omaha, Nebraska in 1986.

Please join us in congratulating Sr. Mary Stiefvater, our “Brooklyn Sister,” on 60 years of profession!