Remembering Sister Patricia Mitchell, OSF

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In mid-June, 2023, Sister Pat was happily welcoming visitors to the new home she had moved to early in the year as Our Lady of Angels was preparing to close. Along with Sisters Ann Freiburg and Mary Agnes Cross, she was the first to arrive at Heritage Woods Assisted Living in Minooka, Illinois. They would soon be followed by others. The visitor’s Pat was so happy to see in June were the many Sisters arriving from out of town for the annual community week of meetings, missioning, and Jubilee celebrations. She was as eager to show them her new home as they were to see it. Always smiling and always hospitable…that was Pat.

Soon after those meetings, a sudden visit to the hospital for tests revealed that Pat had a malignant tumor pressing on her lungs. She entered into hospice care, lost the ability to speak, was anointed and moved from a hospice facility to Ascension Villa Franciscan Place, and died on the morning of July 18, 2023…a rapid transition from welcoming others to being welcomed home to heaven.

Read More About Sister Pat’s Life

If you would like to make a donation in honor of Sister Pat or another Joliet Franciscan Sister, please click here:  Remembering our Deceased Sisters.

Remembering Sister Carole von Buelow, OSF

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Our Sister Carole von Buelow was born the youngest of three children to Bodo and Winifred (Geary) von Buelow on December 27, 1937, on Chicago’s north side. She and her sister Carlene and brother Robert were raised in a loving and supportive German-Irish Catholic family. She graduated from St. Clement grade school and high school where she encountered the Joliet Franciscans she would join directly from high school.

Growing up in Chicago was formative in Carole’s life. She had an early and life-long allegiance to the Chicago Cubs, recalling attending games on Ladies Day – and dressing up to do so. She retained and stayed in touch with her girlhood friends from St. Clement throughout her life. She did not learn to drive as a teenager, as so many people do, because she had no need to do so. She rode public transportation as did her parents. In fact, it was well into her adulthood that she finally obtained a driver’s license, though she always shied away from highways. Although reticent about driving, that was certainly not one of the characteristics of her professional or religious life. Carole was a decisive, clear-thinking, innovative educator, consultant and administrator. As far back as her freshman year in college, one of her superiors wrote that she would be well-positioned for graduate school in whatever subject she would pursue. That intellect and discipline would serve her and so many others well for the almost 50 years she spent in education.

Read More About Sister Carole’s Life

If you would like to make a donation in honor of Sister Carlene or another Joliet Franciscan Sister, please click here:  Remembering our Deceased Sisters.