Sr. Michael Ann: no regrets on life of service

After 60 years in service as a Franciscan Sister of Christian Charity, Sr. Michael Ann O’Donnell of Imperial has no regrets. She’s been at the center of celebrations this year recognizing her six decades of service, one of which was held Sunday at St. Patrick’s Church.
June 14 marked the 60th anniversary of taking her first vows after Sr. Michael Ann completed the novitiate (second) year with the Franciscan Sisters at Holy Family Convent in Manitowoc, Wisconsin. Since that important date in 1963, she has not looked back.
After taking her final vows several years later, Sr. Michael Ann has served in educational roles in Ohio, Wisconsin, Arizona, New Mexico, California, Hawaii and now Nebraska. Much of her work has been in the classroom in education, the degree she sought as she started college as an 18-year-old at Holy Family College in Manitowoc, Wisconsin. It was later that year when she was approached by other young women already in formation to become Sisters that she considered religious life as her vocation.
Sr. Michael Ann said it was in February of that first year of college when two of three Sisters were killed in a vehicle accident about 50 miles outside Manitowoc. They were all school teachers.
“All of the Sisters I was in class with then were so stunned because they all knew them. They asked ‘Who will take their place?’ in teaching the children,” she said.
Then one of them asked her if she’d considered religious life. That was all the push she needed to begin seeking answers on the questions she had about religious life. After a summer working back home in Ohio, she entered her first (postulate) year with the Franciscan Sisters community in Manitowoc.
Like other women in the 1960s, most Catholic Sisters, after taking final vows, took roles in education, nursing or in homemaker duties. Hers was in education, teaching in schools, doing retreat work or helping in the formation of young women discerning their vocations. Her service has taken her to many Indian reservations in several states. At times, she has also been assigned tasks at the Mother House in Wisconsin which included gardening and landscape work.
Sr. Michael Ann moved to Imperial in the spring 2019 in a temporary assignment, replacing Sr. Monica Mary who had been in Imperial since fall 2018 but became ill and returned to the Mother House for care.
Each fall since, when the Sisters’ assignments are made, she and Sr. Rochelle have been reassigned to St. Patrick’s in Imperial and southwest Nebraska.
Imperial is one of few parishes in the western part of the state to benefit from the presence of religious Sisters in its community. Both Srs. Michael Ann and Rochelle stay busy in their service, not only to Imperial but to eight other parishes and communities in southwest Nebraska.
Sr. Michael Ann serves as assistant to the pastor at St. Patrick’s, which includes a vast array of duties, one of which is teaching religious education classes at the parish and preparing youths for the Sacraments. Her crocheted items are on sale at St. Isidore’s Gift & Thrift and she has helped make blankets for needy families.
“Where ever the need is I respond,” she said.
She is well-known in the community beyond St. Patrick’s parish. She enjoys the many ecumenical events in town and occasionally has lunch at the Community Center. She said Imperial has never wavered in its welcoming nature.
“For Imperial, of all the places I’ve been, what sticks out to me is that people are so welcoming,” she said, “and accepting of people coming to this area.
“It felt like home right away. People here are generally concerned for others,” she said.
She said she’s never questioned her decision to enter religious life. In addition to the service she’s been able to provide, she said it has also taken her to places and provided opportunities she would not have experienced otherwise.
And, she has no plans to retire.
“We don’t really retire. We will continue to receive assignments according to our abilities,” she said.
“Your vocation does not end.”