Boarding at Loretto

Marjorie Louan and Sandra Crawford

by Sandra (Crawford) Martin – Loretto Academy boarder 1941-1946

Seventy years ago my mother delivered my sister and me to Loretto Academy along with three other cousins.  We were going to boarding school because of the war and there was no one to stay with us while our mothers worked.  It was 1941 and I was three years old.  When I first saw the nun in her habit, I recall screaming as I was handed over to Sister Rose.  That night, she tucked me in at the bottom of her bed.  I slept there until I became accustomed to my new surroundings— until I felt comfortable sleeping in my own little bed in the dormitory. That became my home during the school year until  I left Loretto to start the third grade at Morehead Grade School on Arizona Street.

Education in the Borderlands

by Nancy Pineda-Madrid, PhD, Loretto Academy (El Paso) ’77

Nancy Pineda-Madrid is Assistant Professor of Theology and U.S. Latino/a Ministry at Boston College.

I graduated from Loretto Academy High School in 1977.  As I look back over my life since then I am quite confident that I have had no educational experience that has influenced my life more than my years at Loretto.  Loretto took seriously the importance of developing the whole person in an integrated manner by encouraging me to focus intensely on my own intellectual development, by fostering in me a deep appreciation of the humanities and the arts, and by calling me to prayer, my interior life and an ongoing relationship with God.  At Loretto I learned that women could pursue and become whatever they put their minds to.  Today I am one of a still limited number of Latina Catholic theologians in the United States and I teach at Boston College.

During my years at Loretto I met and studied with a number of girls from Ciudad Juárez and grew greatly in my appreciation of my own Mexican heritage.  It was an enormous privilege to study with them, one I am grateful for to this day.  In teaching us to value the whole person, Loretto took seriously the geographical and cultural context of the borderlands and instilled in me a love of this land that has had such a foundational impact on my identity.  Recently I published a book entitled Suffering and Salvation in Ciudad Juárez, which no doubt grew out of my love for this land of my youth and early adult years.

One Joyful Dance

by Donna Sullivan

Donna Sullivan has worked as the Lower School counselor at St. Mary’s Academy in Denver since 2001.

At the end of my first year at St. Mary’s, I was invited to attend the trip to the Motherhouse. At that time it was a “working” retreat, so we mostly focused on how to teach and model the four Loretto values in our classrooms. We still had time to talk with several of the nuns, to walk the grounds, and to get to know each other.

My favorite memory, however, was the mass on our final day there. 

Brief Hello!

by Mary Ann Place Unsell, Loretto Academy ’57

My grandmother was a Loretto Graduate from San Antonio-Socorro, N.M. My grandparents moved to El Paso, with their three daughters at that time to give them the best education they could. They went to Loretto Acadamy at that time. There were six girls in all. My brothers and I went to St. Patricks, and I went on to Loretto, my brothers to Cathedral High.

Loretto in the 50s

by Rose-Marie Porter Baumann, Loretto Academy (El Paso) ’57

The old stories are wonderful.

Each year before school was out, my parents gave a day of recreation to the Sisters who could come down to our farm in the lower valley. My parents arranged cars to pick them up and take them home afterward (1955-1957).

The times were so different from today.  The Sisters were certainlydressed in full habit. In fact, they left Loretto rarely and always in twos.

We had a big picnic on the farm. It was fully of gaity and laughter. The Sisters were not allowed to enter the house, except if truly needed, for the call of nature. That mattered not. It was a fun refreshing time.

How I love the Sisters of Loretto. As a boarding student, I think I was blessed with a special relationship with the Sisters, as were most Boarders.

In the 1950′s, it was the best of times at Loretto. The opportunities provided and the daily virtue are still to be commended.

Gratitude to Loretto Heights

by Janice Green

I entered Loretto Heights College in September 1956 as a freshman.  I had graduated from West High School in Denver, and my beloved high school counselor had told me he thought Loretto would be a wonderful fit for me, and he believed I would be eligible for a partial scholarship there.  As I was a Protestant, I had some misgivings, but my mother and I visited Loretto and I was convinced it was the school for me.

The Gift of Loretto

by Mary Bickel

Mary Bickel has appreciated Loretto since 3^rd grade – when she started at Immaculate Conception in Maplewood, MO.  She continued her Loretto education at Nerinx Hall High School and Webster College.  She says that her career in music education was greatly shaped by her Loretto teachers.

Mary with her piano teacher, S. Alice Eugene Tighe SL

What a gift to have had the Sisters of Loretto as teachers and models from 3rd grade through college. On a daily basis, they demonstrated their energetic spirituality, enthusiasm for the subject matter, loving compassion, thoughtful seriousness, and, of course, humor.

Many memorable experiences at the elementary level were facilitated/led by my Loretto teachers: diagramming sentences at the blackboard; walking across the playground to practice for special liturgies; singing from the Liber with Sr. Francis Xavier Ratermann; beginning piano lessons in the convent, not knowing, until much later, that Sr. Hubert Hentzen was really taking care of me and my little brother after school. My memory reflects on more names: Sr. Mary Gertrude (8th), Sr. Mary Martin (7th), Srs. Crescentia and Gervasia, and the only lay teacher at that time Miss Margaret (4th grade).

Girls Night Out

by Mary Ann Chacon (Cancellare), Loretto Academy ’66

S Rita Rinker SL

At the time of our 10th year reunion in El Paso, Texas, friends in Loretto Academy’s Class of ’66 encouraged me to attend a prayer meeting at Open Arms Prayer Community.  I was introduced to Sister Rita Rinker in that community where she led praise through music.  There, the Lord did “bind us together in love.”

Learning Compassion

by Lisa Reynolds, CoL

Lisa Reynolds is a Loretto co-member who has known the Loretto Community since she attended Loretto Heights College in the 1970s.  She lives in Denver, CO.  Lisa tells us that she had many meaningful memories she could have shared – and that this experience she shared with Loretto sisters “shows in a nutshell Loretto at its best.”

I was at “Sisters Against the War” day of prayer and demonstration in Colorado Springs.  Several Loretto members and I, along with other individuals and communities, were gathered to witness against the Iraqi War, as we had done since its beginning.  Our morning started with breakfast, some good entertainment, and then prayers and some powerful talks by several people.  Our afternoon was to be spent outside the gates of Peterson Air Force Base witnessing against the war.  We headed out to the base and lined ourselves up along both sides of the road leading into it.  I found a spot, planted myself there and was holding my anti-war sign dutifully and, admittedly, as stoic as I thought I should look.

It Had to Be the Holy Spirit

This story is from Jean Chapman, a friend of Loretto who first met the community as a long-term volunteer at the Motherhouse.  She is a member of the Loretto Circle.

Jean gets a haircut from Marilyn, a fellow retreatant

“It was all because of you!” I say to Sr. Kathleen Vonderhaar, there being a twinkle in both our mutual eyes.

The Loretto adventure began when my younger daughter began looking for a program after high school in which she could work as a volunteer and perfect her Spanish.  In usual style, I set out collecting resources and helping her glean information.  One book that came into my hands was Response 2001, a guide to Catholic volunteer opportunities.  We soon found a good place for Joyce in Nicaragua, but the perusal of all those guides set me to visioning:  I could do a lot of them myself!  Why not?  My girls were out of the house; I could do something different for a while.