Cardinal Dolan visits 100-year-old nun who taught him to ‘love and serve the Lord’

ACI Prensa Staff, May 15, 2025 / 17:03 pm

Cardinal Timothy Dolan, archbishop of New York, shared a video on May 14 in which he appears with Sister Mary Bosco of the Sisters of Mercy, a 100-year-old Irish nun who taught him to “love and serve the Lord.”

“I’m in Tullamore, Ireland, with my beloved Sister Mary Bosco! She’s 100 years old and she taught me when I was just a little boy,” the cardinal explained in a video posted on X after being in Rome participating in the conclave in which Pope Leo XIV was elected.

“Choosing is always important for God — he chooses us! I thank God for Sister Bosco’s vocation, the call of Pope Leo, for St. Matthias [whose feast day is May 14], and for my parents, who chose to get married today in 1949,” he added.

“That’s choice in action! Thank God for calling us,” he concluded. 

On Jan. 4, Dolan congratulated Sister Mary Bosco in a video message on her 100th birthday, noting that she “played a crucial role in my life,” as she was his teacher in second, fourth, and fifth grade.

“She taught me wisdom, she taught me knowledge, she taught me to put Jesus first. She taught me to know, love, and serve the Lord, she taught me to love the Church, to desire to receive the Lord in holy Communion and to strive to do my best to live the commandments and the beatitudes,” he recounted in January.

“I don’t know where I would be without her,” he shared at the time.

This story was first published by ACI Prensa, CNA’s Spanish-language news partner. It has been translated and adapted by CNA.