CNA Staff, Dec 19, 2020 / 04:01 am
Eight elderly religious sisters died of COVID-19 complications in one week at a retirement home for the School Sisters of Notre Dame near Milwaukee.
"Even though they're older and most of the sisters that did go to God are in their late 80s, 90s ... we didn't expect them to go...so quickly," Sister Debra Marie Sciano, the provincial leader for School Sisters of Notre Dame Central Pacific Province, told the Associated Press. "So it was just very difficult for us."
"We believe that each of these sisters, and all the sisters, really, they've made a difference in this world," Sciano said. "I just think it's important that people know that, and that they were committed up until the end of their lives."
Sisters Rose M. Feess and Mary Elva Wiesner both died Dec. 9. Sister Dorothy MacIntyre died Dec. 11. Sister Mary Alexius Portz died Dec. 13, and Sisters Cynthia Borman, Joan Emily Kaul, Lillia Langreck and Michael Marie Laux all died Dec. 14 at Notre Dame of Elm Grove.