OBITUARIES (01/26/97)

OBITUARIES

Sister Innocence Bodnar, former teacher

FOX CHASE MANOR, Pa. - Sister Innocence Bodnar, 81, a Sister of St. Basil the Great and a former elementary school teacher, died on December 19, 1996, at the Holy Redeemer Infirmary in Meadowbrook, Pa.

Born Kathryn Bodnar in Northampton, Pa., Sister Innocence entered the order in 1930 and professed her final vows in 1938. She then taught elementary school in Philadelphia, Arnold, Pittsburgh, Centralia, Olyphant and Berwick, Pa., as well as in Chicago, Hamtramck, Mich., and Parma, Ohio.

She returned to the motherhouse in Fox Chase Manor in 1986 and two years later became ill and was at the infirmary until her death.

She is survived by five sisters: Sophie Terleski and Margaret Kent of Whitehall, Pa.; Anna Czekner and Mary Klucsarits of Northampton, Pa.; Helen Gibiser of Allentown, Pa.; and several nieces and nephews.

A viewing was held and a funeral liturgy was offered at the motherhouse of the Sisters of St. Basil the Great. Burial was in the convent cemetery.

Sister Anna Duda, former worker at Rome-based humanitarian agency

SLOATSBURG, N.Y. - On November 28, 1996, Thanksgiving Day, Sister Anna Duda SSMI entered into eternal rest. The oldest of 11 children, Anna was born on February 26, 1917, to Theodore and Xenia Kowal Duda of St. Peter and Paul Ukrainian Catholic Church in Ambridge, Pa.

It was through the loving example of her mother that Sister Anna learned early in life of love for God, church, family and community. This family nurturing drew her to religious life when she entered the Novitiate of the Sisters Servants of Mary Immaculate in Canada in 1942. Sister Anna would later pass on this same loving example to her sister, Sister Bernitta, also a Sister Servant.

Sister Anna's teaching assignments took her to St. Mary's Villa Academy in Sloatsburg, followed by elementary education teaching in Rochester, N.Y., Detroit, Cleveland, Passaic, N.J., and Chicago.

It was in 1969 that Sister Anna was asked to minister to the poor of India and seeing that as God's will, she agreed. She traveled as far as Rome. Political unrest prevented her from going further. It was in Rome that for the next 20 years Sister Anna would spend her life working for the Catholic Near East Welfare Association (CNEWA), a papal agency for humanitarian and pastoral support that serves the churches and people of the Middle East, Northeast Africa, India and Eastern Europe. Sister Anna never did reach India, but her dedicated work from her office in Rome served the people of India in their need.

While visiting the U.S. in 1989, Sister Anna had a debilitating stroke, after which she was unable to return to Rome. During these last years of her life in a nursing home, she never lost sight of her friends in Rome, the clergy and religious with whom she so closely worked.

They too did not forget her. Receiving word of her death, Cardinal A. Silvestrini, prefect of the Sacred Oriental Congregation wrote, "...as you well know, Sister Anna was a devoted and generous collaborator of this congregation for over 20 years. By all accounts, the quality of her service to the Catholic Churches of the East and their many faithful who had contact with her set a high standard for those around her and for those who followed her. May she now enjoy the reward of her unstinting labors." one could ask for no greater recognition than to be remembered, as Sister Anna was, for her dedicated service for all God's people.

This again was seen and remembered in the homily given by Bishop Basil Losten during the evening parastas service on December 2, 1996, as well as well as during the funeral divine liturgy the following morning with Msgr. John Opalenick, main celebrant and homilist, and assisting clergy, Msgr. Roman Golemba, Msgr. Peter Skrincosky, the Rev. Stephen Shubiak, chaplain, the Rev. Emil Paulshock, the Rev. Edward Young and the Rev. Edward Higgins.

On December 3, 1996, surrounded by her community and family, Sister Anna was laid to rest in the Sisters Servants of Mary Immaculate cemetery in Sloatsburg.

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