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Sister Therese Decanio, OP 1930-2021

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Sister Therese Decanio, OP 1930-2021 Sister Therese DeCanio, OP 1930-2021 On April 10, 1930, a young Chicago couple, Anthony and Frances (Liana) DeCanio, welcomed their first-born child, Therese Genevieve, into the world. At the time, the little family lived on the second floor of an apartment building owned by three unmarried Irish sisters. These early days of the Depression were difficult, for Anthony – whose occupation is listed as “printer” in later Congregational records – was unemployed at the time of Therese’s birth. But the family’s landladies told him to not worry about the rent until he got a job. “My mother and father often spoke of their kindness,” Sister Therese wrote in her autobiography. “… They were a great gift in my young life as they spent much time reading to me, making pancakes for my breakfast and simply loving me.” In the years following Therese’s birth, two more children were born, Joseph in 1933 and Loretta in 1938. Therese’s early school years were spent in public school, including Fort Dearborn School when the family moved into a home in St. Kilian Parish the summer before she entered fifth grade. That move proved pivotal, for she attended CCD classes at St. Kilian. It was her introduction to the Adrian Dominican Sisters, and she went on to attend St. Kilian School for sixth grade and then Aquinas Dominican High School. Her parents preferred that she attend high school closer to home, but to her the 45-minute trip to Aquinas was well worth it because she was drawn to the Sisters’ joyful and caring presence. She entered the Congregation after graduation in June 1948, and that December was received as a novice with the religious name Sister Thomas Frances. In January 1950, right after making first profession, she was sent to St. Mary School in Rockwood, Michigan, to complete the school year. She was sent next to Precious Blood School in Detroit, and it was here, she wrote in her autobiography, that thanks to the tutelage of Sister Leonita Noetzel “I learned how to teach and where I was inspired to be the best possible teacher. Since that time, to this very moment, ‘to preach is to teach.’ For me the charism of the Order is thus fulfilled.” After two years at Precious Blood (1950-1952), subsequent assignments took Sister Therese to St. Joseph School, Port Huron, Michigan (1952-1953); St. Vincent Ferrer School, Cincinnati (1953-1957); St. Thomas the Apostle School, Escanaba, Michigan (1957-1958); St. Mary and St. Joseph School, Iron Mountain, Michigan (1958-1961); Ascension School, Harvey, Illinois (1961-1963) and St. Edmund School, Oak Park, Illinois (1963-1964). St. Edmund School would be her final elementary-school ministry. In 1964, she was sent to St. Edward High School in Elgin, Illinois, for a year (1964-1965), followed by five years (1965-1970) of teaching at Bishop Muldoon High School in Rockford, Illinois. During her time at Muldoon, having completed her bachelor’s degree in history from Siena Heights College (University) in 1955, she followed that degree up with a master’s in history from DePaul University in 1966. As it so happened, Sister Therese was part of the final faculty at Muldoon High School, for the school closed at the end of the 1969-1970 school year. With the advent of what was known as “open placement,” or the ability to choose one’s ministry, she then went to Montini High School in Lombard, Illinois, and spent the next four years (1970-1974), during which time she completed her second master’s degree, this one in economics from Northern Illinois University. She spent the 1974-1975 school year, at the request of the Congregation, in a study sabbatical at the Chicago Theological Cluster of schools, focusing her studies on economics and ethics leading up to a Certificate in Social Ethics. The next five years (1975-1980) were spent on the faculty at Regina Dominican High School in Wilmette, Illinois, and then she embarked on the ministry which would encompass the next thirty years: teaching at St. Ignatius College Prep School in Chicago. Sister Therese was one of the first woman teachers recruited by the then-principal, Jesuit Father Robert Bueter, when the school went co-educational, and she chaired the Social Studies Department for many years. After her death, Father Brian Paulson, SJ, Provincial of the Midwest Jesuits, and John Chandler, the school’s president, wrote this in a remembrance sent to Adrian: … Sr. Therese DeCanio was a consummate ambassador of the Dominican charism of preaching the Word and teaching truth to the Jesuit world of St. Ignatius. Sr. Therese loved God, country, free markets and her students, and preached that “gospel” every day of her life in the classroom. She expected the best from her students, and, by and large, her students delivered. … There was a formality to Sr. Therese, which was not off-putting but, rather, which commanded respect from her students and colleagues. As tough as she was as a grader, Sr. Therese’s compassionate heart and kind, listening ear were available to those who came to her with problems and questions. She was “old school” in the best sense of the word. Sister Therese retired from active ministry in 2010 but continued to live in Illinois until 2017 when declining health required her to return to Adrian. She died at the Dominican Life Center on March 17, 2021, aged ninety and in her seventy-second year of religious profession. The remembrances shared after her death focused on her deep commitment to faith, family, friends, and her students. Wrote her niece Annette Murphy, on behalf of the family, about “Auntie,” as Sister Therese was known: I believe her first love in life and root of everything she did in life was the love of our Lord. I think He was at the core of everything she did throughout her life. The next love she had was her Adrian Dominican Community Sisters. … Another love in her life was her students. Her students throughout her 62 years of teaching in the classroom were what made her get up every morning. There were so many students throughout her educational ministry that kept in touch with her and wrote to her to let her know what a huge impact she had in their lives. … The final love of her life was her family, both her immediate and extended family. She often spoke about her admiration of her mom and dad and the sacrifices they made for their family, and the gift of letting her go to St. Kilian’s Catholic School, where she first encountered the Adrian Dominican Sisters who changed my Aunt’s life forever. Sister Janet Schaeffler, who had once spent time at the Dominican Life Center after surgery for a broken ankle and got to know Sister Therese there, was one of several members of the Congregation who shared their own memories: … I was always aware of Therese’s committed beliefs, as well as her desire to read, talk, and learn more. She was always thinking about spirituality, the life of the Congregation, the church, and our nation. Therese wanted to understand more, wanted to understand motivations, the foundational values and the vision for the future. … Therese often spoke of her teaching days, especially in high school (where she spent most of her ministry). There must be hundreds and hundreds of people in the world today who are benefitting from her guidance, her expertise, and the ways she encouraged them to be critical thinkers and faith-filled disciples. Some of those former students, in fact, wrote to share their own memories of Sister Therese and the impact she had had on their lives, and the funeral homily was written by one of her Muldoon students, Sister Judy Rimbey: Anyone who encountered “Tuffy,” our nickname for her, which in later years after graduation we shared with her, knew that she was a no-nonsense teacher, dedicated to your academic success and growth as a person of faith. Therese was the consummate teacher, and until she died was always reading to keep up with what was happening in the Church and the world and being a committed Dominican ready to share with others the fruits of her study and contemplation. Even if our readings were not always from the same sources, we were always able to engage in the Dominican exercise of disputatio and to hold our views with respect and understanding. … As I read the short section from John’s gospel that she chose,1 I thought of it as a final declaration of her life’s mission and her report card on how she did. … Thus, it is appropriate that the words in today’s gospel can now be Therese’s: I know you and these know that you have sent me I made your name known to them and I will make it known So that the love with which you have loved me may be in them and I in them. 1 John 17:24-26. Right: Sisters Mary Margaret (Margaret Charles) Fallon, left, and Therese (Thomas Frances) DeCanio Left: Sister Therese DeCanio and Natalie pose with Mickey Mouse at Disneyland. .Right: Celebrating the Golden Anniversary of Anthony and Frances DeCanio, Sister Therese’s parents, are, from left, Frances, Joseph, Loretta, Anthony, and Sister Therese. Left: Friends gather to honor Sister Therese DeCanio (standing, second from left) on her retirement, May 2010. Right: Standing from left, Sisters Patricia Downey, Kieran Therese Quirke, Anastasia McNichols, and, seated, Sister Therese DeCanio. Members of the 1998 Golden Jubilee Crowd are: back row, from left, Sisters Judith Mary Singer, Mary Catherine Jordan, Marie Geraldine Brownell, Mary D.
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