Dear family and friends of Sister Anita Rosaire:

I want to thank you for coming to pay tribute to a most extraordinary woman. She dearly loved God, her family and many friends throughout her long life.

She told me that she wanted to be a religious nun from the first grade in our own Saint Boniface School in New York City. She loved the Dominican nuns from Newburgh and later the Amityville Dominicans in College Point where she went to high school.

She loved teaching. She was one of the first sisters to graduate from our normal school here in Newburgh and her first class was kindergarten. When she made it known that this was where her heart was—teaching those little ones, she was promptly told that she would be teaching older children. However, she never lost that love. When she was asked to be principal of St. Joseph grammar school in Toms River, she begged instead to continue teaching. But that was not to be. One of her greatest joys there in Toms River was to visit the kindergarten class. She loved them and that love was returned in abundance. And later, I can remember when she moved to Virginia to work after completing ten years of teaching in our own Mt. St. Mary College, she still couldn’t resist getting the eye of little ones in church and smiling at them as their mother or father held them high facing the back pew.

Whatever task she had, she gave it all of her attention and time. I was told that she would be up late into the night preparing classes and go into class the next morning with no notes whatsoever. Later, when she went to work for Congressman Gilman in Washington, she spent her whole day working hard—answering the phone, opening and sorting mail, and fulfilling constituent requests for bills or other materials. And whenever other religious sisters, priests, or anyone of import came to visit the Congressman, Sister Anita would be sent for to be introduced to them. And all she really wanted to do was fulfill her workday finishing tasks.

Sister Anita was blessed for most of her life with good health. She had never had to stay in a hospital with an illness until November of 2004 when she was rushed to the hospital in Arlington, VA where she had lived and traveled to work in Washington for over 23 years. She had a bacterial infection and a temperature of 104, and I thought I would lose her that early morning. She rallied and got better, but that incident was followed by two more visits to the hospital there in December and again in February. Finally, she came here to Newburgh to be cared for in our own infirmary on March 21, 2005.

What I remember most about her was her beautiful smile that she gave anyone who approached her with kindness and love. On February 21, I whispered to her that God was coming for her very soon and that she would be happy with Him, our Blessed Mother, St. Joseph, the saints, especially her dearly beloved Dominican saints and her treasured family and friends who had gone to heaven. I pictured her with that smile when God came for her a few minutes later, and I was very grateful to Him. May God bless all who have loved her and have shown great kindness to her. Her smile will show her thanks.

Part Two--CELEBRATING HER LIFE

Let’s start with sister’s name: anyone who knew her well realized how much she loved her full name to be used, both in speech and in writing. And, if you didn’t acquiesce, she may gently remind you about it.

Sister was born—oops, let’s just use Sister Anita for now—was born Margaret Catherine Fay in 1908 in New York City into a loving family. Her father was James Francis and her mother was Mary Ledwith Fay.

Sister Anita had one sister, Mae, the eldest, and six brothers, one of whom died shortly after birth. Those that survived were, in order: Jimmy, Moey, John D., Tom and Mickey. I’m sure that those of you who were taught history or political science by Sister Anita would recognize the name Tom, who worked for the Herald Tribune. You may even have received that same newspaper daily in her class.

With each of his wife Mary’s pregnancies after Mae was born, her father would kneel at our lady’s altar after mass on Sunday mornings to pray for another little girl. This, of course, was much to the chagrin to her mother, because that’s how Mrs. Fay’s lady friends learned she was pregnant. However, four boys followed before Margaret Catherine finally came on the scene.

Well, it wouldn’t be difficult to guess that Margaret Catherine became very spoiled by her father. However, her mother helped young Margaret Catherine to be well balanced whenever spoiling became evident.

Now, for a few things you may not have ever known about Margaret Catherine: she loved ice cream, but who doesn’t? She and her younger brother Mickey would have a grand time sitting side-by-side eating ice cream. They would, however, have to be careful not to begin coughing, because if this happened to either of them, their mother would say, “all right, you have had enough ice cream.” Sister Anita told me they would practice stifling coughs, during their favorite indulgence.

Also, Margaret Catherine didn’t like to eat breakfast and would try running out to school early. Usually, though, her attentive mother caught her and made her sit down and eat.

The Fay children were taught not to tell on each other, or “no snitching”, and they were adamant about this rule. But Margaret Catherine got into trouble keeping this rule. She and her brother Tom attended Saint Boniface grammar school when the following story took place. The sister principal called Margaret outside of class one day to ask her mother to call the principal that evening. Apparently, Tom was walking around his class helping the boys with their math problems. He was so bright and compassionate that he couldn’t resist this action! That afternoon, Margaret came home but did not apprise her mother of the principal’s request. Of course, she had no intention of “snitching” on her brother. When the principal didn’t get any call that evening, she cornered Margaret the next day. The principal did not appreciate her explanation, and Mrs. Fay got a call from the principal pronto!

Moving along—when Margaret was in the novitiate in 1928, each postulant had a certain time on a certain day of the week to get a bath. Somehow, or other, on this particular week, she was assigned to take her bath in early afternoon. However, Margaret was also supposed to be in class at that same time. Where do you think she reasoned she should be that early afternoon? You are right! She took her bath—I guess as long and leisurely as she dared! Meanwhile, there was no Margaret in class. The sister teacher asked if anyone knew where she was, and the teacher was greeted with innocent silence. When the postulant mistress was approached on this matter, she figured out where Margaret might be. Now you can guess what happened to Margaret when they found her!

My last story takes place after Sister Anita finished ten years of teaching history and political science at our college here in Newburgh. I had come down to Virginia the year before in 1974 and was working for the Federal government. I was living with the sisters of the Sacred Heart of Mary at Marymount College in Arlington, Virginia, and Sister Anita joined me there. We promptly bought a typewriter after she arrived, and she practiced diligently on it each day just in case she might need this skill.

A short time later, Congressman Benjamin Gilman, whom I had worked for the year before in Newburgh and knew Sister Anita well from Mount Saint Mary College, invited her to come to work for him in Washington until another position became available. Sister Anita wasn’t working at the Congressional office very long when she received this phone call: a man said to her to “get off your seat and put the Congressman on right away.” As soon as the man finished speaking, Sister Anita hung up the phone. The phone rang again with the same response from Sister Anita for a total of four times. After a few minutes of reflection, Sister Anita went in to see her boss, the administrative assistant, Bob Becker. She looked very sad and told him that she had done something terrible and maybe she would be fired for it. It reminded me of the movie, “The Sound of Music”, when the sad-looking nuns went to the superioress to confess that they had pulled vital cords from under the hood of the Nazi’s car so that the car wouldn’t start.

All her boss did was laugh and say that it served him right for talking that way to a nun! He went right in to explain the story to the Congressman, and they could be heard laughing. From that time on, when that man visited the Congressman in his Washington office, he would ask, “Where is that nun”? He learned to come into the office where Sister Anita worked and ceremoniously bowed to her! That was my brother Dick’s favorite story, and he told it to many of his theatre friends.

One last thing—Sister Anita’s smile became her most memorable feature. I keep seeing that smile even now and know that’s what she did when Our Lord came for her on February 21, 2007 and called her by name.

Goodbye, dear friend, until we meet again. Thank you all and god bless you.

Jean Merrell, OP