A funeral Mass for Sister Mary Anne O’Connor, S.S.N.D., was offered June 12 in the chapel at Villa Notre Dame in Wilton, Conn. Sister Mary Anne died June 7; she was 89.
In August of 1936, two months after her high school graduation, Anne Margaret entered the School Sisters of Notre Dame Candidature at Immaculate Conception in Malden, Conn. She entered the novitiate in July 1938, and took the religious name of Sister Mary Simplicia, though she would later be known by several other names, including Anna Margaret and Annie Mag. Most recently her fellow School Sisters of Notre Dame knew her as Mary Anne.
One month after entering the novitiate, she took her first vows in Baltimore before leaving for Puerta de Tierra, Puerto Rico, where she taught junior high school. In 1945, she took her final vows.
In 1955, Sister Mary Anne returned to Maryland and taught secondary grades at St. Mary’s Academy in Annapolis until 1964. While at St. Mary’s she earned her Master of Arts degree in English with a minor in Latin from Catholic University of America in Washington, D.C. In 1964, Sister Mary Anne moved to San Felipe, Chile, where she would live for more than 30 years. In 2001 she retired from active ministry and returned to Villa Notre Dame, where she has lived since.