8/11/06
year:
2006
Aston, PA — Sister Margaret Grace Gannon professed her final vows as a member of the Sisters of St. Francis of Philadelphia on August 11, 2006. The liturgy, attended by many of Sister Margaret’s family, friends, and community members, was celebrated in Our Lady of Angels Chapel, located in the congregation’s motherhouse here.
The daughter of the late Charles and Margaret Gannon, Sister Margaret was born in Fort Washington, Pennsylvania. She graduated from Upper Dublin High School in Fort Washington and earned both a B.S. and a Master’s in Education from Chestnut Hill College and a PhD in Educational Leadership from Immaculata University.
Sister Margaret professed her first vows in August 2001. The five years between her first profession and her final vows were, for Sister Margaret, years of discernment. “When I made my first vows, I knew, in my heart, that they would be forever,” she said. “The past five years have given me time to see what it really means to be a Sister of St. Francis. The mystique is gone at this point and it is with no doubt that I say this is who I want to be for the rest of my life.”
For the past three years, Sister Margaret has served as principal of Our Lady of Perpetual Help School in Morton, Pennsylvania. In September she will begin a new ministry as principal of St. Katharine Drexel School in Chester, Pennsylvania. The school, which because of declining enrollments, had faced the possibility of closure, has received a promise of hope thanks to the recently formed Neumann/Drexel Collaborative Initiative, a joint venture on the part of the Archdiocese of Philadelphia, Neumann College, and several congregations of women religious, including the Sisters of St. Francis of Philadelphia.
The Sisters of St. Francis also gathered to celebrate other members who were either renewing vows or making final vows. On August 10 Sister Patricia Kerezsi, who made first profession in 2005, renewed her vows in Our Lady of Angels Chapel, located in the congregation’s motherhouse in Aston, Pennsylvania. Sister Patricia, daughter of Patricia and the late Louis Kerezsi, is a native of Aston, Pennsylvania. She currently ministers at St. Joseph Family Center in Spokane, Washington.
On August 5 members of the congregation gathered in Sacred Heart Church in Tillamook, Oregon, to join the family and friends of Sister Theresa Marie Lamkin, who, like Sister Margaret, professed her final vows as a member of the Sisters of St. Francis of Philadelphia.
To learn more about the Sisters of St. Francis of Philadelphia, visit our website, www.osfphila.org.
