Skip to main content

Sister Rosemary HomrichSister Rosemary Homrich, OP entered eternal life on October 29, 2020 at the age of 93 after 71 years of religious life.

We commend Sister Rosemary to your prayers.

Evening Prayer with Remembering Service:
Wednesday, November 2 at 7:00 pm
Dominican Chapel at Marywood

Funeral Mass:
Thursday, November 3 at 10:00 am
Dominican Chapel at Marywood

All services are private due to the Coronavirus.

Most important to me . . . is the joy I have experienced in being able to do the work in life that I feel called to do, with the support of the community.

Rosemary was born in Muskegon, March 20, 1927, the third of six children of Bernard and Ella Valley Homrich. Her brother Eugene, with whom she was very close, became a Holy Cross priest, serving as a missionary among the most impoverished people in Bangladesh. Rosemary attended St. Joseph School in Muskegon, graduating in 1945. She said that she always appreciated the joy and kindness she saw in the Grand Rapids Dominicans who were her teachers.

After high school Rosemary entered Mercy Central School of Nursing, earning her R.N. in 1948. Soon after, on October 1st of that year, she entered the Dominican Sisters at Marywood.

Her nursing colleagues describe Sr. Rosemary as both hard working and outspoken. She had high expectations for herself and those who worked with her. She was self-assured and confident in her nursing and administrative abilities. These attributes conveyed a sense of safety and security to her patients and colleagues. “She knew what to do, and went ahead and did it,” said one of her nursing companions. Another reflected that Sr. Rosemary had the heart of a missionary, always seeking the hardest jobs and giving 100%. Although she showed a gruff exterior, she had a deeply tender heart, recalled another.

“I have had a wonderful, meaningful life,” she wrote. “My community has always been supportive and saw me through some very difficult times. I have been grateful to be able to work in nursing, even in my early years when I entered a teaching community.”