†Sister Mary Jo Beckett, OP

“Rejoice in the Lord always. I say it again, Rejoice!”

~ Philippians 4:4

Mary Josephine was born March 4, 1939, in Mt. Pleasant, Michigan to Floyd and Velma McKnight Beckett. When she was five, her brother Don joined the family. Tragically, their mother died two years later leaving behind a bereft and lonely daughter and a little boy too young to understand.

After a series of housekeepers, their father married Marie Esch who was Catholic. Marie became a loving and understanding stepmother. The children and their family converted to Catholicism at the dismay of the extended Beckett family.

Mary Jo’s first six years of schooling were at the University Lab school connected to the education department of Central Michigan University. In grade seven she enrolled in Sacred Heart Academy, where she met the Grand Rapids Dominican Sisters. She was attracted to the life of the Sisters and to the study of religion. The idea of a religious vocation brought her to seek advice from a local priest. Following his counsel, she applied to enter the community.

In September 1957, Mary Jo joined a large class of postulants. In June she received the habit and a variation of her own surname. Sister Thomas a’Becket she remained until she resumed her baptismal name and was known thereafter as Sister Mary Jo. After her canonical novitiate she took her first vows and continued her professional preparation at Aquinas College. She was one of a group of sixty student sisters who moved into the recently constructed House of Studies.

In 1961 she was assigned to teach second grade at St. Michael, Maple Grove, initiating a 23-year career in primary education which took her to St. Mary Magdalen, Melvindale; St. Joseph the Worker, Beal City; Our Lady, Chesaning; and ending full circle at Sacred Heart, Mt. Pleasant.

Meanwhile she earned a BA from Aquinas College and an MA in Elementary Education from Central Michigan University. Other certifications earned include Healing Touch Ministry, Person-centered Care for the Family Caregiver, Cultural Awareness for Catechists & Educators, Bible Institute Preaching and Teaching from the Word of God, as well as the S.I.S.T.E.R Program

While teaching at Beal City in 1982, Sister Mary Jo volunteered to drive Sister Rose Patrice O’Donnell to an evening meeting in Mt. Pleasant. She intended to visit her ailing father and her brother at the same time. Their car swerved on an icy patch. The crash was instantly fatal to Sister Rose Patrice and Sister Mary Jo suffered multiple and critical injuries. In time she healed and was comforted by the assurance that came to her in a dream that all would be well.

Having known and loved two mothers, Mary Jo missed them both in their deaths. She doubled her attention to her father and brother Don. After her father’s death her concern for and care of her disabled brother intensified. She became his advocate and support for the rest of his life.

Beginning in 1988, Sister Mary Jo focused on her ministry in religious education. She served as Director of Religious Education and pastoral ministry at St. Joseph, Saginaw, and Guardian Angels, Manistee. On February 8, 1994, while in ministry at the latter parish, she suffered a brain aneurysm and was rushed to Traverse City for surgery. When she awoke the doctor told her, “Sister, it looks like the Lord has work for you to do yet. Usually, 75% of this kind of surgery patients don’t make it.” A week later she went to Aquinata to recuperate. Subsequently, her new ministry would be to Sisters at both Aquinata Hall and Marywood Health Center who benefited from her skills and knowledge of activities to benefit persons dealing with physical and mental losses.

Sister Mary Jo’s classmates remember her as the “glue” that held the class together. She arranged meals and get-togethers for her classmates throughout the years. “If not for her, we probably would not have been such a close class,” said one of her classmates. Another claimed her as the “unofficial class archivist” who documented their lives through photographs. She often emailed or mailed a monthly communication to her classmates with photographs she took and made into a card, a review of health happenings as well as death anniversaries of classmates.

In her later years, Sr. Mary Jo ministered to her Sisters at Aquinata Hall with activities to “energize the brains and bodies.” Her own near-death experiences and life-long care for her brother filled her with both compassion and gifted her with the means to offer activities for her ministry with the Sisters.

Basic to Sister Mary Jo’s works was the ever-pervasive power of prayer. The verse “Rejoice in the Lord always” was frequently on her lips and in her letters. She spread joy. She had a ready smile for anyone she met along the way with a word about Jesus, and a closing reminder to pray the mercy prayer, “My Jesus mercy.” Today she truly rejoices in the Lord with whom she walked and talked all of her days.

Sister Mary Jo is survived by her cousins; many friends and members of her Dominican Community.