Medical Mission Sister Margaret O'Sullivan, M.M.S., Fox Chase

Medical Mission Sister Margaret O'Sullivan, M.M.S., the daughter of the late James and Mary Anne (Coleman) O'Sullivan and a Philadelphia resident since 1980, died on May 19 at St. Joseph's Manor in Meadowbrook. She was 91 years old. Her Funeral Mass will be celebrated on Thursday, May 24, at 10:30 a.m. at the Medical Mission Sisters' North American Headquarters, 8400 Pine Road, in the Fox Chase section of Philadelphia.

A Social and Pastoral Minister at St. Cecilia's Parish, Fox Chase, from 1990 to 1997, Sister Margaret spent an additional 8 years visiting the sick and homebound in the area before moving to St. Joseph's Manor in late 2007. She also served as an Activities and Pastoral Minister among elder Medical Mission Sisters living at their 8400 Pine Road Center for many years.

Born in the Bronx in 1921, Sister Margaret became a nurse and worked a total of 10 years as a Navy nurse and in industrial nursing in New York City before entering the Medical Mission Sisters in Philadelphia in 1953. She made her First Vows in 1955 and her Final Vows in 1960.

Sister Margaret spent almost 12 years as a maternity nurse and supervisor in Medical Mission Sisters-staffed hospitals in Venezuela before returning to the United States in 1966. She then worked two years at St. Vincent's Hospital in Southwest Philadelphia, two years at Holy Family Hospital in Atlanta, and one year each in the U.S. Public Health Service Indian Hospital in Shiprock, New Mexico, and the Appalachian Regional Hospital in South Williamson, Kentucky.

At the age of 54, Sister Margaret completed a course in Pastoral Ministry at Trinity College in Washington, D.C., and began a second stage of her life of service to others. She worked first at St. Peter's Medical Center in New Brunswick, New Jersey, for four years, then in 1980 returned to the Medical Mission Sisters' North American Headquarters in Fox Chase to minister to the elderly Sisters there. She later began her service to the people of St. Cecilia Parish.

Asked several years ago about her life of healing presence, Sister Margaret said, "To be able to visit with so many people and reach out to meet their needs whenever possible was a privilege. To listen to and understand their problems and to bring Christ to the needy is more than I could ever ask to do."

Tributes can be left at http://www.urbanfuneralhome.com.