50-YEAR JUBILARIAN BIOGRAPHIES

Sister Caryl Bastasch, SNJM
(Sister M. Carolyn Frances)

Sister Caryl was born in the old St. Vincent Hospital in Portland, Oregon, to Frank and Frances Bastasch. She has two older brothers, two younger brothers, and a sister who is the youngest.

Caryl’s mother was one of nine children, all born in Prince Edward Island, Canada. The Hogan family came to Oregon when Caryl’s mother, third eldest, was eighteen. Caryl’s great uncle, Father William Hogan, a Canadian priest serving in Oregon’s mission territory, welcomed them. Caryl’s Bastasch grandparents came from the same village in Austria but met only after they arrived in Portland. They were young and filled with a spirit of adventure. Caryl is grateful for her family. All of her relatives are a blessing of her.

Caryl attended All Saints Grade School staffed by the Holy Names Sisters. She graduated from St. Mary’s Academy, and the next step just seems to have come from above! Although she had thought of other paths, on the last day of her senior year, she asked about entering the convent. That July, at age seventeen, she entered the Novitiate at Marylhurst. Sister remembers that the rules were strict but the call seemed clear. The Sisters in charge were beautiful models, and the “set” – those who entered at the same time – became friends easily and supported each other.

After professing First Vows and attending Marylhurst College, Sister Caryl taught grades one through six in The Dalles, Portland, and Salem. She enjoyed helping children and was known to be creative and enthusiastic. Along the way, she earned an M.S. from Portland State University.
Later, Sister answered a request to begin a new ministry as pastoral Associate in Lincoln County. She lived in Newport and traveled to Lincoln City, Waldport, Toledo, and Siletz. The experience was most rewarding, especially on sunny days! She continued in that ministry at Resurrection Parish in Tualatin, Oregon.

Caryl now assists at Mary’s Woods sharing the wonder and beauty of faith with the people she encounters. Sister Caryl’s is a happy and fulfilling life. Reflecting over these “few short years,” she sees how many people have helped her and is grateful to all.
 

Sister Brigid Baumann, SNJM
(Sister M. Brigid Louise)

Born and raised in Portland by parents from Ireland and Switzerland, Brigid attended St. Francis Elementary School and St. Mary’s Academy, leading to her desire to join the Holy Names community.

She taught elementary school in North Bend/Coos Bay, Eugene, St. Helens, and Bend, and earned a Master’s degree in Library Science at Rosary College near Chicago during summer vacations. She then served as school librarian and taught in Medford, Salem and Portland, as well as coaching volleyball and track.

During a thirty-day retreat in the early 1980s, she saw a short film, Roses in December, an account of the work of four Maryknoll women in El Salvador, and of their subsequent rape and murder. Moved by the violent situation in which many women live, and shocked by the invasive role of the US foreign policy, she turned her attention to the countries south of the United States. Her first experience brought her to Nicaragua and work with Habitat for Humanity, a time she cherished, and which also motivated her to study Spanish, first at Portland State University and then in an immersion program in Bolivia.

Later she joined the mission in Arequipa, Peru, that the Holy Names Sisters had operated for more than thirty years, where she fell in love with the country and the people. In 1988 she joined two other sisters in a small rural village of La Curva where she worked with children and youth, teaching guitar and taking books and music on the road to children in surrounding areas. When the Arequipa mission closed, she returned to Oregon to care for her mother and work as a Vista volunteer and with Portland Community College, coordinating English, Adult Basic Education and Family Literacy programs for Hispanics in the West Washington County area, also studying at Portland State University for another Master’s in post Secondary and Adult Continuing Education.

In 2004 she returned to Peru where she began teaching guitar; founded two libraries, which she still directs; and started the Marie Rose Women’s Center, which educates and trains women in job-related, life, and health skills.

Sister Kathleen Kircher, SNJM
(Sister M. Stephen Mark)

Sister Kathleen Kircher came from Eagle Grove, Iowa. She began her education at St. Francis Grade School in Portland and later graduated from St. Mary’s Academy in 1956, entering the Holy Names Novitiate the same year. Like most Sisters she attended Marylhurst College, receiving a degree in chemistry. Unlike the others, who frequently moved from mission to mission, she spent her 20 years teaching at just three locations: Holy Names Academy in Spokane, Sacred Heart Academy in Salem, and St. Mary’s Academy in Portland.

While she was at Sacred Heart she received two National Science Foundation grants for graduate study: one at UCLA for physics and the other at Marquette University in Wisconsin, where she received her master’s degree in chemistry.

In a change of direction she found herself at Mt. St. Joseph, where she worked as a nurses’ aide. There she learned how to physically care for people and fell in love with the work. That led her to take chaplain training at Providence Hospital in Portland, where, in her customary fashion, she stayed on for the next 20 years. She ended her years of service as the director of chaplains’ services.

After leaving Providence, Sister Kathleen planned to retire and devote her time to her main interests: travel, nature study, etc., but her Province had other plans for her. She was selected as a member of the last Oregon provincial team, where in addition to the regular administrative duties, she also took part in the physical transition of the Oregon Province region, spending significant time buying and overseeing the many cars that the Sisters use.

The highlight of her time as a Holy Names Sister was the year she spent in prayer and meditation at the house of prayer in Los Gatos, California.


Janina Kokorowski, SNJM
(Sister Janina Marie)

Janina first met the Holy Names Sisters at St. Mary’s Elementary School three days after she arrived in the U.S. from Germany. Although Janina was born in Poland, WWII uprooted the family’s life on a subsistence farm in Southeastern Poland. The family was transported to Germany where her parents worked as slave laborers. When the war ended they were fortunate to be living in the British zone in post war Germany. For the next five years the family moved from one refugee camp to another. Several countries were welcoming refugees in the post war years. Her family was lucky to immigrate to Seattle and settle in a parish which had a school staffed by the Holy Names Sisters.

Janina’s teaching career began in the first grade at St. Mary’s School in Eugene, OR. For sixteen years Janina taught and served as Principal in the Portland Archdiocese. These were exciting years. The fresh air circulating in the Church after the Second Vatican Council was life giving and exhilarating. It was a time of great change in the congregation and in the Church.

A change occurred in Janina’s life as well. She enrolled in a theology program at the Franciscan School of Theology in Berkley, CA. Upon receiving a Master’s degree she served as a Director of Religious Education in several parishes in Oregon and twelve years at St. Michael Parish in Olympia, WA. Currently she is the Director of Religious Education at Our Lady of the Lake Parish in Lake Oswego.

The energizing power for Sr. Janina is a passion for handing on the faith to the next generation. Janina believes that the family and parish community are the primary nurturers of faith. Family prayers, religious customs, and involvement in parish worship and activities are critical to passing on the faith to the next generation. To that end she has developed and implemented a number of family activities in the sacramental preparation and religious education programs. The people’s response inspires her to find ever more creative ways to proclaim God’s Kingdom.

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Sister Beverly Miller, SNJM
(Sister M. Carol Jean)

Sister Beverly Miller was born in Phoenix, Arizona, and was the oldest of three children. During her childhood the family moved often with her father’s work, to various places in Arizona, California, and then to Central Oregon. She attended three years of high school at St. Mary’s Academy in The Dalles. It was there she became acquainted with the Catholic faith and with the Sisters of the Holy Names, and although she moved back to Los Angeles to complete high school there, her heart was set on a return to Oregon.

In Los Angeles she attended Immaculate Heart College and Queen of Angels Nursing School to obtain her nursing degree, and she worked at the Veterans Hospital while completing State Board Exams and licensure. She then returned to Oregon and worked at St. Vincent Hospital until entering the novitiate at Marylhurst.

After completing the novitiate her assignments included Christie School and the Care Center at Marylhurst, and then to care for severely handicapped children at the Kerr Center Facility at Marylhurst. She served for six years in provincial administration, and then returned to work with handicapped children in a pilot project that would change the focus of care for such young children from a lifetime of institutional custodial care to one of family style small-group living with maximum education and training for each person to reach his or her full potential. She served in various capacities in this field for the next decade.

After retiring from nursing, she worked at St. Vincent Hospital in medical transcription and also assisted her mother, whose health was failing. She was privileged to care for her until her death.

The years leading to this Jubilee all seem to have passed so quickly, and Sister Beverly found in reflecting upon them a sense of profound gratitude for her Holy Names Community, for all the opportunities experienced, and especially for all the wonderful, courageous and inspiring people whose presence made those years bright with blessings.


Sister Marilyn Nunemaker, SNJM
(Sister Maria Jacinta)

When Marilyn was 7 she gathered playmates together and played school, making flashcards and creating lessons. As a student at Holy Redeemer she loved to be asked to fill in for a teacher. So, on becoming a Holy Names Sister, she excitedly began her official teaching ministry. There followed 25 fulfilling years as a fifth and sixth grade teacher in several schools. These years included mentoring many new teachers, updating Curriculum for the Archdiocese, involvement in inner-city summer programs and a much loved two-time assignment to St. Francis Inner-city School in Portland.

Then Marilyn answered a new calling — to teach adults who needed a basic education, a ministry she had been doing after school as a volunteer. Working in Portland Community College's Adult Basic Skills program was her next teaching adventure of 20 years. Besides full-time teaching, this included co-chairing the Department of 50 teachers. Many of her students were immigrants from all continents of the world. This rich cultural experience led her to want to do more with the immigrants in her neighborhood so she acquired TOEFL certification and studied Spanish. This has equipped her for her present "retirement" ministry which is teaching adult ESL groups and Citizenship classes.

Creativity flows deep in Marilyn's veins and displays itself in numerous ways. She loves the multifaceted physical and artistic challenge of total gardening and landscaping, and loves to share her backyard for parties. Indoors finds her doing many things artistically and practically. Painting landscapes with bright intense pastels is her latest artistic endeavor.

As a true Oregonian, love of the outdoors and a strong feeling of kinship with nature still find Marilyn backpacking throughout the Cascades, and hiking, camping, skiing, snowshoeing, biking, kayaking, rafting, and canoeing with friends. Of course she is never without her loving dog, a very special companion, and blessing from God.

Marilyn is grateful and thankful for being able to continue doing what gives her great joy—teaching. As she continues with this ministry and others, she reminds her self daily to "Treasure Relationships" and "Enjoy the Journey."

Sister Donna Van Laeken, SNJM
(Sister M. Sebastian)

Early on, summers found Donna, a native of north Portland, picking in bean and berry fields to help pay tuition for her education at Holy Redeemer School and St. Mary’s Academy. Then she heard the scriptural dictum to “Be still, pause awhile, and know that I am God,” calling her to a life centered in prayer as a Sister of the Holy Names. The decades since Vatican II have brought unforeseen changes and challenges as she has shared her life with others on pilgrimage toward Oneness.

Capitalizing on Donna’s diverse interests, momentum, and adaptability, her career as a creative, resourceful educator included teaching students in every grade, 1-14, in 11 Pacific Northwest schools and on the Hawaiian island of Kauai. With her expertise in journalism, English, and linguistics, she instigated changes as Chair of English Curriculum Development for Portland Archdiocesan schools. She also transitioned from an outstanding athlete to a coach for volleyball, swimming, softball and track teams.

Plagued lifelong by congenital feet deformities, when standing all day became too difficult, she drew from her deep spirituality to assist others in their journey through life with their God as a staff member in eremitical, contemplative, and active houses of prayer in Texas and Arizona.

Demographic studies of our country’s aging population led Donna to obtain a Master’s degree in gerontology. She now offers the elderly compassionate care born of her own poignant and humorous experiences in living a total of nearly three years from a wheelchair.

Donna is grateful for having been blessed with loving parents, Bill and Martha Van Laeken, who through their concern for others, truly lived their faith. Standing 6 feet tall, she is prayerfully confident she can measure up to whatever God asks of her in the future.