Sister Blanche Thiel: 'Every Day I See What it Means to be a Christian'

The following comes from Dorsey Funeral Home:

Maryknoll, NY.  Sister Blanche M. Thiel, a chaplain, pastoral worker, and dietary
researcher, died August 29, 2013, at Maryknoll Sisters Home Care III, Ossining, NY. She was 87 years old and had been a Maryknoll Sister for 64 years.
Born on October 10, 1925, in Milwaukee, WI, to Mathias and Gertrude Biesen Thiel, Sister Blanche entered Maryknoll at their Valley Park, MO, residence from St. Augustine’s Parish, Milwaukee, on October 14, 1948.  A 1940 graduate of St. Augustine’s School and 1944 graduate of St. Mary’s Academy, both in Milwaukee, she earned a B.S. in home economics from Marywood College, Scranton, PA, in 1957 and studied public health nutrition at the University of Minnesota in 1967.

A nurse’s aide at St. Luke’s Hospital, Milwaukee, from 1944-1945 and toll operator for the Wisconsin Telephone Company, Milwaukee, from 1947-1948, prior to entering Maryknoll, Sister Blanche received her religious name, Sister Matthias Marie, six months after her entrance. She made her First Profession on May 8, 1951, in Valley Park, and her Final Vows on May 8, 1954, at the Motherhouse in Ossining, NY.  

Sister Blanche first served with Maryknoll  as a receptionist, operating the Sisters’ switchboard from 1951-1958. She was then sent to Queen of the World Hospital, Kansas City, MO, the first interracial hospital in the nation, where she worked as a staff dietician for two years. In 1960, she became the supervisor of the Sisters’ kitchen at their residence in Topsfield, MA, serving in that capacity until 1965. 

Sister Blanche then served for three years as a researcher at the Harvard School of Public Health until joining a team of researchers at Children’s Hospital, Columbus, OH, in 1968.  There she worked with the Children’s Hospital Research Foundation and Ohio State University’s Pediatrics Department on a nationwide research program, entitled “Evaluation of Nutritional Status of Preschool Children in the United States,” beginning as a dietary researcher, visiting families in Columbus to gain information for the study, and finally being appointed the program’s supervisor in 1969. 

From 1970-71, Sister Blanche worked as dietician supervisor for Letchworth Village, a residence for the physically and mentally disabled operated by the New York State Department of Mental Health, in Thiells55, NY, until she was appointed to serve in the congregation’s Central Pacific region, serving first as dietician and cook for Sisters at St. Anthony’s Convent on Maui, then as receptionist and, later, as pastoral care worker at St. Francis Hospital, Honolulu, from 1973-1979.
Later in 1979, Sister Blanche became director and chaplain of Catholic patients at Queen’s Medical Center, the largest hospital in Honolulu, where she served until her retirement in 1992. “In my work as a hospital pastoral associate,” she reflected in 1981, “every day I see what it means to be a Christian, when I meet a new patient and they cry [because] I came to pray with them.... They are so happy…. Many attribute their becoming better to our visits and prayers.”

Following her retirement, Sister Blanche lived at the Maryknoll Sisters’ residence in Monrovia, CA, where she volunteered in various capacities until returning, finally, to the Maryknoll Sisters Center, Ossining, NY, in 2005.

A Vesper service will be held for Sister Blanche on Tuesday, September 3, 2013, at 4:15 p.m., followed by a Mass of Christian Burial at 11 a.m. on Wednesday, September 4, 2013. Both will be held in the Annunciation Chapel at the Maryknoll Sisters Center.  Burial will be in the Maryknoll Sisters Cemetery at Maryknoll, NY. Dorsey Funeral Home is handling the arrangements.