Sr Margaret Mary leaves ‘second home’

Sr Margaret Mary Jordan left Lisdoonvarna after 64 years of active ministry and service. She retired to her native Mayo on Thursday, April 25. 
Sr Margaret Mary was present when the secondary school opened its doors to students for the first time in September 1949.
In 1955 Sister Evangelist encouraged Sr Margaret Mary to get a qualification in speech and drama. Each Friday from September to Christmas she travelled to Limerick and ended up passing her Senior Advanced by the end of December of the same year.
In June 1956 she was awarded her Diploma in Speech and Drama from the London College. She continues to prepare and enter students for examination with the Leinster School of Music and Drama. This year she had 12 students from Grade 9 to Grade 4 all honour students.
In 1990, at the age of 66, she formally retired from the teaching staff of Mary Immaculate. In the past 23 years, since her retirement, there hasn’t been a day when she hasn’t walked the corridors, mingling with the students, arranging readers and gardeners, challenging students, distributing religious magazines, and whenever a class is going a begging doing some speech and drama with them.
“To this day, 63 years on, our present students would look forward to the knock on the classroom door when Sr Margaret Mary comes looking for a few boys who would prepare the flower beds, lift some flowers bulbs or plant some seeds that will flower later in the year. And all the time she is talking to them, asking them about their family, quoting Shakespeare and imparting a love of nature and awe of God’s Creation in them.  And nothing that was said was ever forgotten.  God has blessed her with a wonderful intellect and an amazing memory,” said John O’Loughlin, Mary Immaculate School principal.
“In student speak Sr Margaret Mary is a legend.  She is deeply loved and admired by the whole community for her kindness, her hard-working nature, her humility and above all for her striking example of living faith, prayerfulness and service,” he added.
“We wish Sr Margaret Mary many happy years in Castlebar and thank her for all she did over the many years she spent in your second home, Lisdoonvarna. Myself, the staff and the students wish her the best and think of her with deepest love, affection and admiration,” he concluded.