Sister Ann Keating, CSC
Read the memories shared at Sister Ann's funeral.
Sister Ann Keating, CSC
(Sister M. Rose Angela)
December 6, 1925 - July 11, 2019
Word has been received of the death of Sister Ann Keating, CSC, who died at 3:45 p.m. on Thursday, July 11, 2019, in Saint Mary’s Convent, Notre Dame, Indiana. Sister Irene entered the Congregation from Sacramento, California on July 31, 1943. Her initial profession of vows took place on February 2, 1946.
Please join us in prayer for Sister as we renew our faith in the resurrected Jesus and strengthen our hope that all the departed will be raised to eternal life.
Sister Ann Keating said of herself in 1990 at nearing age 65, “I’m a lioness; if you touch my cubs, I’ll protect them.” Sister had delivered at least 500 infants as a nurse-midwife during her 40-plus years in obstetric nursing at hospitals in California, Utah and New Mexico. Sister Ann died at Saint Mary’s Convent, Notre Dame, Indiana, on July 11, 2019.
Betty Ann Keating grew up in Sacramento, California, always wanting to be a nurse like her mother, Vern Francis Keating, who had died when Betty was a child. Her father, William C. Keating, Sr., was a successful contractor. Betty moved out of their large home to attend Holy Rosary Academy, a girls’ boarding school of the Sisters of the Holy Cross in Woodland, California, 15 miles from Sacramento. Betty entered the Sisters of the Holy Cross in 1943 only under the condition that she would be allowed to pursue her primal vocation of nursing. Her insistence would normally have precluded her acceptance into a vowed life requiring obedience! As Sister M. Rose Angela, she soon learned to temper her tone but never her principles.
Sister trained as a student nurse and graduated from College of Saint Mary-of-the-Wasatch, Salt Lake City, Utah, with a Bachelor of Science in 1949 and was certified as a registered nurse at Holy Cross Hospital in Salt Lake City, Utah. She soon returned to her baptismal name when customs changed after the Second Vatican Council. By 1969, as Sister Ann Keating, she had earned a Master of Science from The University of Utah, also certifying as a nurse-midwife. In 1970, already an experienced head nurse and director of nursing service at Holy Cross-sponsored hospitals in Salt Lake City and Fresno, California, Sister Ann was asked to be on the faculty as an obstetrics instructor at Martin Luther King, Jr. Community Hospital in Watts, California, until 1974. After three years back at Saint Agnes Medical Center in Fresno, Sister Ann’s expertise in midwifery education continued at Los Angeles County/University of Southern California Women’s Hospital (1974-1976), Loma Linda University San Bernardino Campus (1976-1977), the University of San Francisco (1977-1982), and San Francisco General Hospital (1982-1984).
Sister Ann was notoriously camera-shy and shunned attention, but she graciously accepted the 1991 Woman of the Year Award granted by the Fresno, California Committee on the Status of Women. At the time, Sister Ann coordinated Women’s Health Services at Saint Agnes Medical Center in Fresno. Sister also served on the Board of Directors for the Fresno Women’s Network, and chaired a committee to provide opportunities for women to support each other in business, personal and professional growth by networking with one another. Sister Ann remained in Fresno until 2004 when she retired to Saint Catherine by the Sea, Ventura, California. There she pursued her interest in nurturing and became a master gardener in the civic community until 2017 when her ill health brought her to Saint Mary’s Convent, where she died. She said of herself, “I might not have had a child of my own, but I was a mother of many.”
We invite you to donate to the Ministry With the Poor Fund in Sister’s name.
Written by Sister Catherine Osimo, CSC
