Sister Marilyn stops to give personal instruction to one of her second-graders. |
When Ursuline Sister Marilyn Mueth came to teach second grade at St. James Catholic School in Millstadt, Ill., Sister Dorothy Helbling, then the superior of the Ursuline Sisters of Belleville, Ill., told her she only intended her to stay three years.
“I’m starting my 18th year,” Sister Marilyn said. That’s been fortunate for the 700 families of the church, the only Catholic parish in the small town near Belleville.
“I keep asking her to stay to teach my youngest, who’s in first grade now,” said Wendy Fischer, a parent of three. “I think having nuns and priests brings religion more to life. It’s important to have her with the kids, she can explain so much. She does so much for the school.”
Sister Marilyn is responsible for preparing her students, and the public school students from the parish, for first Communion. She teaches her second-graders every subject except physical education. She leads both the children’s choir and the parish adult choir, started a liturgical band for students a few years ago, and maintains the school Web site.
“I open the church at 7, she’s usually there already,” said Fr. Marvin Volk, the pastor at St. James the past four years. “I’ve been fortunate to have someone like Marilyn. It’s hard to imagine what it would be like if she weren’t here. Who would fill all those shoes?”
Sister Marilyn leads math class for her second-graders, letting them know they are counting and subtracting by four. |
When the Ursulines of Belleville merged with the Ursulines of Mount Saint Joseph in 2005, Sister Marilyn chose to stay in Millstadt at St. James, where she lives with her mother, Marie, and down the street from her sister. She is the only sister teaching at the school, and believes there should be more of an Ursuline presence in the Belleville area.
“My principal said, ‘I didn’t know every Catholic school didn’t have a sister.’ Everyone wants that sister in second grade teaching sacraments,” Sister Marilyn said. “I can give practical ideas because I’ve taught everything. Ursulines do a good job of living in the middle of people, like Angela intended us to be.”
All four of Eric Guetterman’s children were taught by Sister Marilyn, the oldest of whom is now 20. “All four kids loved having her -- the way she teaches, the way she gets God across,” Guetterman said. “It’s great that she has second grade, for the sacraments. She helps the parents too. I’ve never heard of one kid who didn’t like her.
“I think there should be more sisters to teach,” Guetterman said. “They add a value that regular teachers can’t.”
Greg Rakers said it means a lot to have Sister Marilyn working with the children of the parish.
“My daughter is a sophomore in high school, she told Sister she was the most influential teacher she had,” Rakers said.
Sister Marilyn holds up a flashcard to simulate what three plus seven equals. |
Sister Marilyn’s co-workers at St. James marvel at her energy level and her devotion to her students.
Sue Casto, a 25-year veteran, teaches first grade. “I call her ‘the flying nun.’ She has more energy than anyone I know,” Casto said.
“She keeps us on our toes. She comes up with a lot of liturgical ideas that we wouldn’t have thought of,” Casto said. “She (helps) us with the religious focus, because that’s the focus of her life.”
Sister Marilyn’s presence reminds the staff that everyone needs to focus on service to others, Casto said.
“We’re more than just going to Mass and praying. People in the community notice that,” she said.
“She’s a tough teacher, she expects a lot from the kids, but not more than they can handle.”
Patty Kenetski is the third-grade teacher at St. James, where she’s taught for 28 years.
“Her kids could go right to fourth grade,” Kenetski said. She’s impressed by the way Sister Marilyn “sits back and listens to it all, then comes up with a reasonable, sensible solution to look at the problem.
Sister Marilyn’s fellow teachers are impressed that she never leaves her class, even during recess, when she is full-time roller during kickball. |
“She’s with her kids all day long. She plays kickball with them, eats with them. The rest of us look for that 15-minute recess to get away.”
Sister Marilyn brings religious angles to the yearly theme for the school, and to solve problems, Kenetski said. “People can’t say no to her because she’s a sister.”
Rebecca Chell is the principal at St. James and calls Sister Marilyn the spiritual leader of the staff.
“She helps out with catechist classes, and teaches her peers,” Chell said. “The staff likes having a sister. She’s very good at what she does. The children learn discipline, she eats with them every day, she goes out to recess with them, helps them run and kick,” she said.
“She seldom wears a watch. If she has (her students’) attention, she’s not going to stop just because it’s 10 o’clock,” Chell said. “My first year, my daughter was in her class, and she enjoyed it.”
Sister Marilyn’s classroom on the bottom floor of St. James is wrapped in children’s art work, even though it’s not for art class. “Even my art has another reason,” she said. She disdains the move toward having specialists in the classroom.
“If we don’t learn to integrate, you don’t become a person of integrity,” she tells her students. “Everything we do has an affect on someone.”
She starts her day with math class with far more vim and vigor than her second-graders, but soon she has them out of their seats, singing and jumping to her lesson plan. “Four plus six equals 10,” she sings. “10 minus four equals six and 10 minus six equals four.”
Sister Marilyn joins hands with the members of her student liturgical band as Fr. Marvin Volk leads them in prayer on Aug. 21. The students played later that morning at the opening school Mass. |
In tune
Music is part of Sister Marilyn’s ministry, Chell said. “She brings out the music in the kids. The music fills the church.” There are 116 students kindergarten to eighth grade at St. James, 150 when counting preschoolers.
Her liturgical band members practice at 7 a.m., and enjoy the time with Sister Marilyn. “She helps a lot with music, that makes it a lot easier,” said Grace Fischer, a sixth-grader who plays the keyboard. “I don’t mind the early practice. I’m not late and I don’t have to wait for my brother.”
Morgan Hinkle, a sixth-grader who plays the flute, said, “She keeps us very organized.”
The liturgical band plays with the children’s choir, which sings on the third Sunday of every month. The other Sundays feature the adult choir, a 10-member group that practices on Thursday nights under Sister Marilyn’s tutelage.
“She’s very patient,” said Donna Krausz. “She works with each different section. She’ll work with us until we get it, even if it takes 40 times.”
The choir members obviously enjoy their time together, and with Sister Marilyn. “Our biggest fun is when we make her laugh,” Krausz said.
Students of all ages sing under the direction of Sister Marilyn at the opening school Mass on Aug. 21 at St. James. |
Brenda McManemy, another choir member, said, “Once we hear the song, she tells us the meaning behind it, so we can have the reverence.”
Rachel Besse is a student at Kaskaskia College and sings soprano in the choir. She was taught by Sister Marilyn in the second and eighth grades. “She was good,” Besse said. “I remember doing sign language to ‘Abba Father.’”
Catherine Dixon said the group has fun together because Sister Marilyn isn’t a rigid taskmaster.
“I think we’re meaner to her,” Dixon said with a smile.
A farming life
Sister Marilyn grew up on a farm in the small town of Paderborn, Ill., not far from where she lives now. Mueth is an often mispronounced German name, which rhymes with “teeth.”
“In Paderborn, it was pronounced ‘Meat,’” she said. “Just call me Marilyn.”
Her family was her whole community as a child, Sister Marilyn said. “My two sisters and my mom, we were all in the garden, all mowing grass, all doing laundry,” she said. “My mom didn’t drive, so we always went everywhere with Dad. That was my life.”
Sister Marilyn joins Fr. Marvin Volk, pastor of St. James, and her mother Marie in her living room. |
Four generations of the Mueth family lived on the farm in Paderborn.
“It was my great grandpa’s farm. In the early 1900s he came over from Germany,” Sister Marilyn said. An early business decision set a different course for the family.
“My earliest ancestors owned Laclede’s Landing,” she said, now a prominent St. Louis destination point for dining, entertainment, and tourism. “It wasn’t good for farming, so they sold it.”
Her father, John, was a farmer all his life. Her mother, Marie, remains a homemaker.
After high school, Sister Marilyn began working in an insurance office, but later learned that Gibault High School (in nearby Waterloo, Ill.,) needed a secretary. The principal was Fr. Ed Hustedde, who had taught her two years of high school. “He said, ‘You should be in school,’” she said. When she later got a scholarship, he urged her to go. The two shared a love of education.
After graduating from college, she was a lay teacher for seven years at Immaculate Conception School in another nearby town, Columbia, Ill., where she taught junior high and fourth grade. She was a math teacher, and did musicals.
Sister Marilyn gives instruction to her adult choir, which meets at St. James Parish on Thursday nights. |
“I was the organist, I practiced three hours a day,” she said. “Music keeps coming back to me. I started with the accordion, and still play. I taught myself the guitar.”
Her sisters got married, but she did not think that was her calling. She took a year off and “went convent shopping.”
“I never met an Ursuline until four months before I entered.”
At home with the Ursulines
“I went to the Notre Dame Sisters, but their rule was I had to go to four other convents first,” Sister Marilyn said. The people of her parish in Paderborn asked her to learn sign language for “Abba Father,” because they’d seen Ursuline Sister Dorothy Helbling perform it at King’s House Retreat Center in Belleville. That was her first step toward becoming an Ursuline.
“God gets you where He wants you to go,” Sister Marilyn said. She was 30 years old when she entered the postulancy, and the next year became one of 34 Ursuline Sisters of Belleville. This is her 28th year as a sister.
Joining the Ursulines was hard on her close-knit family.
“When I drove out of the driveway, my dad thought he’d never see me again. That was the experience he had with sisters,” she said. “They tried to talk me out of it. They said this community won’t last.”
Sister Marilyn plays the organ and sings with her adult choir. |
She had worked briefly in a nursing home, and vowed she would never have her parents live in one. “I said, ‘Lord, I’m doing what you want, but you’ve got to take care of my parents so they don’t go to a nursing home,’” she said. “He put me back in with them so I could take care of them. I’m grateful for the job I have here.”
Her father bought the house in Millstadt where she lives 14 years ago and rented it. The family moved there three years ago, then her dad died a year later, in 2007.
Early ministries
During her postulant year in 1980, Sister Marilyn taught second grade at Holy Childhood of Jesus School in Mascoutah, Ill., where Ursulines had taught for many years.
“It was the best year I ever had,” she said. “They were the most exceptional group of kids I ever had.”
Sister Marilyn replaced Sister Mary Ellen Backes in Mascoutah, who left to get her master’s degree in theology. “I don’t think I would have gone to graduate school if she hadn’t been there to take my place in Mascoutah, I would have felt too guilty to leave,” Sister Mary Ellen said. “Marilyn is a hard worker, very conscientious. She has such a gift for teaching.”
Sister Marilyn had her novice year at the motherhouse, then went to Our Lady Queen of Peace in Belleville, where she taught fifth- to eighth-grade religion, played music for the church, and prepared children for the sacraments.
In 1985, she wanted to do retreat work, and spent a year at King’s House in Belleville, run by the Missionary Oblates of Mary Immaculate. In 1986 she became a pastoral associate at St. George Parish in New Baden, Ill., but in 1988 she wanted to get back in the classroom.
This statue in the playground at St. James School was done in honor of Sister Marilyn’s 25th jubilee in 2006. The plaque reads “With gratitude to Sr. Marilyn Mueth, OSU, 25 years of service 2006.” |
“The principal knew me at Holy Childhood of Jesus in Mascoutah,” she said. “I taught junior high social studies and math. After one year, they asked me to take second grade,” she said. “I’ve taught kindergarten to senior citizens, and I can’t say there was a year I didn’t like. I love to teach.”
Walking with Angela
When she has free time, Sister Marilyn likes to walk, do yoga, quilt, embroider, and crochet. “I like to read, especially biographies or some spiritual books.”
The last few years have brought new challenges, with both the loss of the community she joined and her father.
“The merger was painful. It wouldn’t have been as easy for me if not for Sister Michele (Morek, congregational leader),” Sister Marilyn said. “She was the right person at the right time. They say leaders get elected to accomplish certain things. Someone told me Michele was elected to handle the mergers.” In 2008, the Ursuline Sisters of Paola, Kan., became the second community to merge with Mount Saint Joseph.
Sister Marilyn continues to look to the lessons of Ursuline founder Saint Angela Merici to ease her path.
“Angela saw things differently,” Sister Marilyn said. “Angela didn’t look at male/female, widow or single. She looked at people as people -- where they are, what’s the best way for them.”
- By Dan Heckel