Sister, teacher, missionary: Sister RoseAnn Cappola, SSMN, reflects on 60 years of consecrated life

Sr. Bernadette Cappola, OSC, (at right) came from South Carolina to celebrate 60 years of consecrated life with her twin Sr. RoseAnn Cappola, SSMN at Our Lady of Victory Center, Thursday August 15, 2024. (NTC/Rodger Mallison)

If you ask Sister RoseAnn Cappola what sparked a desire to join the Sisters of St. Mary of Namur 60 years ago, the Lockport, N.Y., native remembers being five years old and hearing the story of a poor French girl who saw a vision of the Blessed Mother.

“My mother sent me and my twin sister to religious education classes on Saturdays and that’s where we learned about St. Bernadette,” recalled Sr. RoseAnn, who grew up with three brothers and a twin sister in a household steeped in Italian traditions.

The unlikely tale of a sickly teenager from an impoverished family meeting the Virgin Mary in a grotto left an impression with the kindergartners.

“When we got home, my sister [baptized NoraJean] told our mother she was going to become a nun and change her name to Bernadette,” Sr. RoseAnn said. “I didn’t do that. I was more interested in the foreign missions.”

After high school graduation, both girls announced plans to enter the convent. NoraJean’s decision didn’t surprise her parents.

“When I told my mother I planned to enter, too, she said I wouldn’t last,” Sr. RoseAnn continued with a chuckle. “Then we had to get our father’s blessing which was the Italian custom.”

But another tradition presented an even greater obstacle. Italian families still arranged marriages for their children and RoseAnn, the elder twin daughter, was expected to marry a neighborhood boy.

“I told my dad I didn’t plan to marry, but it was my grandmother who was more upset,” she said, reliving the moment. “She wanted to see me walk down the aisle on the arm of my father. It was a custom, and I broke it.”

After turning 18, both young women joined the Sisters of St. Mary of Namur in Buffalo, N.Y. NoraJean legally changed her name to Bernadette and later decided to lead a more contemplative life with the Poor Clares religious community in South Carolina.

Sr. RoseAnn, on the other hand, arrived in Fort Worth last December from the order’s U.S. eastern province in Buffalo to begin a yearlong assignment serving her fellow sisters at the OLV Center, bringing 60 years of experience to share with the diocese.

A dream made reality
Eager to make a difference in the world, Sr. RoseAnn’s teaching career began in western New York before moving to her order’s mission near Charleston, South Carolina, where the educator worked with kindergarten and first grade students for 12 years.

p>Her next assignment in the Dominican Republic was the realization of a long-held dream. For the next 30 years, she lived in the island country educating children both academically and in the faith, along with sisters from the Congo, Canada, Brazil, and Rwanda.

“I began teaching religious education in a parish, and then I started a school for kids living in the streets,” the missionary said, reflecting on a project that changed the lives of dozens of youngsters from the barrio. “Four students came back to tell me they went on to college.”

When the school closed, Sr. RoseAnn spent the next 10 years in a remote mountain region where donkeys moved goods and people.

“I worked mostly for the church in religious education trying to find catechists to teach children,” she said. “It was ‘mama catequistas’— women in the church — who taught the kids. On Friday nights, I’d drive a 15-seat bus to take them for training.”

Sr. RoseAnn and other members of the SSMNs left the Dominican Republic in 2019 just before the COVID pandemic.

“It was excellent timing because we would have been isolated at home and some of our sisters were sick,” she explained. “One sister broke her shoulder, and the hospital was two hours away driving on bumpy roads.”

The veteran missionary describes the past 60 years as an adventure with the greatest reward being “teaching about Jesus.”

Young children are so impressionable and “there was just such a love for Jesus,” said Sr. RoseAnn, who often used hands-on teaching methods with children to create enthusiasm for the Gospel message. “One year I got a donkey for Palm Sunday and had the parish priest ride it in front of 500 kids carrying palms. It was really wonderful.”

On another occasion, the religious educator director sewed white robes in a variety of sizes for children in the parish’s first Communion class. The project was inspired by a woman crying outside a Santo Domingo church because her daughter didn’t have a white dress to wear like the other girls in her religion class. She was too embarrassed to attend the first Communion Mass and remained outdoors.

“So together, with the catechists, we made white robes — small, medium, and large. Girls could have their white dresses, but they wore robes over them,” said Sr. RoseAnn, explaining how the uniform look was appreciated by parents and the children. “I met catechists in their 20s who said they never celebrated their first Communion because they didn’t have the [right] clothes.”

Today, instead of traveling to a foreign mission, the educator finds opportunities to serve needy children closer to home. On Mondays, Sr. RoseAnn helps immigrant youngsters from the Congo and Afghanistan get ready for school by teaching them English at Immaculate Heart of Mary Parish in Fort Worth.

Serving others with love and compassion continues to bring unexpected joy into Sr. RoseAnn’s life. Along with Sister Joan Markey, Sister Donna Powers, Sister Jane Conway. and Sister Mary Jean Warmuth, the Buffalo visitor will reflect on her years as an SSMN during a Jubilee Mass celebrated August 15 in the Our Lady of Victory Center chapel.

“As sisters, we just try to follow God’s will,” she said. “It’s all about living like Jesus would want you to.”