Intercom Features

Sunday Dinner with the Glutz Sisters
By S. Mary Bodde

(From left to right) Sisters Alice, Gemma and Jean Ann Glutz enjoy Sunday dinner at the Motherhouse Dining Room. The three sisters live and volunteer at the Sisters of Charity Motherhouse where they come together every week to share a meal and reflect on their week.

Sisters of Charity Gemma, Alice and Jean Ann Glutz, the only three living siblings in the Community, still observe a family tradition. Every Sunday the Sisters, the last of five children – two boys and three girls, enjoy dinner together at the Mount St. Joseph Motherhouse

“On Sundays Mom always went to an early Mass so she could cook dinner,” S. Jean Ann said of their days growing up in Mount Adams (Cincinnati, Ohio), “and we went to the later High Mass. When we came home we all sat down to a hot meal.” Their dad, who owned Glutz Meat Market, died when the girls were 13, 11 and 9.

“Our brother Ray quit school,” S. Alice said, “to take over the meat market, and then he went into the Service. So Mom ran the meat market.”

“Mom’s family owned a shoe store, so she was familiar with sales,” S. Gemma explained, “and the men in the meat packing business were wonderful. One taught her how to keep the books. The men would do the ordering in consultation with her, and she would ‘check up’ (tally all the checks) in the store every evening. For 18 years she managed the meat market while rearing us.”

S. Jean Ann remembered “riding the streetcar downtown and carrying the money to do the banking for the meat market. We were safe in those days,” she said. S. Alice recalled her first ‘paying job’ when she was 6 years old – “5 cents for going to the store for the lady who lived behind the meat market.” She also worked as a sales associate until Sept. 8, 1946, when she, the middle daughter, was the first to enter the Sisters of Charity. After two and one-half years at Ohio National Life Insurance, S. Gemma followed on Feb. 2, 1947; S. Jean Ann entered Sept. 8, 1949, after one year of employment at Western Southern Life Insurance Company.

Elementary education became their primary ministry as Charities – with a few ‘side trips.’

“I joined the convent,” S. Alice said, “because I was sure that’s what God wanted me to do, but I wanted to work with kids – at the orphanage or Fayetteville (the Military Academy.) But my first mission was at El Pomar, Colorado Springs, Colo., scrubbing floors, waiting tables at the retreat house. But just for one year.”

During approximately 40 years in elementary education – in Michigan, Ohio, Colorado and New Mexico – “my favorite was St. Mary’s in Jackson, Mich.,” S. Alice said. “I was there 11 years and the people seemed like family to me.”

For five years she ministered at St. Joseph’s Orphanage. She also was a secretary at Holy Family School in Price Hill for 11 years, and a volunteer pastoral minister at Cincinnati’s Good Samaritan Hospital before coming to the Motherhouse in 2005.

S. Gemma served 32 years in education, three as elementary principal at St. Raphael in Springfield, Ohio. However, it was her first mission at St. Mary’s in Lansing, Mich., that stands out. “You know how your mother always wants to make sure that you are in a good neighborhood? My mother decided to visit me in Lansing my first year on Easter Sunday, and we had a blizzard! She never came to see me again.”

S. Gemma spent four years at Holy Cross in Mount Adams “where I would often see my mother, but she ‘always kept the rules’ (about visiting).” S. Gemma also worked at the orphanage four or five summers where she was in charge of the senior girls, and subbed in Mother Margaret Hall nursing facility for Sister nurses who were on retreat. “I so admired those women,” she added.

Twelve years as a pastoral minister in Ravenna, Ky., and Stanton, Ky., followed teaching. “The parish – first a storefront, then a log cabin, and finally a church – had three missions. Ten Sisters from various communities at these home parishes would get together every so often with the Rev. Lou Lipps, SJ, for a morning Mass, a meal and then confessions and spiritual direction. We had such great support,” she said. “But living alone, as we all did, I missed Community life. When my health began to fail (after pneumonia) I came to the Motherhouse in 1994 – for just a short time, I thought.”

That ‘short time’ turned into six years of volunteering in the Office of Mother Margaret Hall. She also has worked at the MMH reception desk for four and one-half years. “Being present to the Sisters there makes my Motherhouse front desk service so special now, because I see them again as they wait for transportation.”

S. Jean Ann’s first mission, at Sacred Heart School in Denver, Colo., was traumatic. “The school was destroyed by fire and water. I remember eating lunch with the Sisters of Loretto, who were so friendly and didn’t let me take yard duty even though I was young.”

Like her sisters, S. Jean Ann was in elementary education, teaching 38 years both on eastern and western missions. Later for three years she was the hospital receptionist at St. Francis-St. George. Her volunteering at Bayley Place turned into 14 years – 10 in finance where her office had the ‘banker’s window’ for Sisters’ deposits and withdrawals. She also volunteered in the pastoral care department as a Eucharistic Minister. Then she worked “a couple years” in the gift shop.

“I had wanted to come to the Motherhouse for 15 years, but it was always postponed. Living here [since January 2005] has been very enriching for me. The Sisters are very spiritual, good women. I look up to them as a source of inspiration,” she added.

All three Glutz Sisters are currently part of the Motherhouse front desk crew – S. Gemma on Friday mornings; S. Alice, Monday and Wednesday mornings, and Tuesday and Thursday afternoons; and S. Jean Ann, Tuesday and Thursday mornings. Their volunteer service at the Motherhouse keeps them apart much of the week, but their Sunday family dinners give them a chance to come together and to continue a family tradition begun many years ago.

 

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