This reflection was written by Sister Marietta when she celebrated her 60th Jubilee.

I was born at home on February 5, 1930, the last of 10 children born to Mary and Leo Hanus. A family friend, Father Bauer, soon baptized me at home because I was a “blue” baby. Later I was baptized at our Czech speaking parish, Holy Trinity Church in Brainard, Nebraska.

The name “Blazenka” is translated “Beatrice” in English. It means “blessed” or “to be a blessing.”  Although we were given the choice to return to our baptismal names in the late ’60s, I decided to keep “Marietta” since I always wanted the name of Mary and the School Sisters of St. Francis, who taught me for 12 years at St. Mary’s School and Marietta High School in Bellwood, Nebraska, had asked Mother Corona to give me that name. The former Sister Marietta, who had started our high school, died when I was a postulant.

My mother and father and his family emigrated from the Czech Republic in 1907. They got married in Omaha and started the family. Eventually they moved to rural Nebraska, renting farmland. During my lifetime, that was three different farms. We lived very simply. I remember the farms without electricity or running water. Everyday life included gardening, canning, butchering chickens, pigs, and cattle, and selling eggs and cream for the weekly groceries. There were years of drought and Depression, but we were happy.

As my older brothers and sisters married, Sunday visits and family reunions with singing to the music of my brothers playing the accordion and the trumpet were common events. From age five on, I usually ended up entertaining the nieces and nephews. As the years went on, there were 35 of them.

The example of the five sisters in our little country parish inspired me to consider religious life. My parents would have been pleased if I had joined the Czech Notre Dame Sisters in Omaha, closer to home. When they arrived in this country, Dad had done fundraising for them to build a Motherhouse.

When I was a senior in high school, Sister Sidora, our teacher and organist, said to me, “Beatrice, you ought to be a sister.” I didn’t answer. She died of a heart attack that night and our pastor drove to Milwaukee for the funeral with five of us students. Sister Laurentia was with us. We saw the Motherhouse, Sacred Heart Sanitarium, St. Mary’s Hill, Pius XI High School, Alvernia High School and Holy Angels. That experience helped me to decide to be a School Sister of St. Francis.

The pastor recommended that I ask to be a teacher and organist to replace Sister Sidora. During the summer months I walked to the rectory frequently to learn to play some little thing on the piano to help that happen. Because I played a trumpet in the school band, I was able to read music. I did become a teacher/organist.

As a Postulant, I was very homesick and never had visitors. The Novitiate was a little bit of heaven. All of my Alverno College classes were at St. Joseph Convent and I graduated from Alverno at Mercy High School in 1953 with a major in Latin and a minor in mathematics.

After one year of teaching fifth and sixth grades at St. Lawrence  Wisconsin  I was sent to Holly Springs, Mississippi, to teach high school and music. In the summer I went to DePaul University for a master’s degree in Latin. My next mission was St. Patrick High School in Fremont, Nebraska. It was a joy to finally have my family visit me there. Later I was sent to Madonna High School in Aurora, Illinois, to teach Latin. Sister Engratia encouraged me to use the new language lab to learn Spanish. The next summer I taught a first-year Spanish course to a group that had failed the class. At that time, the Omaha Province was beginning and I asked to join it. I loved the four years I spent teaching at Ryan High School in Omaha.

It was a shock when I was asked to come to Milwaukee to train to be a novice director for the Omaha Province. Sister Joanne Wolsfelt from Rockford and I were sent to Marquette University to study theology. There were about 120 first- and second-year Novices then, directed by Sister Mary Dingman. The three of us became life-long friends.

The next shock came in 1966 when I was elected to the Generalate Team. The ’60s were turbulent years with all the changes that were happening in religious life and in the Church. A second term in the Generalate followed, and during those years I got to know the international congregation well: working in Europe for four months and visiting Honduras, Costa Rica, and Guatemala.

After leaving office, I struggled with what seemed to be a call to volunteer my services in Latin America. I was uncertain. I will never forget a dream I had the night before I was leaving for Guatemala. In the midst of a crowd of unknown people, someone said to me, “I will show you how to do a Latin American dance.” I felt the Good Shepherd was guiding me and I had no more doubts.

Sister Maureen McCarthy and I left together for Honduras. After a short time with Sister Maria Rosa, I was asked to go to Juticalpa, Olancho. Sister Ruth Vasen was there alone since Sister Mary Garcia was returning to the United States. The massacres of 1975 had taken a toll on her. I was scared!

After Sister Ruth left, I worked with Sister Benedicta Bonilla. I learned how to do a Latin American dance there, how to do pastoral work in a rural diocese, and how to live in a parish that faced persecution.

That experience prepared me for my next mission: to go to Guatemala and assist in the formation center and do pastoral work in Los Amates. Less than two years later, our Franciscan Italian pastor, Father Tulio Maruzzo, was murdered and we became refugees. Sister Maureen and I stayed in the capital with three Junior sister students. The rest fled to Honduras and then to Mexico.

A year later, it was possible to return and begin again in Guatemala City. For the next 12 years, I was in the central house. I assisted in the formation program, the beginnings of new missions and in financial administration. My last mission in Guatemala was in Coban, Alta Verapaz, as a tutor of the Aspirants who were finishing their high school studies by radio schools and assisting the Spanish-speaking parishioners to form a choir in the Qʼeqchiʼ-speaking parish.

After 20 years in Latin America, I sensed the need to return to the U.S. I worked in the Development Office, working on behalf of the sisters in Latin America. I asked to live at Maryhill Convent since it was important to me to live with sisters who understood my experiences in Latin America. In summary, I have been blessed, and I ask God to make me a blessing for others.

In February 2018, Sister Marietta moved to Our Lady of the Angels where she continued her ministry of being a blessing for others.

Sister Rusbi Aldana: Sister Marietta taught us to pray from the very beginning of our formation. She used to tell us that one way to become silent was by praying short prayers from the heart, or “aspirations.” She explained that these helped quiet the noise in our minds. She encouraged us to repeat them often, even though we would laugh at everything, perhaps because we were so young. For me, this is a teaching I have never forgotten, and it still helps me today when I cannot concentrate. She also taught us to sing and to study the writings of St. Francis, along with many other practical things. She taught everything with patience and with deep love for the community.

Sister Argelina Marroquín: I met Sister Marietta when I entered the convent in 1979, and I remember her as an energetic sister, deeply dedicated to pastoral care, evangelization, and everything related to the liturgy. She introduced us to the choir with such tenderness and enthusiasm. She encouraged us and taught us to share with those most in need, always with her special smile and joy. She was tireless. She lived among us during the most painful years of the internal armed conflict, which led her to be present in the parish where Blessed Father Tulio and Obdulio were martyred. Later, she lived in exile, like thousands of Guatemalans who had to go into hiding in order not to suffer the same fate. She could connect with so many people, parishes, and groups that supported the missions and local houses with resources, friendship, and meaningful connections. These relationships strengthened our missionary work, especially in Guatemala.