McKenna, Sister Evelyn OSF 1940-2014

MCKENNA, KERRIGAN, ALLEN, BYERWALTER, CURRAN, HARKINS

Posted By: Ruth Maring - Volunteer
Date: 11/14/2014 at 19:16:06

Sister Evelyn McKenna, OSF, age 74 of Clinton, passed away Tuesday Oct. 7, 2014 at the Alverno Health Care Facility. A Mass will be celebrated at 11:00 AM Saturday Oct. 11th at The Canticle (841 13th Ave N.); Msgr. Francis Henricksen will officiate. Visitation will be held Friday 4 – 8 PM at the Canticle with the rosary at 4:00 and the wake service at 6:30. Burial will be at St. Irenaeus Calvary Cemetery. Casket bearers will be family, friends, and members of Sisters of St. Francis.

Evelyn Ann McKenna was born April 26, 1940 in Chicago Illinois, the fourth of five children of Daniel and Evelyn (Kerrigan) McKenna. She had one brother, Daniel, and three sisters, Patricia, Denise, and Kathleen. She attended St. Francis de Paula Grade School and Aquinas Dominican High School, Chicago, graduating in 1958.

She entered the Sisters of St. Francis at Mount St. Clare Convent, Clinton on September 8, 1958, and received the name Daniel Mary at her reception on June 15, 1959, later resuming her baptismal name. She made her first profession on August 12, 1961 and her perpetual profession on August 12, 1964. Sisters Kathleen Cleary, Paschal Hocum, Shawn Kelley, Judith McKenna, Dorothy Mae Stolmeier, and the late Mary Ann Phelan were novitiate classmates.

After attending Mount St. Clare College, she completed a bachelor’s degree in education from De Paul University, Chicago, and a master’s degree from Northern Illinois University, DeKalb, Illinois. During the early years of her ministry she taught and served as principal at St. Patrick School, Clinton, Iowa. She also taught at St. Ann, Toluca, Illinois; St. Kieran, Chicago Heights, Illinois; and St. Catherine of Alexandria, Riverside, California.

In 1974, she was appointed admissions counselor at Mount St. Clare College and became the director of admissions two years later. After eight years at Mount St. Clare, she moved to Chicago and continued her work in admissions at St. Xavier’s College. She served there for fifteen years, becoming director of admissions and later Vice President for Enrollment Services. After leaving St. Xavier’s, Sr. Evelyn was an assistant principal at St. Bernadette School, Evergreen Park, where she ministered for five years. Her final years of active ministry were at Little Company of Mary Hospital, where she served as unit secretary in the neonatal intensive care unit and later as Heath Education Associate. She retired to The Canticle in December 2010 and moved to the Alverno in July 2013. She died there on October 7, 2014.

She is survived by her sisters Patricia Allen, Denise Byerwalter, and Kathleen (Dan) Curran, several nieces and nephews, and the Sisters of St. Francis with whom she made her home for 56 years. She was preceded in death by her parents, her brother, Rev. Daniel McKenna, OMI, and her brothers in law Jack Byerwalter and John Allen as well as nieces Karen Byerwalter Harkins and Shannon Curran.