Sister Eleanor Kuhl, MM
Born: May 1, 1905
Entered: April 4, 1930
Died: August 11, 1989
On August 11, our Sister Eleanor met her Lord at 3:00 a.m. at Santa Teresita Hospital in Duarte, California.
Eleanor Veronica Kuhl was born in St. Martin, Minnesota on May 1, 1905, the eleventh child of the thirteen children of Matthias and Lucy Dietrich Kuhl. Three remain to mourn her: Elizabeth (now Sister Agatha, OSB), Katherine and Joe.
Eleanor attended local schools, and entered Maryknoll on April 4, 1930; she made her First Profession on January 6, 1933 and pronounced her Final Vows in 1936. Earlier at her formal Reception into the Community she received her religious name, “Sister Marion Cecilia.”
As was usual at the time, the innumerable demands of nurturing the ‘Young Maryknoll’ made it necessary for all hands to do countless jobs, and so it was with Sister and her life for the next six years once she joined her missionary group.
In 1936 came her first overseas assignnent to the Philippines where she would live, study, suffer and minister for the next fifteen years. From 1942 to 1945 she was the guest of the Japanese at Los Banos Internment Camp.
In 1951 she was recalled to the Center to help neet the heavy sewing and housekeeping demands of the “growing Maryknoll” which was opening its doors to greater numbers of those seeking to follow the mission call.
In 1967 she again returned to the Philippines, the latter years being spent in home as well as prison ministry. In 1980 she elected to return to the U.S., naming Monrovia as her choice.
Sister Eleanor liked music and was always faithful at choir rehearsals. She sat in her key seat for special Masses, her strong, true voice lending leverage to those of us who had trouble addressing the notes as intended. One of her favorite pictures was that of “her choir” – the residents of the Baguio jail.
Our concelebrants today are Father Randall Joyce of our Passionist chaplains, and Father Thomas Golden, of Maryknoll.