We sadly announce the departure for the Mission of Heaven of Sr. Kathleen Appler, Superior General of the Daughters of Charity.
Sr. Kathleen was originally from Utica, New York, United States. Sr. Kathleen joined the Company of the Daughters of Charity in April 1973 in Boston, Massachusetts. She completed 46 years of vocation in April 2019.
Sr. Kathleen served in ministries of education, administration, vocation and formation. She worked in schools in Syracuse, N.Y. (Cathedral School, 1974 to 1975); Bridgeport, Connecticut (St. Ann’s School, 1975 to 1979); Utica, N.Y. (School of Our Lady of Lourdes, 1979 to 1982 and 1985 to 1995); and Wilmington, Del. (St. Peter’s School, 1982 to 1985). She also served at St. John’s Parish Center in Brooklyn, New York, from 1995 to 2000 where she was the Sister Servant from 1997 to 1999. In 2000 Sr. Kathleen was elected Visitatrix of the Northeast Province of the Daughters of Charity, Albany, N.Y. and in June 2009, she was elected as a General Counselor, for a period of six years. Sr. Kathleen served as General Councilor of the 5 provinces of the Daughters of Charity of the United States and of the provinces of Great Britain, Ireland and Australia.
She was named General Superior of the Daughters of Charity on May 23, 2015. And she was named a member of the Congregation for Institutes of Consecrated Life and Societies of Apostolic Life, on July 8, 2019.
Regarding her studies, Sr. Kathleen graduated in 1970 from the Utica Catholic Academy in Utica, N.Y., she earned a Bachelor of Liberal Arts from Maria Regina College in Syracuse, N.Y., in 1975; a BA in English Literature with a Major in Primary Education from Sacred Heart University in Bridgeport, Connecticut, in 1978; a master’s degree in elementary education from the State University of New York at Cortland, Cortland, N.Y., in 1984; and Certification in Spiritual Direction from the Center for Spirituality at Work, Denver, Colorado, in 2006.
Worldwide there are more than 14,000 Daughters of Charity, living and serving in 94 countries. Sr. Kathleen led the community of these sisters, which is divided into 60 provinces and one region.
We offer our condolences and our prayer of solidarity to each of the Daughters of Charity in the world.
This article says that Sister Kathleen entered the Company of the Daughters of Charity in Boston, Massachusetts. She entered in Albany, New York. That is where our Provincial House was and where all of us entered in the mid 1970’s. Sister Kathleen was a Postulant for a few months in Boston, but that is not where she entered the Company – at least not as we Daughters of Charity count our vocation dates.