Daughter of Charity Sister Cecilia Van Zandt retires

Intermountain Catholic

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Daughter of Charity Sister Cecilia Van Zandt

SALT LAKE CITY — Daughter of Charity Sister Cecilia Van Zandt will retire June 30 after serving as a religious for 66 years. She took her first vows on Sept. 26, 1945.

Sr. Cecilia was called to Utah in 2005 to assist Daughter of Charity Sister Stella Marie Zahner in the Special Needs Program, which provides scholarships to children from poor families to attend Utah Catholic schools.

After her retirement, Sr. Cecilia will continue to stay at the Saint Olaf Sisters’ Home in Bountiful. She will continue to occasionally assist Sr. Stella Marie in the Special Needs Program, help Daughter of Charity Superior Sister Germaine Sarrazin with community records and fulfill other duties.

"I’ve really enjoyed working here and have had six very happy years in Utah," said Sr. Cecilia. "I have actually worked in the Diocese of Salt Lake City for 12 years. I taught seventh and eighth grade for three years during the 1970s and fifth grade in the 1980s at Saint Olaf School. I was teaching fourth grade in 1990 when I was called to be on our Provincial Council in Los Altos Hills, Calif."

She served as the council’s councillor for education from 1990 to 1999. "We conducted a study on 14 Catholic schools as they related to our charism of serving the poor," Sr. Cecilia said. "The number of sisters was decreasing, and we found that some of the schools we were teaching in would be able to carry on with lay teachers. So during the 1990s, we withdrew from four schools including Saint Olaf School, J.E. Cosgriff Memorial School in Salt Lake City and Notre de Lourdes in Price."

Daughter of Charity Sister Loyola Louapre was the last sister at Cosgriff; when she died of cancer, there was not a sister to replace her. The last two sisters in Price left in 1998; the school itself closed a year later.

When Sr. Cecilia first began her service as a religious, she worked in child care and teaching. She was born in Branson, Mo., and her family moved to her mother’s home town of New Orleans, La., when she was 7 years old. "I lived there until I became a Daughter of Charity," she said. "I attended Saint Stephen Catholic School and a Catholic high school run by the Daughters of Charity. I wanted to be a sister because I saw them working in childcare. I was young when I entered as soon as I graduated from high school, but as I developed my work, I found I was better suited for teaching and became a full-time teacher in 1960."

She received two degrees in U.S. history; a bachelor’s degree from the Sisters of St. Joseph Carondelet in St. Louis, Mo., and a master’s degree from Loyola University of Chicago.

Sr. Cecilia taught the middle grades and junior high. She also taught a year and a half in high school and was a principal in Catholic schools in St. Louis, Mo.; Phoenix, Ariz.; and Ephrata, Wash.

"I taught in seven different Catholic schools, some of them more than once," she said. "I have lived all over the country except in the New England states. As I think about my life, I have friends all over the country because of where I have lived, many of whom still correspond with me. That’s really a blessing. I have had a happy life."

Being a sister has fulfilled a dream for Sr. Cecilia of following the teachings of Saint Vincent de Paul, who founded the Daughters of Charity. In grade school, the sisters taught her about St. Vincent’s great love for the poor, and that is what attracted her.