A memorial Mass for Sister Mary Ann Hilgeman was celebrated Oct. 30 at Nazareth Living Center Chapel in south St. Louis County. Sister Mary Ann died Sept. 28 at Nazareth Living Center. She was 89 years old and a Sister of St. Joseph of Carondelet for 70 years.
Sister Mary Ann was born on March 23, 1934, in St. Louis to Herman Albert and Marie C. (Molumby) Hilgeman. She entered the Sisters of St. Joseph of Carondelet in 1952 and was received into the novitiate in 1953 as Sister Albert Marie. She earned a bachelor’s degree in mathematics from Fontbonne College in St. Louis 1966 and a master’s degree in mathematics from The Catholic University of America in Washington, D.C., in 1971.
Sister Mary Ann was an educator for 35 years. From 1955-61, she taught at the elementary and high school levels in St. Joseph, Missouri, and at Immaculate Conception School and St. Edward School in the Archdiocese of St. Louis.
Sister Mary Ann spent five years at St. Joseph School in West De Pere, Wisconsin, before teaching one year at Little Flower High School in Chicago. She returned to Missouri in 1967, teaching at Valle High School in Ste. Genevieve and at St. Joseph’s Academy in St. Louis until 1985. Sister Mary Ann ministered in family care for one year before returning to Valle High as an administrative assistant until 1991.
She served as a staff member at the Center for Spirituality, located at the St. Joseph Provincial House and, beginning in 1996, served as the director of music at St. Bernadette Parish, a position she held until her retirement in 2006.
Since 2016, Sister Mary Ann resided at Nazareth Living Center where she carried out her ministry of prayer and presence.
She is survived by two brothers, Father James Hilgeman, MM, of Maryknoll, New York, and John Hilgeman of Belleville, Illinois. Sister Mary Ann donated her body to science.
