Sister M. Julia Kovanic, OSF

FEBRUARY 28, 1894 - march 1, 1927

Sister Julia (Angela) Kovanic died on March 1, 1927, in Bethlehem, Pa. She was 33 and in her 13th year of religious life. She endured a great deal of suffering in her life. Few others have experienced as difficult a path  to death and eternal life as our beloved Sister Julia.

Angela was born in Slovakia on February 28, 1894. As a child, she and her parents immigrated to America and settled in Pittsburgh. After some time, she became acquainted with our congregation and asked to be admitted to the candidacy. As only the second postulant received by Mother Louise, she became a candidate at St. Gabriel Convent on January 17, 1914.  She received her religious habit from the hands of late Archbishop Canevin, entering the novitiate on July 23, 1914, and given the religious name Sister Julia. 

In that same year, World War I broke out while Reverend Mother M. Xavier Furgott was in America making visitation. After many difficulties, Mother Xavier at last obtained the necessary permission to return to Europe, but she needed a companion for such a hard and dangerous journey. To accompany her, she chose the novice Sister Julia because no other Sister had a passport.  Reverend Mother had to leave in a hurry to get home through Italy since no one could travel through Germany or France.

Being selected as a companion to Reverend Mother was certainly a great privilege and honor for Sister Julia. Because they traveled through Rome, she was present with Reverend Mother at an audience with the Holy Father, Benedict XV. In her travels, she experienced other joyful occasions and also many difficulties. Finally, after many sufferings, they arrived home in Prague.

Sister Julia was then sent to Slatinany to continue her novitiate. After she pronounced her first holy vows she was sent to Kral, Vinohrady, where she registered for a preparatory course for teaching. It was hoped that she would again return to America as a teacher. But this hope died as she was sent to Slatinany to become a nurse. 

She pronounced her perpetual holy vows on August 24, 1924. Later she was assigned to Kampa, where she cared for blind girls; then to Mnichovice and to the workshop at Ruzencova, where she became the superior. When the new boarding house was opened at Alemanka after the new Motherhouse was built, she was given charge of the first group of boarders.

Sister Julia was a person of unusual gentleness and goodness. She had such a quiet and generous temperament that one Sister remarked, “Sister Julia will die soon because she is a very good person.” While she was taking care of the boarding girls at Alemanka, signs of a terrible sickness became apparent. She experienced intense pain in her hip. 

After several unsuccessful attempts at a cure, she had to undergo a very serious operation. The doctors themselves said that there was no help for her. But the Lord left dear Sister Julia a long span of years to suffer on her bed of pain. She was transported to Slatinany, where she offered her last painful sacrifices to the Lord. Her infirm hip constantly caused her intense pain. 

Sister Julia was truly an “angel.” With her pleasant expression she was an example of patience and resignation to God’s will.  In her last years, she was able to move only her hands and her head. Hoping to make herself useful, if only in a small way, and to bring joy to her superiors, she prepared beautiful buttons from thread, which she displayed on a framed cardboard. She asked that they be sent to Reverend Mother as a small gift and token of her esteem, since she had a great respect and love for her during her entire life. Sister Julia left a legacy of herself as a loving, childlike and obedient Sister.

On March 1, 1927, Sister Julia died peacefully, at last released from her bodily suffering. She was buried on March 3, 1927, in Slatinany Cemetery in the Slovak Republic.